Torrential rain may have washed away the MTV booth, but not the spirits of Canadian producers and broadcasters who, by most accounts, did brisk business at last month's MIPCOM in Cannes, France.

The theme of the 21st annual TV market was mobile content, but, as usual, what dealmakers cared most about was what was happening on the floor. The dry spots, at least.

Rain took a heavy toll on the Palais des Festivals on day three of the conference, when leaking ceilings and power failures forced a dozen companies, including MTV and Hallmark, to relocate their booths.

But the sun shone on toon- and doc-makers throughout MIPCOM. Nonfiction and animation were in high demand again this year, with Nelvana, Decode Entertainment and the National Film Board all doing major business.

Nelvana found homes for Backyardigans (20 x 30) with Discovery Kids Latin America, and sold Magic School Bus (52 x 30) and Studio B's Being Ian (52 x 30) to that region's Cartoon Network. The Toronto toon giant also announced a deal with Discovery Kids in the U.S. for Grossology (26 x 30), followed by a coproduction deal with Singapore's ST Electronics for a series of direct-to-DVD animated features and three animated series. The first project will be The Future is Wild, a 26 x 30 3D series about time-traveling teens.

Scott Dyer, Nelvana's EVP of production and development, says it was a positive market for most and that he noticed a lot of activity from one territory in particular.

"The German side seems to have come back in a big way," says Dyer. "There was a lot more activity from the German broadcasters... it has been quiet in previous years."

Rink Rat Productions' Mary Sexton met with potential German broadcasting partners for a feature doc she is producing called Accordion Voice, a look at the history of the instrument beyond polka.

"Most people glaze over when you say 'accordion,' except for the Germans," she says. Sexton was also pleased to see more dramas at the market, and fewer reality programs.

The NFB sold a whack of product as well, signing the 4 x 60 doc series Shining Mountains over to Italy's RAI and Spain's TV3, the feature doc The Peacekeepers to Sweden's SDT, and They Chose China, another doc, to History UK and HBO Europe.

Decode sold its Radio Free Roscoe and Planet Sketch - a new 13 x 30 copro with Aardman Entertainment - to ABC Australia and, according to president Steven DeNure, other deals initiated at the market should close soon.

Other highlights include YTV/Treehouse inking a five-year output deal with MTV, giving the Corus-owned youth specialties regional syndication rights to current and new Nickelodeon programs, and a deal with Sesame Workshops for preschoolers Play with Me Sesame, Elmo's World and Global Grover.

CHUM Television sold HD one-offs of its 2005 MuchMusic Video Music Awards and The Essence of Haute Couture to CCTV in China. Frantic Films president Jamie Brown found the market "busy but not booming," adding there was "a buoyancy" among the Canadian contingent, many of whom were showing new programs, not just new cycles of older shows. He says there was also considerable buzz around the repurposing of content for mobile technologies and for distribution via video-on-demand, mail-order video rental and other streams.