sentences:  From there, what had begun as a simple software demo for Morimoto rapidly escalated to a full-fledged all-CG feature-film project, helmed by Morimoto, with computer graphics efforts directed by Arias himself.Though the completed 4-minute went on to take an Outstanding Performance award for Non-Interactive Digital Art at the Japan Media Arts Festival and be featured in the SIGGRAPH 2000 Animation Theater', the project was abandoned shortly thereafter for lack of funding and director Morimoto's flagging interest in "Tekkonkinkreet".Then, in 2000, while still under contract to Softimage, Michael accepted an invitation from Joel Silver and Lilly and Lana Wachowski (the Wachowskis) to produce Warner Bros’ "Matrix"-inspired animation anthology "The Animatrix", a project that consumed him for over three years.