Four Hundred and Seventy-Nine - I Recommend Stopping Losses as Soon as Possible.

As the weather in New York begins to turn colder, the filming progress of the crew is also accelerating. Whether it is the actors standing in front of the stage or the staff working behind the scenes, most of them live in Los Angeles, which is warm all year round. The sudden change of weather , it seems that everyone has increased their concentration on work and wants to leave this uncomfortable place as soon as possible.

Time has entered December, and the crew has been running smoothly. Wayne sees that the filming progress is ahead of schedule every day. After careful calculation, if no major surprises occur, he is confident that everything will be completed before Christmas. Shot material in New York, and then led the team back to Los Angeles in advance.

In fact, Wayne did not block all news from the outside world. When he was concentrating on filming the film, Nina would receive calls from her agent Jimmy from Los Angeles from time to time, reporting the latest news to them at any time.

The crew of "The Matrix" went to Australia for preparations in mid-November, and the latest news is that Zack Snyder has just started filming. This film has a sufficient budget, and the main cast has not changed much. For the time being, it seems that there are no problems that Zack Snyder can't handle.

Wayne's studio accounts for half of the investment in this film. Even if overseas pre-sales have started in advance, Australia's tax rebate amount is quite high. Even so, Greenberg Studio will still spend nearly 6,000 yuan in real money. Ten thousand dollars, so he showed great concern for this film even when he was busy at work.

In addition to Jimmy's side and Warner Bros.'s side paying attention to the crew's updates, Ector Henry, who is on the "Matrix" crew in Australia, will also call at fixed times every week to report on the specific preparations and filming progress.

"Boss, I want to remind you that there is less than 40 million US dollars left in the Greenberg Studio account!"

After a day's work, Wayne just came out of the pull-out room exhausted. Before he could enjoy a hot bath, Nina, who was sitting on the sofa, pushed up her glasses, holding her work record book in her hands, her face expressionless. With an expression, he told a piece of news that made him frown.

"What?"

There was a pause on the way to the bathroom. Wayne turned around and sat across from the assistant lady, tilting his head and looking at her with a puzzled expression. "Are you kidding me? I remember that there were basically no major purchases in my living expenses. The income and share of the first part of "The Matrix", and my first salary share of "The Departed", no Did everything go into the studio account this year? No money?"

Ever since he achieved so-called financial freedom, he has hardly cared much about the composition of his assets, leaving almost everything to the assistant. But he still knew the general figures. He didn't have any large investments or large liabilities, so the cash flow on hand should be astonishingly abundant.

"Of course." Nina shrugged and glanced down at the numbers in the notebook. "The studio account has just transferred the third and final investment of US$30 million to Hacker Studio's third-party guarantee account. Blue Sky Studio recently updated its computer animation system, and will continue to do so in the second half of this year. Approximately $40 million was transferred.”

When she said this, she paused deliberately and emphasized the figure of 40 million US dollars. The extent of the animation studio's cash burn is only now beginning to show. You must know that the studio has no formal feature film projects in progress and is still in the stage of accumulating technology.

It is basically impossible to make any profit by relying on the studio to occasionally take on some small rendering jobs that are outsourced by Hollywood. It is almost sucking the blood of Wayne's cash flow. It is in a slow development stage, and there is no hope for the time being. What does the future hold.

“Let’s talk specifically about Blue Sky Studio.”

Taking out a cigarette and lighting one, Wayne leaned on the sofa and began to doubt whether his decision-making had made an uncontrollable mistake.

Computer-animated feature films are a major trend in the future, he is very sure of this, and Blue Sky Studio, despite being inconspicuous now, wants to enter the scene and share the dividends of computer-animated feature films, this is the last chance.

He is not the world's top programming expert like Gang Leader Qiao. As an ordinary person, his understanding of computer animation is limited to watching computer animation. It is impossible for him to lead a group of people to create a second Pixar. Then there is only one way to acquire and develop Blue Sky Studio while it is still in its infancy.

Nina nodded, took out another document from the briefcase beside her, glanced at him, and said: "The leader in computer animation is Pixar, and the latecomers include DreamWorks Animation Studio and us at For latecomers, all related software and systems must be purchased from Pixar, and some require authorization.

Just like the already successful "Toy Story", Pixar is based on the independently developed computer-aided production system CAPS. This system won the Academy Award for Science and Engineering in its first two years. There is no way. If we want to use the same computer-assisted system, we have to spend a lot of money to buy it from Pixar and a series of related licenses.

It's a pity that what we and DreamWorks Animation Studio have spent a lot of money to get are most likely the technologies of Pixar's first two years. But as long as we want to keep up with the pace of computer animation, these big money must be spent. According to me Analysis: This is just the beginning, and it is impossible to avoid costs in this area in the future. "

Perhaps before 1995, studios regardless of size may have dismissed these, but since "Toy Story" set a new box office record for animated feature films in North America with $192 million, it set a new box office record for animated feature films worldwide with $360 million. After recording this, no ambitious animation studio dares not to follow in Pixar's footsteps.

"Toy Story" is like an animation bomb, allowing movie fans and related people to see the power of computer-animated feature films for the first time. It also awakened many people in the industry, and more and more people started to take a fancy to it. Computer animation has also begun to believe that the future of animated feature films is computer animation, and the decline of hand-drawn animation is inevitable. No one could have imagined that after the decline of Disney's hand-drawn animation, it would immediately become the publisher of Pixar and continue its monopoly in the animation industry. Everyone knows that computer animation is a new big cake, and there is no telling how much capital is watching in the dark.

And Joe, the head of Pixar Animation Studio, also took advantage of the brilliant achievements created by "Toy Story" in 1995, and his net worth jumped to more than one billion US dollars. Therefore, he was once again invited back by the fruit company that was on the verge of bankruptcy. , taking charge of the overall situation.

Some people have already reaped the earliest dividends, and some ambitious animation studios certainly don’t want to miss out on the new round of wealth-making myths of computer-animated feature films. If you want to follow in the footsteps of Pixar's success and copy Pixar's success, you will inevitably have to pay tuition to the other party.

The corner of his mouth twitched slightly. Wayne had actually thought of this outcome from the beginning, but faced with the huge money-burning pit of a computer animation studio, he still felt that his thinking was too simple. "Profitable projects in the hands of Blue Sky Studio..."

"In fact, Blue Sky Studio has never been short of things to do." Nina seemed to know what he was going to ask, so she interrupted his question and said directly: "Since Greenberg Studio's capital injection, their The living environment is much better. This year I produced nine advertising projects and participated in the production of the IBM corporate logo. Unfortunately, these meager incomes are small compared to the large expenditures..."

Although the assistant lady shook her head unconsciously when she said these words, when the same words came to Wayne's ears, it was exactly the opposite view.

It was obvious that he relaxed his tight upper body and slowly leaned into the sofa. "As long as you always have a project in hand and keep exploring for progress, Nina, this is a good thing."

"Boss."

The assistant lady stuffed the relevant documents about Blue Sky Studio back into her bag, and without any change of expression on her face, she spoke seriously and spoke out her well-thought-out suggestions.

"Because of the huge success of "Toy Story", there is now a lot of capital willing to enter the market. I suggest cutting losses as soon as possible. It is too difficult to support a computer animation studio with personal funds in a big pit that requires money."

After receiving the financial statements about Blue Sky Studio, Nina carefully investigated the relevant news. The success of Pixar Animation Studio is based on nearly ten years of hard work and hard work. During this time, Pixar had countless top computer animation talents.

Just thinking about Blue Sky Studio and having to lean on them to suck blood and grow up for many years, Nina felt that the gains outweighed the losses. For the same capital investment, whether it is invested in the stock market or invested in the film project of the boss, the return will be more obvious than if it is invested in an animation studio.

Wayne shook his head in amusement and waved to the assistant. "If this is the case for now, Blue Sky Studio will gradually get better. Do we have other large expenditures?"

As long as it doesn't fall into a stagnant situation, he will never let go of this animation studio easily. Even if he wants to let go and cash out, it is definitely not at this point in time, it is still too early.

"have."

Sighing, Nina was ostensibly in charge of his life and finances. In fact, when she needed to make decisions about funds, she could only give her own carefully analyzed suggestions. How to implement them depends on her boss. decision.

"Jimmy gradually transferred nearly 20 million US dollars from Greenberg Studio, but the direction of the funds was only to acquire film and television rights. And..."

"etc."

Wayne stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray. "I know this part of the funds, you don't need to track it. Tell me directly, will the money left on the account now affect normal operations?"

"Not yet."

Nina knows how fast her boss makes money. The main reason why she reported this today is Blue Sky Studio. After thinking for a while, he added another sentence. "There is nothing that needs to be spent in the near future, but I want to remind you, boss, whether it is "The Lord of the Rings" or "King Kong" in your plan, the money you need to spend is not a fraction."