Shreveport, Louisiana is the home to Moonbot Studios, a 6-old-year multimedia production studio with a knack for creating storytelling magic. Founded by filmmakers William Joyce, Brandon Oldenburg and Lampton Enochs, the company won an Academy Award in 2012 for the whimsical animated short The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore. Currently boasting a staff of 50 artists, producers and support personnel, Moonbot has also produced feature-quality animation for television, games, apps, branded entertainment and a myriad of other mediums. Along the way, it's filled its trophy rack with four Emmys, 12 Clios, 14 Cannes Lions and five Webby Awards.
The company's output covers a wide scope, but its work is unified by engaging, heartfelt storytelling and impeccable execution. One week we may be working on a book and the next week on a film, notes Brandon Oldenburg, Moonbot's Chief Creative Officer. Every project is different, but it all focuses on stories that appeal to the child inside us all.
Moonbot's team of master storytellers is empowered by an impressive array of technology, much of it supplied by GPL Technologies. GPL has outfitted the company with everything from artists' workstations and software to the scalable EMC Isilon storage units that serve as its data hub. GPL also provides technical support and acts as technical advisor, providing Moonbot with recommendations on technology acquisition, pipeline management and other IT issues. GPL have been really smart in figuring out how technology can enable the creative process, rather than drive it, Oldenburg says. Their support on the tech side allows our team to focus on daydreaming up big ideas.
The diversity of Moonbot's work poses a number of technical challenges. The workflow employed on an animated film is different from that used to create an interactive-web video. Moonbot has to be able to adapt quickly to the demands of individual projects. Flexibility is big for us, explains Pipeline Supervisor, Brennan Chapman. We do 3D projects that require big render nodes, but we also do 2D work where they aren't necessary. Render nodes are expensive. If you use them all the time, it makes financial sense to buy them. But for us, GPL's rental option is more prudent. It allows us to avoid spending money on fixed assets that we don't use on every project.
Moonbot can easily add capacity, which gives them the leverage to pursue a wide range of projects. We work on a lot of projects that have short time lines, and we have to be able to add resources quickly, Lampton Enochs, Moonbot CEO says. We are always looking for projects that excite and challenge our creative team. When the right opportunity comes along, we want to be able to say, yes.' A technology partner who can help us do that is gold.
Moonbot's latest project is Taking Flight, a 5-minute animated short, directed by Oldenburg, that it has submitted for Academy Award consideration. For that 4-month project, GPL provided the company with a 36-node render farm that it used to process some 178,000 frames of animation. Using our old nodes, it might have taken as much as four hours to render each frame; the nodes GPL provided reduced that to an hour per frame, Chapman recalls. That shortened the turnaround time for iterations. It also reduced costs as the licensing fee for the rendering software is by the hour. We got a lot more bang for our buck.
The ability to call on technology experts with a deep understanding of animation and the creative process has been invaluable. We were racing to meet our client's deadlines, adds Enochs. We needed to stick to our schedule and meet our goals with no room for error. Without the flexibility built into our pipeline, we wouldn't have finished in time.
There are a lot of IT companies, but only GPL specializes in the technology used in animation and visual effects, notes Chapman. They are not just a tech vendor; they are a company that we can partner with. We can ask them How should we this?' or What should we do moving forward?' That is super helpful to us.
###
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
04/08/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...
04/07/2026
April 7 2026, 19:00 (PDT) Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in...
01/06/2026
January 6 2026, 05:30 (PST) Dolby Sets the New Standard for Premium Entertainment at CES 2026
Throughout the week, Dolby brings to life the latest innovatio...
30/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
30/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
30/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
30/05/2026
Zero in on one that says yes (and no)
Andy Marken May 29, 2026
0 Comments
Hero image courtesy of Deposit Photos
For content creators the most difficu...
29/05/2026
With InfoComm 2026 just weeks away, NDI is giving attendees plenty of reasons to...
29/05/2026
Reaffirming a partnership that has defined Canadian sports broadcasting since 19...
29/05/2026
Mobile/tablet is No. 2 device for watching TV, suggesting that the sports-production industry needs to take another look at the format
Ring Digital's Sprin...
29/05/2026
Berliner Ensemble, one of Berlin's five major theater companies, has expande...
29/05/2026
Solid State Logic will showcase its new compact, fly-away TCA Tour audio product...
29/05/2026
Gerald (Jerry) Pierce, a pioneering technologist who helped shape the digital transformation of the motion picture industry, passed away last month on April 12 ...
29/05/2026
Paramount+ will be the English-language U.S. home for Barclays Women's Super...
29/05/2026
Further strengthening its virtualisation strategy to fully support broadcasters ...
29/05/2026
Swiss broadcaster Canal Alpha has deployed Harmonic's award-winning, software-based XOS Advanced Media Processor to modernize playout operations across cant...
29/05/2026
PTZOptics will showcase a new generation of intelligent video workflows at InfoComm 2026, June 17-19, Las Vegas. Visitors to booth N8227 will see how PTZOptics ...
29/05/2026
Arizona's Family has launched the Arizona's Family Sports (AZFS) streaming app, a new direct-to-consumer destination for live, local sports. The app is ...
29/05/2026
Starting in 2027, DAZN will be the exclusive home of The Canadian Football Leagu...
29/05/2026
Comcast Business has detailed the advanced network infrastructure it has deploye...
29/05/2026
In two-day event, leaders from academia and industry explored solutions to chall...
29/05/2026
The Basketball Tournament (TBT), now entering their 13th year of competition, ha...
29/05/2026
Roku has launched FOX One as a Premium Subscription on The Roku Channel in the U.S. Roku customers can now subscribe to FOX One using their Roku account for liv...
29/05/2026
In its sixth year, the broadcaster's coverage has become a global brand and ...
29/05/2026
Ratings Roundup is a rundown of recent ratings news and is derived from press re...
29/05/2026
The days are getting longer, the temperatures are rising, and playlists are filling up for the season. With summer around the corner, Spotify's global edito...
29/05/2026
New retro-inspired MPC announced
There are few devices that have gained the status held by Akai Pro's MPC range, and in recent years, the company have s...
29/05/2026
Save up to 30 on acclaimed titles
Following a successful launch at Superbooth 2026, Bjooks have revealed that they will be continuing the Kickstarter campa...
29/05/2026
Binaural monitoring application improved
Genelec have just released an update that brings some powerful new features to their HRTF-based binaural headphone ...
29/05/2026
6 June 2026 at SAE Institute, London, UK
IMSTA FESTA 2026 is almost upon us, with some of the biggest names in pro-audio set to descend upon SAE Institute i...
29/05/2026
Gerald (Jerry) Pierce, a pioneering technologist who helped shape the digital transformation of the motion picture industry, died April 12, 2026, at his home in...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
Comparing 5 AI Video Enhancers for Restoring Old Video Quality
Kate Luvis May 29, 2026
0 Comments
Digitizing VHS, MiniDV, and other legacy formats doe...
29/05/2026
Studio Hamburg Builds New Post Pipeline with DaVinci Resolve Studio
Brie Clayton May 29, 2026
0 Comments
Workflow replaces a patchwork of legacy tools...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
At the Intersection of Music and Dance, an Epic Collaboration Boston Conservatory musicians and dancers found creative parallels in their recent performance o...
29/05/2026
May 29 2026, 09:00 (PDT) Dolby and rednote Bring More Immersive Storytelling to...
29/05/2026
Something fundamental has shifted in how people consume media. Audiences aren't abandoning television or radio content; they're just expanding how, wher...
29/05/2026
Youtube exclusive special drops today
Watch now
UKTV today announces another e...
29/05/2026
Back to All News
The Official Trailer of Physical 100 Italy, on Netflix From Se...
29/05/2026
Genelec announces V2.1 for Aural ID binaural headphone monitoring application posted: 29/05/2026
Aural ID 2.1 enhances binaural monitoring for stereo and ...
29/05/2026
At just 20 years old, Sean Melia from Summerhill Co. Meath has been revealed as the winner of Super Garden 2026. Sean is the youngest ever contestant and winner...
Shreveport, Louisiana is the home to Moonbot Studios, a 6-old-year multimedia production studio with a knack for creating storytelling magic. Founded by filmmakers William Joyce, Brandon Oldenburg and Lampton Enochs, the company won an Academy Award in 2012 for the whimsical animated short The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore. Currently boasting a staff of 50 artists, producers and support personnel, Moonbot has also produced feature-quality animation for television, games, apps, branded entertainment and a myriad of other mediums. Along the way, it's filled its trophy rack with four Emmys, 12 Clios, 14 Cannes Lions and five Webby Awards.
