The Nicktoons Film Festival (also known as the Nicktoons Network Animation Festival and the Nickelodeon Animation Festival) was an annual event that was created by producer Fred Seibert and produced for its first three years by his Frederator Studios. The festival featured a selection of animated shorts (10 minutes and under) from around the world. Shorts selected for the festival had the chance to be aired on Nicktoons Network, online and to be showcased at a live event in Los Angeles in October. Several prizes were awarded each year. Animators under 18 years old were eligible to enter the Greater Creator Contest. The 2009 season was the final season of the festival.

Winners

2004 winners

2005 winners

2006 winners

2007 winners

Episodes

Season 1 (The Nicktoons Film Festival 2004)

This featured the original theme song by Bruce W. Kapler from Timbre House Music, Inc.

Season 2 (The NEXTOONS: The Nicktoons Film Festival 2005)

This is the last season to use Bruce W. Kapler's theme song.

Season 3 (The Nicktoons Network Animation Festival 2006)

The 2006 Nicktoons Network Animation Festival aired on Nicktoons Saturday, August 26, 2006– Wednesday, August 30, 2006. Winners were announced on Thursday, August 31, 2006. This season introduced a new theme song.

Season 4 (2007)

Season 5 (2008)

Nicktoons Network Animation Festival: 5th Year Animation Matters

Season 6: Nickelodeon Animation Festival 2009

2009 was the final season of the festival.

Legacy

Frederator Studios has persisted in the tradition of surfacing new talent, characters, and series in several ways, with The Nicktoons Film Festival being the first to present short cartoons recently produced by independent filmmakers around the world. This tradition has continued online with their Channel Frederator network, the world's largest animation network, with over 3000 members who produce and program their own YouTube animation channels. Some of the most notable entries include To a Man with a Big Nose, Bathtime in Clerkenwell, Kiwi!, Kenya and Magical Trevor, the Ape Escape trilogy of shorts, The Naive from Loli Land, Charlie & Chunk, The Mouschist, Prey, Hero: 108, Bert, Engrish Bwudd, Skippy, Monster on the Moon, Pigly, Libraryhead, Over the Moon, Feb-18-05, Timmy's Lessons In Nature, Farm Force, Late Night Comedy, Zoologic, Maestro, Zoya the Zebra, PGi-13, The Tale of How, Loco Melones, Rockfish, Super Scout and Welcome to My Life. Certain shorts featured here were produced by Nelvana, and those were also shown on YTV's Funpak, such as The Not-So-Superheroic Adventures of Sidekick, which spawned Sidekick. To a Man with a Big Nose was selected for the 2006 Fargo Film Festival in addition to being a Nicktoons Film Festival entry, Bathtime in Clerkenwell won three awards in 2004 including one category from Sundance, Kiwi! and both weebl's Kenya and Magical Trevor were considered major internet memes at that time, The Mouschist was created by Courage the Cowardly Dog creator John R. Dilworth, the Ape Escape trilogy of shorts promoted the game series exclusively for Sony's own PlayStation 2 at the time (and had eventually aired its own series on Nicktoons five years later), and the four were precursor shorts—Super Scout, The Naive from Loli Land, Hero: 108 and Welcome to My Life—would eventually become precursor to Nickelodeon's own The Mighty B! and Cartoon Network's Regular Show and Hero: 108, as well as the latter's failed pilot of the same name. Nicktoons Film Festival (or Nicktoons Network Animation Festival) Grand Jury judges included Genndy Tartakovsky (creator of Dexter's Laboratory and Samurai Jack), John Kricfalusi (creator of Ren & Stimpy), voice actor Patrick Warburton, Bill Plympton (filmmaker behind Your Face and Guard Dog), veteran Disney animator Eric Goldberg, Mike Judge (creator of Beavis and Butt-Head and King of the Hill), David X. Cohen (writer, producer and showrunner for Futurama), Don Hertzfeldt (of Rejected fame), Chris Prynoski (founder of Titmouse, Inc.), Seth MacFarlane (creator of Family Guy and American Dad!), comedian and actor Marlon Wayans (in promotion for Thugaboo also on Nicktoons Network) and Steve Oedekerk (creator of Jimmy Neutron and Barnyard). Eric Fogel, who created Celebrity Deathmatch and Glenn Martin DDS for MTV and Nick at Nite, respectively, also created Charlie & Chunk exclusively for the show. Simultaneously, Frederator has produced 250 original short cartoon films with several cartoon shorts "incubators," including (as of 2016): What A Cartoon! (Cartoon Network, 1995), Oh Yeah! Cartoons (Nickelodeon, 1998), The Meth Minute 39 (Channel Frederator, 2008), Random! Cartoons (Nickelodeon/Nicktoons, 2008), Too Cool! Cartoons (Cartoon Hangover, 2012), and ''GO! Cartoons'' (Cartoon Hangover, 2016). These laboratories have spun off notable series like: Dexter's Laboratory, The Powerpuff Girls, Johnny Bravo, Cow & Chicken, Courage the Cowardly Dog, Larry & Steve (which was the basis for Fox's own Family Guy), Kenny and the Chimp (which was the basis for Codename: Kids Next Door), Grim & Evil (which was split into Evil Con Carne and The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy), The Fairly OddParents, My Life as a Teenage Robot, ChalkZone, Nite Fite, Fanboy & Chum Chum, Adventure Time, Bravest Warriors, Rocket Dog, and Bee and PuppyCat.