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ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) -- Attention Shrek, Simba and Nemo. Meet your new computer-generated neighbors: Delgo, Kyla and Sedessa.

They are the product of a small Atlanta-based studio taking on Disney and Pixar with a full-length, animated feature due out in the spring of 2005.

Fathom Studios had been producing e-learning, Web and broadcast projects for several years when it began working on a computer-animated fantasy adventure called "Delgo" in 2000. The studio has not yet released a feature film. But it hopes to capture part of the more than half a billion dollars that animated movies took in at the box office last year, according to the Motion Picture Association.

The world of computer-generated imagery has completely changed how animated movies are created.

There's no longer a need for movie-makers to be physically based in Hollywood. And the artists and animators who once did the sketches and animation art cells have completely new tools. The 3-D modeling, animation and special effects software "Maya," from the veteran software company Alias, is now the tool of choice at Fathom.

"Delgo's" director Jason Maurer says the options of this computer-based project are endless.

"In this type of environment you have absolute control," says Maurer, who started in the business as an illustrator. "I can put my characters anyplace. I can put my cameras anyplace. I can choose any type of lens. I can have a thousand cameras if I want."

In fact, the technology in this field moves so quickly that equipment needed for certain tasks isn't even purchased until just before it will be used.

"We buy machines as we need them so we are always maintaining the fastest hardware possible," says Maurer.

With no track record in the field, Fathom managed to snag an eclectic and multigenerational cast of entertainers to voice the fantasy characters.

Freddie Prinze Jr. is Delgo, Jennifer Love Hewitt is his love interest Princess Kyla and Saturday Night Live's Chris Kattan plays Delgo's goofy sidekick, Filo.

Other stars include Val Kilmer, Michael Clarke Duncan, Anne Bancroft, Lou Gossett Jr., Malcolm McDowell, Eric Idle, Kelly Ripa, Burt Reynolds and Sally Kellerman.

'Every animator is a ham at heart'
While the main characters in the film have many human qualities, there are plenty of creatures born completely from the imaginations of the film's creators.

"The creatures are really interesting and fun from my perspective because I have to figure out how they move ... not like humans, not like creatures on earth, so you have fun with the flexibility," says Warren Grubb, visual effects supervisor.

"We went to the zoo and we took a lot of video of creatures," says Grubb, also known as the studio's "digital handyman." To illustrate the film's fauna, he showed off a "jomou," a roundish animal with feet like an elephant and a body like a snail.

Character animators use everything from mirrors to old movies to pictures of their dogs for inspiration to help bring the the "actors" to life.

Freddie Prinze Jr. will be the voice of the lead character Delgo.

"Every animator is a ham at heart," says Fathom animator Thomas Judd. While working on a particular scene, he often uses a webcam to tape himself performing an exaggerated rendition of the dialogue. He then uses the camera again for a close-up of his own lips to help sync the words to the characters' mouths.

Lighting and special effects add additional layers to the fantasy production.

When the animation is done, lighting supervisor Stephanie Cushing gets the computer files and "virtually" illuminates them. In some ways, she says, it's a lot easier than physically hauling lights and filters to a real-life set. But it also poses its own challenges.

"With real world lighting, like the sun, the light comes in, it bounces and scatters and creates ambient light. But with virtual light, it comes in and stops. We have to understand the physics of light enough to put bounce lights in to get that ambient feel," she adds.

Cushing says it's common to have dozens -- sometimes more than a hundred -- virtual lights in each scene. Another benefit for animation filmmakers is that lights can be placed anywhere.

"You can have lights that don't cast shadows, you can have a light right in front of a character's face," says Cushing, who watches a lot of old black-and-white films and film noir to get lighting ideas.

'The best special effect is one you never see'
This creative business also encompasses a big slice of math and physics.

Animator Ando Tammik has been working on an action scene that involves a character with wings catching and rescuing someone in mid-air.

"One of the most important aspects of animation is to give the character weight to make it believable," says Tammik. "If it just floats around, it's not going to look real, so people won't identify with the character," he said.

Tammik physically lifted weights and did calculations to account for gravity while constructing the scene.

Animated crowd and battle scenes also take advantage of mathematical formulas to make them simpler to create.

"You have to really work with just an insane amount of characters, so there's a lot of technology that goes into creating all of the guys," says technical director John Lytle.

For example, soldiers charging into battle in the film start out as "particles." Hundreds of these simple particles, seen as dots or small triangles on the computer screen, are programmed to seek each other out in the battle scene. These fast and simple dots are later used to help create the logistics and the combat.

"They'll have the same exact attributes by default: the same height, the same speed, everything's the same," says Lytle.

But once their moves are determined, they'll be tweaked to give the scene more realism.

The particles are then assigned different heights, weights, speeds and looks, making it appear as if each combatant had been created individually.

Director Maurer says no matter how elaborate the characters, the lighting or the special effects, it all has to be conveyed to the moviegoer as a seamless, well-written story.

"A good movie should grip you so much that you forget all those things. The best special effect is one you never see."

And Maurer says the same goes for the contribution of the computer to the world of animation.

"Technology is a paintbrush -- it's just making things better," he says.

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