Random

Look what happens when you miss time a scan, opps. But I liked the effect. I think I like the texture of the tissue paper more though as the door to the scanner was open. Tissue paper is used to protect the paint on the back of cells.

Size Chart

Here is a size chart to show how the main characters in Franks Cat relate to each other. This was a simple one for the style guide for the series. There is another one which has a lot more characters on that was used during the making of the show. I will put it up later.

Character Build

So here is another character from the Finnish ad from an earlier post. On the right is the original client character design. In the middle is the flash model. He has a green tie as we did two versions of the advert but both would feature different colours so we used green so the colours could be 'keyed' in after effects. And on the left is the same Flash model blown apart to show you the different levels. Just to illustrate better what I was trying to explain in the earlier post.

Very Old Logo

Here are two of the very first logo's for us when we were A for Animation. I found these two masters which were used for invoices etc. But as this was in the early 80's it was made using Letraset as computers were not widely used as they are now. So simple things like this were skillfully put together by hand transferring individual letters and graphics.

Model sheet

This was the original model sheet for the Playbus titles. If you compare this to an earlier post showing the actual animated cell you can see the design was simplified. This was partly down to necessity but also aesthetics as it would be far too involved to animate to this much detail. Also with the budget and the Schedule limitations. The passengers were also silhouette in the final animation. I think that was to allow for character changes as the series went on without having to have new titles. Did I mention it ran for over 10 years?

Artwork

Here are some random fish.

Artwork

Here is a comparison between character artwork we are give to animate. On the right is a pencil drawing of a character and on the left is the character drawn up in flash. He is all ready for animating with his legs and feet on one level his body on another and his head is also separate. His tie is it's own symbol also so we could easily adjust it as the clients were unsure if it would need to be coloured in later. This was an advert for Finnish TV. There were about 30 characters so I will show you more of them later.

Props

Here is a selection of props from 4 episodes of Franks Cat, you can see the episode numbers that these are from at the bottom left of the picture. Some of the items were made by Keyenta productions who made some of the other episodes in the series.
These are all made in Flash and some items would have more drawings, for example the film camera near the top has a full turn around so when the animators put it in the scene they can put it at different angles than the one shown. I'll illustrate this later.

Artwork

These are the guinea pigs. They have been disturbed from the beach games and frolics with quite a sight!

Play Bus cell

As Joanna got the answer here is the bus, the back and front of the cell from the title sequence that we did many many many many years ago. They used the tittle seq for over 10 years. That's getting your moneys worth that is.
Now I have the theme song in my head!

BG

Here is another background from the title sequence I asked about earlier. Can you tell what it is yet?

Cells

Here are two Jive Bunny cells from a music video we did many years ago. If you notice the note under the bottom one you see it says teeth. This is so the painter knows that all we see in the mouth is teeth, and not inside mouth colour. The top cell would have been obvious to the painter as to what we are seeing.

Logos

Have you looked at our web site recently? It's still under construction but will be full strength soon.

Screen Grab

Here is a screen grab from FinalCutPro. We use that to do animatics. What you can see open on the timeline is an 11 minute episode of Driver Dan's Story Train. The blue clips are storyboard stills and the green clips are sound. There are 11 tracks of sound, 1 is blips and FX guide for the animators, 2 is Dan, 345 and 6 are the kids tracks then the final four are always the characters tracks.

Artwork

Here is a character sheet for sniff. It's main use is to show proportions and scale to the other character and some expression examples.

Artwork

This is Nine pretending to be Lottie. This was for an episode called Film. Nine was actually Lotties stunt double. The stilts are funny.

Character Design

Here is another unused model for Jim Jam and Sunny. The brief was a Kangaroo made out of wood but keeping in the style of the show. I think this is brill but the sequence was dropped in the end. Shame really as he would have worked very well.

unfinished

This is a very old unfinished background. It was from a title sequence that you would have probably seen if you are between the ages of 35 ish and 20 ish, it ran for quite a while. Any ideas?

Storyboard

Here is another rough board page for a pilot we did last year. We had to clean it up for clarity but it's always good to rough it out first so it's easier to change. The whole board for this 11 min pilot was done in just over a week, which isn't ideal but was necessary due to schedule constraints.
I love the way it looks like it's dipped in tea!

A desk shot

Here is a pic of Pauls desk when he was thinking of ideas for the Prince's Rainforest Project. He has made a forest on his tablet. The closer shots are more convincing. I think he was working out possible shots and views. You can also see that he dribbles his tea!

Boo!

These are some character drawings for the Boo! series. These are painted then given to the CG dept to build. There was a foot ball episode and the teams were in no way meant to represent Bristol City and Bristol Rovers, it was a complete coincidence.... guv!

Plug

Driver Dan's Story Train premiers on Cbeebies tomorrow (Sat 9th Jan) at 12:30!
This is what we have been doing for the last year, we are still in production. This is a sneaky image from the show. That is Driver Dan. His train isn't in shot though.

Artwork

Here is a pic to show you how things can change. This is from the Frankenstein's Cat series.
The robot on the left was the initial design for the Depickler, and on the right the updated and used design. The depickler was the product of 3 things been mistakenly thrown into one of Dr Frankenstiens experiments. They were a pickled herring (there is always a pickled herring in each episode), humbugs and another one of Dr Franks experiments the homework detector.

Artwork

Another Rubbish King of the Jumble cell for you on this snowy morning. He totally looks like he is going to do a Madonna 'Hung Up' impression! ...But without the fish nets.

BAA shortlist

And continuing yesterdays theme, the Mackinnon and Saunders series Frankenstein's Cat episode we made called 'Tail of Tails' has also been shortlisted for a BAA, this time in the Best Kids Series category. Will keep you posted when the nominations are announced!

BAA shortlist

This is a still from another short for the Princes' Rainforest Project. A very big congratulations goes to Mr Paul Hill as this was shortlisted for a British Animation Award! We will find out soon if it is nominated. I will keep you posted. And in the meantime you can watch it here

Artwork

Last post of the year, Here is Jeff and Lolly again in keeping with the icy weather.

Merry Christmas and a happy new year to you all.

Artwork

Continuing with the Christmas theme, here is another previous years Christmas card design.

Artwork

We are having our Christmas party today so in honor of that here is a previous invite to a party from a few years ago. Mark is the big boss. Happy Friday everyone.

Christmas card art

I'm feeling festive so here is our Christmas card art from 2007. That's Lolly and Jeff at the bottom. You will be seeing more of them later.

Backgrounds

Here is the finished BG. I believe this background was only used for a few scenes in one episode. So much effort for so little screen time. But there was a lot of time and effort put into this series from both us and the company in France and everyone else who worked hard on the series. We loved Nine and all the villagers.... sniff

Artwork

Here is the cleaned up drawing. It then gets scanned into the computer ready for photoshop. I will put up the finished colour version up tomorrow.

Backgrounds

Here is another Franks Cat Back ground. First off is this, the pencil drawing. The backgrounds are approved firstly by the pencil drawings. Then any amendments required can be done at this stage. Once they are approved they are then cleaned up. I will show the cleaned up version later.

CG Artwork

These are more computer characters made for a small interstitial.

Artwork

This is another cell from Rubbish King of the Jumble. I have flipped the back view of the cell just so its easier to look at and compare with the front. The drawing above the cell was on the animation paper that was with the cell. You always have a bit of paper on the back of the cell to protect the painting. Cell cell cell, just thought I would add the word cell a few more times just to be sure.

Artwork

Here are the initial character ref for Boo! Each episode he is dressed as something that relates to the story. Here is Train Driver Boo, Bubble Boo and Tiger Boo. These are painted on water colour paper then given to the CG dept for building.

Artwork

This is a development drawing for a pilot we did years ago. Poor dead meat!
That's not the title of the pilot! That was just a comment. I can't see anything being commissioned with a title poor dead meat!

Artwork

This is the front and back of one of the Madonna cells from the Rod Steward - Motown Song video. You can watch it here
I did some shameless plugging.

Artwork

These are some bugs used for a short skit for Mr Maker. We did all the animation in that series too.

Artwork

This is another concept character pic showing the stages from rough to computer model.

Backgrounds

Here is the finished background. All colour done in photoshop. In this scene Bigtop is sitting at his desk with the candle lit, hence the lighting.

Artwork

Here is the picture from before but with a clean line ready for colouring. The bed, table and stool are on different levels so animation can be put behind them. You can see the back of the walls continue through the bed where you wouldn't normally see but this is for safety just in case in a later episode the bed or table need to be moved into a different position. It allows flexibility.

Backgrounds

Here is the pencil drawing for a Frankensteins Cat background. This is the reference copy given to the colourists from the BG artist. It is to show how it should all look put together as the BG artist gives all the elements to the colourist separately with a nice clean line ready for colouring. This is also to indicate how the shadows should work by the blue shadeing.
The bed, table, stool, candle and doors are all a separate drawings to allow the animation of the characters to be put behind them or to be replaced by animation of the doors opening for example.

I will post the finished BG soon.

Character Development

Here is some character development work we did. Starting with some rough scetches then some less rough scetches and when the general character is decided it then get's built in 3D. Sounds easy! But it helps when you have some very talented people doing the work. There is another one of these but with a different character I will post soon.

CG Artwork

Here is a picture of some concept work for Jim Jam and Sunny. We did all the animation bits in that series and this was for a little animated section. They ended up not being used in the end. Shame really as they are quite sweet.

Artwork

Here is a picture showing two characters on a cell, the back and front view of the same cell. This is how 2D animation was always done, each frame of movement was an individual painting. Each colour would need to be painted then left to dry then the next colour painted on top then left to dry and so on. But what was the tricky bit was when painting on cell you would work backwards (as the actual painting would be done on the back of the cell) so you would start with the outline then paint on top of that. So click on the picture to see it bigger and have a look at the back of the cell (bottom half of the pic). It's quite interesting.... or is that just me?

Artwork

Here is a bit of concept art. We have been doing some shorts for the Prince's Rainforest Project for You Tube which Paul has directed. He was coming up with an idea to illustrate deforestation and this is one of his preplanning idea scetches. What it shows is the usual pattern that loggers produce whilst ripping up the rainforest. They start clearing a road like path through the trees then start clearing other paths from those paths. You get a pattern that resembles this picture. Have a look on google earth and look at the Rainforest (for example in the Brazil area), you will find an awful lot of these patterns.

Artwork

Here is a picture with some key positions for a character which was traditionally drawn. The posses with the missing mouths would have had lots of different mouth positions on it during the animation. Click on the pic to make it bigger, the quality of line is lovely. Something you dont see much of these days with digital art and digitally drawn lines.

Artwork

Here is an old advert to accompany our website at the time. So now you can make a nice green box if you so wish. We had quite a few scattered around the studio at the time. Oh the hilarity.

Artwork

Here is an old poster, it was also the design of our old website. Lots of boxes on moving conveyor belts. It also pointed out our many mediums as this was shortly after we joined with Elm Road animation so Stop Motion was added to our many skills.