Greetings from the Weta Team

Hi everyone

We’ll it’s been a busy couple of weeks since we caught up with you last, so we thought we’d try a new format – basically telling you more with less words … or short and sweet as they say! Hope you enjoy …

Cool Kong Workshops

Wellington gallery TheNewDowse will open their Becoming Kong exhibition last weekend, and to celebrate are hosting heaps of cool Kong workshops with Weta crew!

Collectibles now avail in UK

Good news for UK based collectors. We’ve made select Weta Collectibles pieces that were previously unavailable now ready for purchase in our UK warehouse.

Kong Book Sold Out!

We’ve sold out of Weta Publishing’s first publication, The World Of Kong: A Natural History of Skull Island from our three warehouses! If you want one, you will have to check out our other distributors.

Weta Collectibles secret reveal

Weta Collectibles has just revealed a sneaky teaser of what’s to come next … Could they be on the brink of revealing something big? Why yes they are! Can you guess?

Show exclusive revealed

The show exclusive piece for 2007 that will be available at this years San Diego Comic Con is a miniature version of the Weta Originals ManMelter from the Rayguns range, titled, the ‘Manmelter 3600ZX sub-atomic disintegrator pistol – Miniature Version’.

Forum Blitz Announced

In July, Jane and the Dragon concept artists Frank Victoria and Rebekah Tisch will be blitzing the Weta Forums to answer all those question’s you’re dying to know on how the characters from the series came about.

New Zealand and Australian special offer

We’ve given Londoner’s the chance to get their mitts on an exclusive King Kong Weta Collectibles; American’s the offer to purchase a show exclusive and now we’re running a special competition for our local antipodeans!

Pre-ordering opens for second Raygun

You can now pre-order the second of the Weta Original Rayguns, the F.M.O.M. Wave Disrupter Gun! The gun has many articulated parts and as such should only be operated by adults or very clever children.

New concept art

We’ve revealed exclusive concept art from the crew that came up with the Hellgate: London Weta Collectibles, and the designers that worked on early King Kong ideas and Jane and The Dragon concept sketches – check it out!

Weta’s Body Art Sculptures

Weta Bug reveals the sculptures created for the Body Art Awards, and Senior Prosthetics Supervisor Gino Acevedo gives us his thoughts on the competition.

Jane and the Dragon on the big screen

Jane and the Dragon will be showing on the big screen at Wellington kids museum, Capital E in the school holidays, 9-14 July.

Weta’s special dyslexia project

Earlier this year, we were invited to contribute to a very special project, to raise awareness for the New Zealand Dyslexia Foundation, and in May the sculpture was launched to the world …

The making of Superman

Weta Bug interviews Superman Returns Visual Effects Supervisor Mark Stetson and asks him – how did the crew pull off the VFX?

Secret Kids Project!

Weta Bug discovers a very cool kids project the design team are working on, called ‘Champ the Chopper’.

Meet the Crew

Designer Brad Goff loved working with Christian Gossett on The Red Star series, and for WetaHolics, reveals never seen before pix!

Franklin’s Kong Pressie

Weta Co-Director Richard Taylor was raised in Te Hihi, Franklin, a small town of NZ, and donated a special King Kong sculpture to the special town this month…

Lonely Dog exhibition opens in NZ

Weta Bug schmoozes with the Lonely Dog lovers and reports on the official opening party of the Auckland art exhibition…

San Diego Comic Con

The Weta team will be out in force at the San Diego Comic Con in July. And as Comic Con nears, there will be plenty to talk about for you collectors out there… We’ll be revealing more as Comic Con nears, so be sure to book mark www.wetaholics.com for your Weta News, as it happens.

That’s it from the team here at Weta for now.

If you’ve got a friend who you think might enjoy these newsletters, why not forward this along and encourage them to sign up by emailing info@wetanz.co.nz

The Team @ Weta

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Email: info@wetanz.co.nz Website: www.wetanz.com
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Weta Limited, under the brand Weta Originals has revealed its show exclusive piece for 2007, that will be available this years San Diego Comic Con. The piece is a miniature version of the Weta Originals ManMelter from the Rayguns range, titled, the ‘Mini ManMelter’. The Mini ManMelter is a quarter sized replica of its larger brother, the ManMelter. The Mini ManMelter weighs approximately 120 grams (not including packaging), is slightly larger than a matchbox and is priced at $30US. [More]

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Weta Limited will open pre-ordering for the F.M.O.M. Industries Wave Disrupter Gun to their VIP members on Friday 15 June. Pre-ordering for members of the public will open exactly one week later, on Friday 22 June. [More]

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Sideshow Collectibles has just revealed their next Lord of the Rings diorama: Aragorn VS Uruk-hai – The Walls of Helms Deep. This piece looks to be rather large in comparision to the first diorama (Frodo and Gollum – The Crack of Doom), but we’ll have to wait and see! If you didn’t hear about this announcement via email, make sure to join the Sideshow Collectibles newsletter, or, of course, you can just check TORn a lot too! [View Preview]

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Who is the mysterious Dr Grordbort, and what has he got to do with New Zealand’s legendary multi Academy Award® winning Weta Workshop? Well, it seems that Grordbort has reached out from his parallel universe and appointed Weta Limited to manufacture his awesome range of Rayguns.

With names such as the MANMELTER 3600ZX Sub-Atomic Disintegrator Pistol; the F.M.O.M. INDUSTRIES Wave Disrupter Gun, or even the GOLIATHON 83 Infinity Beam Projector, you know that these have been created by a truly warped mind! [More]

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From WETANZ.com: Weta Designer Stephen Crowe returns to the forums to answer as many questions as he can on NZ Thurs 31 May. Here are some of the highlights from last week’s blitz…

Here’s a snippet:

What was your first project with Weta and what was your best?

Stephen: “I was originally brought in to work on the Neon Genesis Evangelion live action movie – which was good fun, and a very steep learning curve for me. The BEST one is probably what I’m working on right now – which of course I can’t talk about!”

How do you find managing the often competing demands of a full work week, extra-hours freelance work, family, socialising and personal projects?

Stephen: “It’s really incredibly difficult to fit it all in, and to say that I’m ‘managing’ these aspects of my life would be grossly unfair to that word!

“Progressing some personal projects is becoming more and more important to me … in particular a graphic novel concept that I’ve been kicking around for a wee while now.. the book takes place somewhere else, or sometime else (is that specific enough?), or probably BOTH, and the main character is a freelancing engineer who is offered a lucrative and attractive contract to go and work on a nearby island that is populated by a mysterious but benevolent race of beings who have largely kept to themselves since their arrival quite some time ago. The engineer ends up becoming involved in a SINISTER PLOT, no less!

“So lots of fun sci-fi design opportunities to keep me happy, and some action/drama to pull it all together. The challenging part will be writing the thing – so maybe a collaboration is in order, as I’ve never written fiction. So utilising my spare half hour per month to it’s fullest, I should be done by about 2047! Keep an eye out…”

Weta Designer Daniel Falconer and a mystery designer also jumped onto the Forums to join in, too!

Congratulations to Weta Forum members Ulrik_fC, hsaunderson, Targos, oldduffer and Arranz, who won a King Kong poster signed by Stephen himself.

Stephen will be hopping on again tomorrow NZ Thurs 31 May (that’s Weds to those of you in North America), so make sure if you haven’t already, you sign up and create an account (free!) to chat to Stephen and the crew.

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