Everything about Aardman Animations totally explained
Aardman Animations, Ltd., also known as
Aardman Studios, is an
Academy Award winning
British animation studio based in
Bristol,
United Kingdom. Aardman is famous for its
clay animation/
stop-motion animation productions, particularly
plasticine duo
Wallace & Gromit.
History
Aardman was founded in
1976 as a low-budget project by
Peter Lord and
David Sproxton, who wanted to realize their dream of producing an animated motion picture. The duo's first big break was providing animated sequences for the children's
art series,
Vision On, for which they created
Morph, a simple clay character. Around the same time Lord and Sproxton made their first foray into adult animation with the shorts
Down and Out and
Confessions of a Foyer Girl, entries in the
BBC's
Animated Conversations series using used real-life conversations as soundtracks. However, these two shorts were not actual Aardman productions.
Later Aardman produced a number of shorts for
Channel 4 including the
Conversation Pieces series. These five shorts worked in the same area as the
Animated Conversations pieces, but were more sophisticated. Lord and Sproxton began hiring more animators at this point; three of the newcomers made their directorial debut at Aardman with the
Lip Synch series. Of the five
Lip Synch shorts two were directed by Peter Lord, one by
Barry Purves, one by
Richard Goleszowski and one by
Nick Park.
Park's short,
Creature Comforts, was the first Aardman production to win an
Oscar. Park also developed the world-famous clay modelled shorts featuring the adventures of
Wallace & Gromit, a comical pair of buddies: Wallace being a naive English green-knitted-tank-top-wearing inventor, and Gromit his best pal, the intelligent but silent dog. The pair undertake many adventures such as
A Grand Day Out (
1989),
The Wrong Trousers (
1993) and
A Close Shave (
1995), the latter two winning
academy awards. In
2000 Aardman Studios produced their first feature film,
Chicken Run, an award-winning worldwide box-office hit.
Following the success of Chicken Run,
DreamWorks and Aardman signed a 3-picture deal, the first being seeing the return of Wallace and Gromit after a ten year absence in . The film took the next Academy award for full-length animated film.
From 2006-2007, the
Ghibli Museum in
Mitaka,
Tokyo,
Japan, had an exhibit featuring the works of Aardman Studios. Sproxton and Lord visited the exhibit in May 2006 and met with
Hayao Miyazaki during the visit. Miyazaki has long been a fan of the Aardman Animation works. According to Aardman spokesman Arthur Sheriff, "The business model of DreamWorks no longer suits Aardman and vice versa. But the split couldn't have been more amicable."
In April 2007 Aardman signed a three-year deal with
Sony Pictures Entertainment. Aardman co-founder Peter Lord remarked "We are all very excited by the potential and have a number of projects we're keen to bring to fruition with this new relationship."
While Aardman is best known for stop motion, the studio has also dabbled in CGI with productions such as
Owzat,
Al Dante,
Planet Sketch and
Flushed Away.
Aardman Features is a
feature film division of Aardman Animations.
Aardman is also known to provide generous resources and training to young animators by providing awards at various animation festivals. For example, The Aardman Award at the UK's Animex Festival in Teesside (held in February,) provides world class story consultation to a promising young animator, for their next film.
Aardman Also Signed a deal with
Hit Entertainment
Company name
The company name is taken from one of its early characters, a superhero created for
Vision On in
1972. Aardman was cel-animated. The name comes from the Dutch word "aard" meaning "earth". However, "aardman" is more commonly translated as "
goblin".
Selected productions
Warehouse fire
On
October 10,
2005, a serious
fire at Aardman's storage
warehouse destroyed over 30 years of
props, models, scenery and awards collected by the company. This warehouse was used for storage of past projects and so didn't prevent the production of their current projects at the time. In addition, the company's library of finished films were stored elsewhere and were undamaged. An electrical fault was determined to be the cause of the blaze.
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Referring to the South Asia earthquake, Nick Park was quoted as saying, "Even though it's a precious and nostalgic collection and valuable to the company, in light of other tragedies, today isn't a big deal."
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Non-Aardman productions by Aardman directors
A number of Aardman directors have worked at other studios, taking the distinctive Aardman style with them. As a result, there are some animated films that, while not actually made by Aardman, are often mistaken for Aardman productions, and may be of interest to fans of the studio.
Barry Purves, director of the Aardman short
Next, also directed
Hamilton Mattress for
Harvest Films. The film, a half-hour special that premiered on
Christmas Day 2001, was produced by
Chris Moll, producer of the
Wallace and Gromit short film The Wrong Trousers. The models were provided by
Mackinnon & Saunders, a firm that did the same for
Bob the Builder and
Corpse Bride.
Similarly,
Robbie the Reindeer in Hooves of Fire, a BBC Bristol/Comic Relief production, was directed by
Richard Goleszowski, creator of
Rex the Runt. Its sequel,
Robbie the Reindeer in Legend of the Lost Tribe, was directed by
Peter Peake, whose directorial credits for Aardman include
Pib and Pog and
Humdrum.
Hamilton Mattress at Toonhound
Robbie the Reindeer at Toonhound
Books
Peter Lord & Brian Sibley: Cracking Animation (1998) Thames & Hudson; ISBN 0-500-28168-8
Wallace & Gromit and the Lost Slipper (1997)
Wallace & Gromit in Anoraknophobia (1998)
Wallace & Gromit: Crackers in Space (1999)
Creating Creature Comforts (2003)
The World of Wallace & Gromit (2004)Further Information
Get more info on 'Aardman Animations'.
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