ORLANDO - — Walt Disney Co. on Friday announced a major expansion of its animation operations at Disney-MGM Studios. The move signals a more prominent and permanent role for Central Florida in the company's core business.
The long-awaited expansion, anchored by a new, 200,000-square-foot building and a work force of 400, is meant to accommodate continued rapid growth in Disney's animation work in Orlando. The animation group now includes 360 artists and support personnel, up from 70 when Disney-MGM opened in 1989.
Currently, Orlando animators are racing to complete Mulan - a movie based on a Chinese folk tale - which is set to debut in the summer of 1998. It will be Disney's first major animated film produced entirely by the Central Florida studio.
With the expansion - expected to be completed by the summer of 1998 - Disney officials say local production will rev up to one full-length animated film every two years.
"It really puts the Florida studio on the map in the animation industry," said Ken Dopher, director of operations at the studio. "A lot of people still don't know that we even exist down here."
In response, Disney has been laying the groundwork to diversify and increase its animated film production. Most recently, the company decided to expand its partnership with Pixar Animation Studios, the computer animation startup that created Toy Story. The partners plan to follow that box-office hit with five major films in the next 10 years.
In Central Florida, Disney is building a four-story structure that will have a screening theater, conference rooms and an 800-car parking garage.
The expansion marks a major milestone in the Central Florida studio's evolution. It was created, in part, to work on short films and "featurettes," but local animators went on to play a variety of supporting roles in such blockbuster productions as Aladdin and The Lion King.
To most people, however, the studio is known primarily as a theme-park attraction with a backstage tour that gives visitors a brief glimpse of animators at work.
