Paperman Director John Kahrs to Helm Feature Film for Paramount Animation

Oscar-winning Paperman director John Kahrs left Disney back at the end of August last year, and we now know what for: the animator-turned-director will helm Shedd for Paramount's recently-established animation division!

Paramount's Plan: SpongeBob 2 and Monster Trucks for Release in 2015

Paramount Animation set up shop in the wake of Rango's success and the studio's expired distribution deal with DreamWorks (who are now under the Fox banner). We heard about their plans back in August of last year, but have heard close to squat since. Today, we got details and release dates for their first two projects: SpongeBob SquarePants 2 and Monster Trucks.

Paramount Animation's Slate Fills Up - J.J. Abrams to Direct

Following the commercial and critical success of Rango last year (winning the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature) and the impending loss of the profit generated from distributing DreamWorks' films when the two companies part ways later this year, Paramount decided to go into business for itself and set up its own animation department. It's worked well for Fox, Sony and Universal, with their respective animation divisions, and Paramount is hoping for success for its animated slate - and it's looking promising so far.

So far, all we'd heard about the division is that it was starting off with a sequel to Nickelodeon's successful The Spongebob Squarepants Movie, due in 2014; to be followed by The New Kid, based on the Penny Arcade comic. But today, in addition to lots of new details about these projects, we got some hints at what we can expect from Paramount Animation in the future - which you can read all about after the jump break!