France’s Gédéon Programmes and Brazil’s Conspiracao are partnering for a €6 million (US$7.8 million) CGI project recreating the history and construction of Rio de Janeiro (pictured), to tie-in with the city’s 400th anniversary in 2015.

The project, tentatively titled Rio, is backed by Planète+ and Arte and will consist of a 90-minute docudrama and a five-part series, following a similar model to Paris: The Great Saga.

The latter title took two years to make and was produced by Gédéon for Planète+, as part of the broadcaster’s strategy of commissioning a few high profile, event-driven documentaries.

Speaking at Sunny Side of the Doc in La Rochelle yesterday (June 25), Conspiracao’s COO Ricardo Rangel said he hopes to raise as much as €3 million in Brazil, thanks to tax incentives that are available to Brazilian producers as long as they hold 40% of the equity in a production.

Conspiracao used this funding system in the past to fund drama mini-series Rouge Bresil, raising some €2.5 million.

Dassault System, which coproduced Paris: The Great Saga, contributing its CGI and 3D technologies, will also be involved in the Rio project. Arte is on-board for the docudrama, and Planète+ for the series, according to Stéphane Millière, president of Gédéon. Millière added that his firm is also in talks with Asian partners to possibly launch a similar project focused on Beijing.

Paris: The Great Saga, distributed by Terranoa, has so far sold to 25 countries, including CCTV9 in China, N-TV in Germany and Foxtel in Australia.