Last year, I did amazingly well with my Annie Awards predictions. This year, I’m not as confident because the playing field is so stranegly different, especially considering the Oscar nominations, so most of my guesses (and those of Peter and Tripp) are simply that: guesses.

ANNIE AWARDS

Best Animated Feature

The Adventures of Tintin (Peter)
A Cat in Paris
Arrugas (Wrinkles)
Arthur Christmas (RU:Tripp)
Cars 2
Chico & Rita
Kung Fu Panda 2 (Wesley)
Puss in Boots
Rango (RU:Wesley / Tripp / RU:Peter)
Rio

Wesley Lovell: While the Oscars will almost assuredly choose Rango, Annie Awards voters are more likely to give its prize to either A) the most nominated film or B) the film created by DreamWorks. And since both of those factors apply to Kung Fu Panda 2, I’m going to go out on a limb and predict it to win.

Peter J. Patrick: I haven’t the faintest clue of who or what will win in any of these categories. This is pure shot-in-the-dark guesswork on my part.

Best Animated Short Subject

Adam and Dog
The Ballad of Nessie
The Girl and the Fox
I Tawt I Taw a Puddy Tat (Peter)
La Luna (RU:Wesley / RU:Peter)
(Notes on) Biology
Paths of Hate
Sunday
Wild Life (Wesley)

Wesley Lovell: I have absolutely no idea on this one, so I went with an Oscar nominee for the win. But, really, it could be any of them.

Best Animated Effects, Animated Feature

The Adventures of Tintin – Kevin Romond (Peter)
Cars 2 – Eric Froemling
Cars 2 – Jon Reisch
Kung Fu Panda 2 – Jason Mayer (Wesley)
Kung Fu Panda 2 – Dave Tidgewell (RU:Wesley)
Puss in Boots – Can Yuksel
Rango – Chase Cooper
Rango – Willi Geiger
Star Wars: The Clone Wars – Joel Aron
Winnie the Pooh – Dan Lund (RU:Peter)

Wesley Lovell: I think the most nominated will win most of the awards, but I’m not sure what achievements each of these individuals is responsible for, so I’ll just pick one randomly for the win.

Best Animated Effects, Live Action Feature

Cowboys & Aliens – Lee Uren (Peter)
Cowboys & Aliens – Gary Wu (RU:Peter)
Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides – Branko Grujcic (Wesley)
Transformers: Dark of the Moon – Florent Andarra (RU:Wesley)

Wesley Lovell: I think Pirates is probably the most interesting visually of these films, which is why I give it my prediction, but since the category is new, it’s hard to know what they are looking for.

Best Character Animation, Animated Feature

Kung Fu Panda 2 – Pierre Perifel (Wesley / Peter)
Kung Fu Panda 2 – Dan Wagner (RU:Wesley / RU:Peter)
Puss in Boots – Olivier Staphylas
Rio – Jeff Gabor
Rio – Patrik Puhala
Winnie the Pooh – Andreas Deja
Winnie the Pooh – Mark Henn

Wesley Lovell: Another case of choosing the most nominated film and, like with Animated Effects, I have selected the winner randomly without knowing for which character the individual nominee was responsible (if either did the work on Shen, I’d say he’ll probably win the award).

Best Character Animation, Live Action Feature

HOP – Andy Arnett (RU:Wesley / RU:Peter)
Paul – Mike Hull
Paul – David Lowry
Rise of the Planet of the Apes – Eric Reynolds (Wesley / Peter)

Wesley Lovell: I don’t really see any other outcome where. Two of the nominated films were terribly reviewed. The other has the benefit of motion-capture animation. However, if the anti-mocap sentiment affects the Annie Awards as well, then this is the category we’ll find out in.

Best Character Design

Arthur Christmas – Peter de Seve (RU:Wesley / Peter)
Cars 2 – Jay Shuster
Puss in Boots – Patrick Mate
Rango – Mark “Crash” McCreery (Wesley / RU:Peter)
Rio – Sergio Pablos

Wesley Lovell: With the most nominated film not available, I’m going with the film that had the most distinct and interesting characters.

Best Directing

Gnomeo & Juliet – Kelly Asbury
Kung Fu Panda 2 – Jennifer Yuh Nelson (Wesley)
Puss in Boots – Chris Miller
Rango – Gore Verbinski (RU:Wesley / Peter)
Rio – Carlos Saldahna
Winnie the Pooh – Don Hall & Stephen Anderson (RU:Peter)

Wesley Lovell: Another victory for most-nominated Kung Fu Panda 2 with name recognition possibly helping Rango.

Best Editing

The Adventures of Tintin – Michael Kahn (Peter)
Cars 2 – Stephen Schaffer
Kung Fu Panda 2 – Clare Knight (Wesley)
Puss in Boots – Eric Dapkewicz
Rango – Craig Wood (RU:Wesley / RU:Peter)

Wesley Lovell: Once again, I go for the most nominated film. See a pattern?

Best Music

The Adventures of Tintin – John Williams (Wesley / Peter)
Puss in Boots – Henry Jackman (RU:Wesley)
Rio – Mikael Mutti, Siedah Garrett, Carlinhos Brown, Sergio Mendes, John Powell
Winnie the Pooh – Zooey Deschannel, Kristen Anderson-Lopez, Henry Jackman, Robert Lopez (RU:Peter)

Wesley Lovell: Who could deny John Williams an award. I doubt the Annie Awards voters will.

Best Production Design

Cars 2 – Harley Jessup (RU:Wesley)
Kung Fu Panda 2 – Raymond Zilbach (Wesley / Peter)
Rio – Tom Cardone, Kyle MacNaughton & Peter Chan
Winnie the Pooh – Paul Felix (RU:Peter)

Wesley Lovell: With those various styles of animation combined into a single film, I don’t see how they could go any other route.

Best Storyboarding

Arthur Christmas – Kris Pearn (Peter)
Cars 2 – Scott Morse
Gnomeo & Juliet – Nelson Yokota
Kung Fu Panda 2 – Philip Craven (RU:Wesley)
Kung Fu Panda 2 – Gary Graham
Puss in Boots – Bob Logan
Rango – David Gosman (Wesley / RU:Peter)
Rango – Josh Hayes
Winnie the Pooh – Jeremy Spears

Wesley Lovell: The most-nominated film doesn’t always win all categories, so this is the one I think Panda is most likely to lose out on, though I could be wrong.

Best Voice Acting

Arthur Christmas – Ashley Jensen as Bryony
Arthur Christmas – Bill Nighy as Grandsanta (RU:Peter)
Gnomeo & Juliet – Jim Cummings as Featherstone
Kung Fu Panda 2 – Gary Oldman as Shen (Wesley / Peter)
Kung Fu Panda 2 – James Hong (RU:Wesley)
Puss in Boots – Zach Galifianakis
Rio – Jemaine Clement as Nigel

Wesley Lovell: They could go for a well known name in animation circles (like Jim Cummings), but Gary Oldman does such a masterful job in Kung Fu Panda 2 that I’d be surprised if he lost.

Best Writing

The Adventures of Tintin – Steve Moffat, Edgar Wright, Joe Cronish (Peter)
Arthur Christmas – Sarah Smith, Peter Baynham (RU:Wesley / RU:Peter)
Gnomeo & Juliet – Andy Riley, Kevin Cecil, Mark Burton, Kathy Greenburg, Emily Cook, Rob Sprackling, John R. Smith, Kelly Asbury, Steve Hamilton
Rango – John Logan, Gore Verbinski and James Byrkit (Wesley)
Winnie the Pooh – Brian Kesinger, Kendelle Hoyer, Don Dougherty, Clio Chang, Don Hall, Stephen Anderson

Wesley Lovell: The genre throwbacks and inventiveness of story in Rango makes it a seemingly perfect fit for this category, but never count out the talented writers from Aardman animation.