The 2007 edition of the Ottawa International Animation Festival kicks off today, and as always, Ottawa’s artistic director Chris Robinson has pulled together a solid lineup of programs. Sadly I can’t make it this year, but if I were going, here are some of the things I’d be checking out:

• The opening night feature: Persepolis.

• Masterclasses by Joanna Quinn and Tomasz Baginski

• The International Showcase screening which includes the world premiere of the Goofy short How to Hook Up Your Home Theater, the first film to come out of Disney Animation’s new shorts program.

• Panels about advertising in animation and blogging in animation. The blogging panel includes the other half of Cartoon Brew, Jerry Beck.

• A lot of design-oriented programs this year including a four-part UPA retrospective, a tribute to Zagreb Film director Dušan Vukotić, and a program showing animation influenced by New Yorker cartoonist Saul Steinberg.

• The competition screenings are always one of the strongest parts of Ottawa, and this year’s selections are no exception. All of this year’s major shorts are playing up there including Koji Yamamura’s A Country Doctor, Luis Cook’s Pearce Sisters, Chris Lavis and Maciek Szczerbowski’s Madame Tutli-Putli and Don Hertzfeldt’s Everything Will Be OK, but there’s always a lot of pleasant unexpected discoveries at Ottawa as well.