KONG is coming is the title of Wired Magazine's King Kong special feature in the October issue. Jonathan Bing details PJ's Wellywood setup and goes deeper into the origins and series of events that led to him making Kong Kong, and our special Production Diaries. Be sure to check out 'Gorilla Filmmaking', an amazing series of photos featuring some of the major players at WETA/Big Primate/3 foot 6 and all the other companies under Peter's banner. Some very familiar faces are seen here, it is a great photo spread and a great article. Check out the photos in our scrapbook, and to read the article go to your local newsstands now or order WIRED online. [Images] [Wired Magazine]

A new flash banner has appeared on the volkswagen site. The site also features a new section on the promotion of the special Touareg model for "Kong". [More]

Michael writes: Monster Zero news features artwork for Universal's DVDs of King Kong vs Godzilla and King Kong Escapes. [More]

Charlie writes: Not sure whether this counts as news, but I was in Toys R Us in Bristol, England on Saturday just gone (the 24th) and found a few KONG toys, including the Venatosaurus, a big pack of bugs which I assume are from the ravine sequence, the Piranhadon and the set I bought, Kong vs Juvenile V-Rex. Kind of cool, really. I scanned in the card back and uploaded it, thought you guys might want to know they're out there in some places now. [More]

The folks from moviefans.de send along this ad for Pepsi featuring King Kong. [More]

From the folks at Film Review: King Kong special Film Review goes ape over Peter Jackson's Upcoming Masterpiece. We talk to just about everyone involved with King Kong including Jack Black, Naomi Watts, Adrien Brody, Andy Serkis, the special effects team, those behind the Kong is King website and of course, the man himself, Mr Peter Jackson. [More]

Chad writes: There’s a 1993 interview from Canada’s CBC with Fay Wray up on their Archives website. She returned to Cardston, Alberta to rededicate a fountain in her honor. She speaks about the legacy of the original film and about her life in the Cardston area. I remember seeing this interview when it aired, but it was nice to see it again. [More]

Kong Spy Gandalf writes: Wellington city is to pay tribute to the local film industry with a towering tripod figure that will be erected on Courtenay Place, just across from the Embassy Theatre - billed as "New Zealand's grandest picture palace" and built in 1924. The tripod was designed and created by Richard Taylor and the designers and technicians at Weta Workshop, funded jointly by the Council and Weta. This brief article with photos comes from the WCC's July newspaper. [More]

Weta Productions, a sister company of Lord of the Rings and King Kong special effects shop Weta Digital, has spent several hundred thousand dollars setting up its own IT infrastructure to create animated TV series Jane and the Dragon. Though not on the scale of Weta Digital's infrastructure of more than 1000 IBM blade servers, Weta Productions has also turned to IBM for its hardware. It has bought 50 blade servers, each configured with two 3GHz Intel processors and 2 gigabytes of memory, 50 IBM workstations and four terabytes of high-speed disk storage, also supplied by IBM. [More]

LOS ANGELES, Sept. 23 /PRNewswire/ -- American Film Institute (AFI) revealed the top 25 film scores of all time in The Big Picture-AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores, a one-night only presentation produced by the Los Angeles Philharmonic Association in cooperation with AFI. A jury of over 500 film artists, composers, musicians, critics and historians selected John Williams' iconic score from the classic film STAR WARS as the most memorable film score of all time. John Williams is additionally noteworthy as the most represented composer on the list with three scores making the top 25.

Max Steiner's score for 1933's King Kong was listed as number 13! [More]

It is time to come together and talk Kong! The chatroom has been a great success, however some people have been popping in at odd hours when there is no one to chat with. To that end we've devised 2 KONG Chat times, a set time and day of the week for all Kong chatters to meet and have fun! Tonight's chat will be at 5:30PM Eastern Standard Time (click here for more info). World times are below, if you need more help click here.

5:30PM (Saturday) EST in New York, Montreal
2:30PM (Saturday) PST in Los Angeles, Seattle
11:30PM (Saturday) (Central European Time)
7:30AM (Sunday) in Sydney
9:30AM (Sunday) in Auckland, Wellington

With 12 weeks to go the color grading department is working full tilt on getting the right 'look' of the film. Color grading, used almost throughout 'Lord of the Rings' is an interesting process, we get to see some great examples of how it works on a few scenes with Naomi Watts, Colin Hanks & Adrien Brody. On the pure fanboy side of things we get to see some great (if small) shots from the film! Skull Island, New York, the Venture and more! Take a look! [QT6 240x132px 7Mb] [QT4 320x176px 14Mb] [QT6 480x264px 17Mb] [Bit Torrents!]

Email us your questions and PJ may answer them in a future Post Production Diary!

Like what you see? Discuss it in our Chat Room! [Click Here] Or the Message Boards? [Click Here]

There might be a rumble in the jungle when King Kong discovers his polystyrene film set has been converted into insulation tiles, but hopefully the giant ape won't wreak his revenge on Masterton. Michael Blundell, Carterton councillor and chairman of Waste Management Wairarapa, proved he practises what he preaches when he invested in 10cm3 of recycled tiles to insulate the floor of his Masterton home. The tiles were supplied by Poly Palace, an innovative Porirua-based business that converts polystyrene into underfloor insulation. [More]

Gandalf writes: A nice day for a stroll round the bays in Wellington today, so I grabbed my camera and did just that. We've seen pics of the Venture before, but I thought the folks at KiKn might like a closer look at some of the weathering and detail on the vessel. This set of photos gets you right up close... check out that rust! [More]

Kong Spy John sends along these scans from the latest issue of Empire Magazine featuring an article on Naomi Watts. [More]

Straford plumber Wayne Lobb, who makes animals from old copper hot water cylinders, is trying to lure film maker Peter Jackson to the town. The bait is his latest creation, a 1.8m-high replica of King Kong. Kong will be a highlight of Stratford Art Society's members' exhibition which opens in the Percy Thomson Gallery on Saturday. The price on King Kong's head is a "very negotiable" $40,000. "I'm not prepared to give him away. If Peter wanted it for his memorabilia collection, I'd certainly be prepared to talk business with him," Mr Lobb said. [More]

It is a silent tribute to the beauty who screamed her way to fame in the clutches of a giant gorilla in love, created by a fan who collected stacks of movie memorabilia. A permanent exhibit featuring "King Kong" movie posters and photographs of the film's star, Fay Wray, is on display on the ground floor of the Empire State Building - a place that the actress once wrote "belongs to me, or is it vice versa?" Miss Wray, who stood atop the building for the last time several months before she died at 96 in 2004, appeared in about 100 movies. But she was remembered best for screeching and writhing in the powerful grip of King Kong in 1933. [More]

It is time to come together and talk Kong! The chatroom has been a great success, however some people have been popping in at odd hours when there is no one to chat with. To that end I've devised a KONG Chat time, a set time and day of the week for all Kong chatters to meet and have fun! The bi-weekly Kong Chats will be Thursday nights at 8:30PM Eastern Standard Time (a new Saturday chat has been added click here for more info). World times are below, if you need more help click here. [Kong Java Chat Room] [irc chat settings: SERVER www.theonering.net ROOM: #kongisking.net]

8:30PM (Thursday) EST in New York, Montreal
5:30PM (Thursday) PST in Los Angeles, Seattle
1:30AM (Friday) in GMT (UK)
2:30AM (Friday) (Central European Time)
10:30AM (Friday) in Sydney, Australia
12:30PM (Friday) in Auckland, Wellington, New Zealand

DreamWorks Animation is developing Kung Fu Panda, an animated film featuring the voice of Jack Black, which is set for 2008, Variety reported. The film will be influenced by cartoonish live-action movies like Kung Fu Hustle and will star Black as the voice of a lazy panda prophesied to save the Valley of Peace, the trade paper reported. [More]

8thWonder writes: Kong: The Animated Series returns to television Friday (September 23rd). The series 'premieres' on Toon Disney, Disney's animated-only channel, this coming Friday night at 8:30pm EST and airs untill 9:30pm. The hour long premiere appears to be the first two episodes making up a two part story, 'The Return'. [Toon Disney]

LONDON (AFX) - BKN International AG, the Frankfurt and London-listed global animation company, announced it has begun development on a sequel to its franchise King Kong animation entitled Kong II-Return to the Jungle and secured a deal with UTV Software Communications Ltd, a listed company in India to produce state of the art computer graphic images. The company said the 80-minute 3D animated film will be ready in time for MIPCOM in October with production scheduled to start in November and will be produced in part by UTV in Mumbai, India, with much of the creative work performed and managed by BKN from London. [More]

Bob writes: Universal is going to release the Toho (Japanese) King Kong films; KING KONG VS GODZILLA(1962) and KING KONG ESCAPES(1967) on November 29th. BenBella Books will release on November 29th, the SmartPop book KING KONG IS BACK which contains essays by luminaries from the SF/Fantasy genre. [More]

LOS ANGELES, Sept. 20 /PRNewswire/ -- The American Society of Cinematographers (ASC) announced today that Richard H. Kline, ASC will receive their prestigious ASC Lifetime Achievement Award. The award is presented annually to an individual who has made exceptional and enduring contributions to advancing the art of filmmaking. Kline will be feted during the 20th Annual ASC Outstanding Achievement Awards on February 26, 2006, at the Century Plaza Hotel. Kline earned Oscar nominations for CAMELOT in 1968 and for KING KONG in 1977. [More]