The project is necessary to boost the awareness of the availability of 3D animation talents in Malaysia, absolutely no doubt about it. It’s the right and necessary thing to do.

The Saladin trailer has proven that we do have what it takes to achieve a certain level of quality that is better than what Singapore and others in the region has to offer.

BUUUUTTTTTT…

1. The execution was extremely poor in terms of financial management.

2. The subject matter is a poor choice.

3. The techniques used in the trailer are nothing to shout about.

Here’s what I think. First let us refer to this article. http://www.msc.com.my/today/default.asp?sec=B&id=76&link=fulltext

“While the trailer is impressive by global standards, two years is a long time to produce a six-minute trailer. The production and audio work was done by Silver Ant Sdn Bhd and Imaginex Studios Sdn Bhd, not by MDeC’s internal project team. Silver Ant spent three months creating the animation while Imaginex spent two weeks creating the sound effects. In this case, how did the Saladin project team add value to the only tangible output that resulted from an idea conceived six years ago?
“To put it in simple terms, MDeC’s role was to do all the pre-production work, while the actual production was outsourced to Silver Ant. For the last two to three years, we worked on the groundwork and fundamentals such as character and script development. It would be difficult for Silver Ant to come up with the trailer without the background information that we provided. Basically, we gave Silver Ant three pages of script to work with to come up with the trailer,” Juhaidah points out.”

Pay attention to these sentences from above.

1) Silver Ant spent three months
2) Imaginex spent two weeks
3) we gave Silver Ant three pages of script

In another paragraph we see this “Imaginex, meanwhile, provided the audio for the trailer for free because it wanted to do it.”

ImagineX did not get paid, they did the work for free, so they use no cut of the rm 20 million ringgit funds.

Silver-ant did 3 months of work. Let’s say they got the project for Rm 5 million. That’s a very huge margin for 3 months work.

We deduct 1 million ringgit again for the foreign scriptwriter, so we’re left with 14 million ringgit of balance to account for.

MDC spent 4 years deciding whether to make a movie or TV series.
Do we really need to take 4 years to decide whether to make a movie or a TV series ?

“The plan to produce Saladin was first announced in 2000, but the actual production planning only started in May 2004. The first four years were spent debating if we should produce a feature film or TV series.”

There’s absolutely nothing else that could justify what happened to the 14 million ringgit left. Even research into the topic, sketches and design need not take up that much, because I sincerely believe the people who are actually doing the actual preproduction work for the trailer do not cost that much salary to eat up 14 million ringgit just like that.

This Saladin movie is not even a full movie, but it’s already used up 20 million ringgit and produced only 6 minutes of trailer. I shiver at the way the money is being managed.

Furthermore, they’re asking for more money in part of the 9th Malaysian plan to complete the series.

We have not even SEEN the budget for the marketing. We all know marketing budgets are huge, because a movie/tv series is not just budgeting to finish it, but also budgeting to market/sell it.

On point 2, the subject matter..

An interesting quote from lowyat.net forum:

“From the trailer you can see very clear that the Christians crusaders will be the villian (even though historically this is quite true) in the series. Do you think kids in US, Europe, Japan, Korea or China will want to watch a animated series based on a Muslim king during the crusades. Do you think we can only depend on the Middle East market only?”

Even Kingdom of Heaven, a movie which I thoroughly enjoyed, is a flop at the box office. What makes these guys think they can do better with an overbudgetted 3D animated movie ? I don’t think they will break even.

On point 3.

I can pretty much guess what sort of plugins/techniques you use for the 3D animation, from particles, volumetrics, soft/hardbody dynamics, cloth etc. Many tools are available to ease the animations that’s why they can finish this thing in 3 months.

I don’t quite like the dead pan faces. If you pay attention, the characters are lifeless, and we haven’t seen the facial expressions that one could compare to even the simplest of TV CG animation in usa.

Animation is too ‘fluid’, the motions are not ‘natural’. There’re not much texturing done for the characters, but I think they used some sort of pastel like shader to get that slightly cell look. I would say you could do all of those things in the trailer using either 3dsmax or lightwave. I don’t think software costs are a major factor. You can recycle many of the human character cage body to produce other characters.

Water dynamics are easy, there’s always realflow and realwave available.
Fire/smoke , use particles and volumetrics. The crowd control is impressive, but there’re plugins available or you scan script a program to help do that using Lscript,MelScript or MaxScript. I am not sure if they have any decent scripters in the company or anyone with competent mastery of computer graphics algorithms/math to write custom plugins. You’ll need that kind of staff/skill to compete with Pixar and the likes of em including Dreamworks.

They’re not rendering film resolutions, so TV resolution at 720×576 pal 25 fps or 50 fields interlaced can cut down rendering time, and you don’t even need to render everything together, can use layer rendering methods and then composite with combustion or afterfx.

Just my humble view lah ok. The trailer is impressive, but I think you don’t need that kind of money to achieve it, and I think generally there’re Malaysians who can do it cheaper and as well or better using cheaper 3D software such as Lightwave, 3dsmax, instead of Maya.

I don’t even think we need high end hardware for all these. Let’s put a PC cost at 3,000 ringgit along with 256 megs nvidia geforce card, if multiply by 20 also it’s only about 60k. I give it 200k for the hardware including a mini renderfarm. It’s not that much cost, so MDC cannot run away using hardware/equipment costs as excuse.

Puteri Gunung Ledang movie budget is 15 million ringgit for the entire movie along with star-studded casts, do not cost as much as 20 million ringgit 6 minute trailer that’s not even a simple 25 minutes pilot TV episode.

MDC/MDec has a lot of explaining to do to the people. There is no excuse for wastage/abuse of funds even though you want to build an industry.

http://www.mmail.com.my/Current_News/MM/Thursday/National/20060420102319/Article/index_html

A SIX-minute trailer costing RM20 million?

Rakan BH

This is the amount spent by the Creative Application Development Centre to develop a trailer for the film, Saladin. The centre is under the Multimedia Development Corporation (MDeC).

The stunning disclosure on the animated movie came from DAP Seputeh member Teresa Kok who told the House that the money on the project was spent over a six-year period, begining 2000.

“Even more galling was that the pre-production script was written by a foreigner. A million (ringgit) was paid to the American script writer. Officials from MDeC also used the excuse of having to liase with the American director to travel to the US regularly.�

However, after six years of plodding, the MDeC failed to produce the movie.

“The right to produce the movie has been given to Silver Ant Sdn Bhd and Imaginex Studios Sdn Bhd,� said Kok.

“The film has been turned into a television serial. Now, MDeC is asking for more funds under the 9th Malaysia Plan for this project. Is this not a waste of public funds, and indirect corruption?� she thundered.�

————————————————————————–

http://teresakok.blogsome.com/2006/04/19/my-10-minutes-speech-on-9th-malaysian-plan/#more-151

Filem Saladin

Datuk yang diPertua, saya ingin minta Kementerian Sains, Teknologi dan Innovasi memberitahu kepada dewan yang mulia ini tentang projek filem Saladin. Kononnya filem itu telah memakan perbelanjaan sebanyak RM20 juta, tetapi pihak berkenaan hanya mampu menggunakan wang yang begitu banyak untuk mengeluarkan filem “Trailer� yang selama enam minit sahaja.

Filem Saladin merupakan tugas asas Creative Application Development Centre (CAD-C) di MDeC untuk melangkahi masuk ke industri animasi antarabangsa dengan menggunakan bakat tempatan, tetapi anehnya kononnya CAD-C membayar US $ 1 juta kepada seorang pengarang skrip Hollywood dan bukannya penulis skrip tempatan untuk menulis skrip pre-penerbitan, mengikut sumber dalam industri filem, kosnya adalah jauh lebih rendah daripada angka ini. Selain itu, pegawai MDeC juga menggunakan alasan ini untuk berulang-alik ke Amerika Syarikat sejak tahun 2000 dan ia telah memakan perbelanjaan yang amat tinggi manakala tiada apa-apa audit dijalankan terhadap projek “out-sourcing� ini.
MDeC membina Creative Multimedia Lab dengan kos RM5.2 juta atas alasan untuk menggunakan peralatan yang canggih dan mahal untuk mengeluarkan Saladin, tetapi sebaliknya Creative Multimedia Lab ini hanya mampu mengeluarkan filem trailer selama enam minit sahaja selepas ia dirancang selama enam tahun, akhirnya, filem ini diberi kepada syarikat swasta iaitu Silver Ant Sdn. Bhd. and Imaginex Studios Sdn. Bhd untuk menjalankan penerbitan, dan Majalah “The Edge� yang bertarikh 17 April 2006 melaporkan bahawa “Silver Ant membuat animasi itu dalam masa tiga bulan manakala Imaginex membuat suara-bunyian (sound effects) dalam masa dua minggu.

Sekarang, filem Saladin telah ditukar menjadi siri filem TV, MDeC ingin minta peruntukan dana lagi bagi projek ini dalam RMK9. MDeC sebenarnya satu agensi kerajaan “one-stop� yang ditugaskan untuk membantu kemajuan sektor ICT di Malaysia. Kenapakah agensi ini membelanjakan wang yang begitu banyak untuk memasuki bidang penerbitan filem secara langsung dan bukannya menggubalkan dasar dan memberi insentif untuk menggalakkan syarikat swasta menceburkan diri dalam bidang penerbitan file mini? Bukankah tindakan MDeC ini merupakan penyalahangunaan wang rakyat dan korupsi secara tidak langsung?

http://teresakok.blogsome.com/2006/04/26/press-statement-by-yb-teresa-kok-mp-for-seputeh-on-26th-april-2006-at-kuala-lumpur/

Saladin: RM20 million for 6 minutes trailer?

Press Statement By YB Teresa Kok, MP For Seputeh On 26th April 2006 At Kuala Lumpur

Jarmaluddin Jarjis Did Not Give A Satisfactory Reply To My Series of Questions On “Why The Saladin Project Took 6 Years To Produce A 6- Minute Trailer?�

I am not satisfied with the reply given by YB Dato’ Seri Jamaluddin Jarjis, Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation on my queries over why it took 6 years for Multimedia Development Corporation (MDeC) to produce a 6- minute trailer (http://www.saladin.tv/) ?

Jamaluddin Jarjis gave me a short reply due to the limitation of time in the Dewan Rakyat, and he said the trailer of Saladin only costs RM400,000 only and not RM20 million as pointed by me..

My reply to him was, the RM20 million that I mentioned in my speech earlier include:

The RM 5.2 million state-of-the-art Creative Application Development Centre (CAD-C) opened in 2004;
Overheads of Creative Application Development Centre (CAD-C) since its inception;
An alleged payment of US $ 1 million (RM 3.8 million then) to a Hollywood script writer for pre-production script that industry insiders claimed should cost less than the amount;
Multiply trips to United States by MDeC officials since 2000;
A number of outsourcing jobs with expensive price tag were awarded. No result was produced and no project audit was ever conducted.

My argument is, Saladin is not a personal project of a philanthropist, but it is entirely a government investment and therefore the Dewan Rakyat needs to be informed how the money has being spent in the past 6 years.

Background of Saladin Project

Saladin was initially planned as a feature film when it was first announced in 2000. It is now planned as a 13-part series. The series is based on the epic story of the 12th century Kurdish warrior, Saladin (1137 or 1138–1193), who founded the Ayyubid dynasty of Egypt and Syria and fought against the Crusaders. It is not uncommon for modern Muslim rulers seeking to capitalize on the reputation of Saladin.

To produce Saladin has become the core duty of MDeC’s Creative Application Development Centre (CAD-C) with the ultimate aim of launching Malaysia into the lucrative international animation industry.

One of CAD-C’s objectives is to create and increase the pool of local talent in the animation industry and increase their expertise to that of world-class standards. The strategy is as such: the government will be the sole investor in the production of Saladin and in the course of so doing, build capacity in the local participants.

At one point, it was also planned as MDeC’s tribute to the former Prime Minister and MSC’s mentor Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad at his retirement. Two and half years since we have a new Prime Minister, Saladin is no where to be seen except in the form of a six-minute trailer. Even then, the trailer is outsourced to two companies, i.e. Silver Ant Sdn Bhd and Imaginex Sdn Bhd.

My questions are as follow:

Why outsource?

MDeC constructed its RM 5.2 million CAD-C under the pretext of using this advanced and expensive facility to produce Saladin, which is in turn touted as the platform to launch Malaysia into the lucrative industry.

But the actual production of the six-minute trailer after six years of “planning� was outsourced to Silver Ant Sdn. Bhd. and Imaginex Studios Sdn. Bhd. The Edge (17/4/2006) reported that “Silver Ant spent three months creating the animation while Imaginex spent two weeks creating the sound effects.� According to the producer of Saladin, Silver Ant Sdn. Bhd. was given “three pages of script to work with to come up with the trailer.�

In fact, judged by the Request for Proposal to produce the Saladin series, all production will be done outside MDeC’s innovation centre. This raises question as to why the CAD-C was built in the first place.

Why Hire Hollywood Scriptwriter

It was openly claimed by MDeC officers that MDeC has commissioned a Hollywood script writer to work on the project. If so, why can’t MDeC commission a local writer to work on the project if the project was indeed used as a pioneer project to spearhead local creative content industry?

Also, claims were made that the said writer was paid US$ 1 million for the work, is that true? According to producers in the know, US$ 1 million is considered astronomical, can someone justify the expenditure? What was the selection process and why was he selected? Why didn’t we have local writers understudy the Hollywood writer?

Further, as the pre-production script was written for the originally proposed feature film, how much is it applicable to the now 13-part series?

Why Foreign Film Director?

CAD-C hires a foreign director with monthly salary of RM25,000 to direct the Saladin TV series. What happened to the original intent of MDeC to build capacity and to groom local talent?

4.Why Should MDeC Involve in Saladin Project?

MDeC is a one-stop agency tasked to promote the development of ICT sector in Malaysia. It must explain why by directly sinking money into making a film or series is a decision from the top than to groom private firms through the right kind of sector-wide incentives and policy framework.

MDeC and CAD-C supposed to be a catalyst of growth or a government agency that encourage local talents to involve in film and multimedia industry, it should not have got involved into it by designing the films and invested money into it. These are the jobs of the contractors and not MDeC.

I urge the Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation and the ACA to investigate whether there is any misconduct in the Saladin project since its conception in year 2000 and to prevent greater wastage and abuses.

Teresa Kok

Call the ACA! Something is wrong with the management of the creative multimedia MDec! As they say, all shit happens is due to greed! Just change the whole management!

brilliant piece of work, i appreciate all of the team. My best wishes r with u ppl. and plz let me knw when it will release. Where from i get it? Carry on ur work with full of dedication. My prayers r with u ppl.