The Beginning....
Aardman is an animation producer based in Bristol and was first founded by Peter Lord in 1972 and made many low budget shorts for major companies like the BBC and Channel 4. After 5 years of continuous short projects Aardman was inspired to create "Morph" and produced it for the BBC as children's programming and became very popular. This was only the start of something very very big.
Type of Animation
Aardman mainly produces Claymation and Stop-motion animation. The claymation process includes making clay models sometimes around wire or hinged frames, putting them onto a set, taking pictures of them moved gradually and stringing all together in a sequence at roughly 24 frames a second. This illusion makes it look like the images are moving. These types of animation rely on persistence of vision to create the illusion of movement and expression on the screen.
First Oscar
'Creature Comforts' was a short comical claymation/stop-motion animation film made in 1989 and featured animals speaking about their lives in a zoo for comic effect. These were spoken by non actors of the British public and were mimed by the appropriate animals in the film. The film then got an Oscar in 1990 for best animated film, much to Aardman's delight. 'Creature Comforts' as a film was originally created by Nick Park and later became an episode series for regular viewing on Channel 4 and was for all audiences to be entertained.
Academy Award Winning
A few years later 'Wallace and Gromit' which was also created by Nick Park as a claymation/stop-motion animation. Wallace; the stereotypical British man with green jumpers and tendency for a bit of DIY who lives with his best friend Gromit; a silent dog who's a lot smarter than he looks. The first film was aired in 1990 with 'A Grand day out', which was nominated for an academy award for best animated film but lost to 'Creature comforts', also by Nick Park. His later two films 'The Wrong Trousers' (1993) and 'A Close Shave' (1995) both won academy awards for best animated film the years they were made. These short 30 minute long films were aired on BBC 1 and BBC 2 as well as various children's programs at the time and were mainly for children's viewing however many adults always enjoyed the comical pair.
Feature Film
Finally Aardman animations put together their first feature length film of 84 minutes 'Chicken Run'. Another claymation/stop-motion animation film but the first where Aardman teamed up with DreamWorks, this was created in the year 2000. On Tweedy's chicken farm the chickens are plotting for escape before Mrs.Tweedy turns on her mysterious contraption and cranks out the pies, could Rocky the 'flying rooster' be the answer to their prayers? 'Chicken run' was built on a massive scale by Nick Park and Peter Lord having 15ft long sets, over 100s of characters and only 180 pairs of hands to accomplish it.
'Chicken Run' won many prestigious awards for best motion animation and was also nominated for best motion picture in the golden globes. This film grossed over 180 million dollars and is well known around the world for both children and adults as a brilliant comedy and a legendary animation.
'Chicken Run' won many prestigious awards for best motion animation and was also nominated for best motion picture in the golden globes. This film grossed over 180 million dollars and is well known around the world for both children and adults as a brilliant comedy and a legendary animation.
Stop-motion to CGI
One of Aardman animation's more recent films was a completely computer generated feature called 'Flushed Away'. Still partnered with DreamWorks; Aardman expanded their horizons by creating a CGI film in 2006 and completely moving away from stop-motion. 'Flushed Away' features Roddy; a pampered mouse who doesn't know the world past the comforts of his own cage is flushed away, down in the underbelly of his home town lies a city run by mice amidst the sewers, where he meets Rita; a street mouse who knows her way around town, Roddy is stuck between getting home and helping his first love out of trouble.
The main reason Aardman switched from stop-motion to CGI in this film was because the film is based around water, which is too difficult to render in stop motion and using real water could damage the models, so Aardman opted for a completely computer generated film. The characters in the film still resemble Aardman's traditional model design as the CGI representation came straight from the models he created. This film was classified as a 'U' so is suitable for family viewing but is mainly directed at children. 'Flushed Away' was an expensive product and didn't gross much money, this led to DreamWorks and Aardman splitting studios in a rather messy way a year later in 2007.
Currently
At this time Aardman is currently signed with 'Sony Pictures Entertainment' and since the break up with DreamWorks has made a number of feature films, some of which are in 3D, e.g. CGI created 'Arthur Christmas' and stop-motion 'The Pirates ! A Band of Misfits'. Both of which have done well in the cinemas and on DVD for children viewing.
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