Aardman Animations

Aardman Animations, Ltd., also known as Aardman Studios, is an Academy Award winning animation studio settled in Bristol / UK. Aardman is famous for its claymation/stop motion productions, particularly plasticine duo Wallace & Gromit.

History

Aardman was founded as a small backyard project by an ambitious pair named Peter Lord and David Sproxton in the mid-1970s. Lord and Sproxton wanted to realize their dream of an animated motion picture. Their first big break was providing animated sequences for the children's art series Vision On; during this time 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, which 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; these included the Conversation Pieces series. These five shorts worked in the same area as the two shorts Lord and Sproxton made for Animated Conversations, 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 yet buddyful "dreamteam": Wallace the arch-British, naive, green-knitted-tank-top-wearing inventor and his best pal, the intelligent but silent dog, Gromit. The "cheeselovers“ withstand many adventures such as A Grand Day Out (1989), The Wrong Trousers (1993) and A Close Shave (1995), the latter two winning more Oscars. In the year 2000 Aardman Studios "let the birds" fly with Chicken Run, an awarded worldwide box-office hit. This movie was Aardman's first feature film. 2005 and after ten years being on holiday Wallace and Gromit returned very rested and relaxed on the silver screen in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit and caught the next Academy award for full-length animated film.

While Aardman is best known for claymation and other forms of stop motion, the studio has also dabbled in CGI with productions such as Al Dante, Planet Sketch and Flushed Away.

Aardman Features is a feature film division of Aardman Animations.

Selected Aardman productions

Conversation Pieces (1983)
Creature Comforts (1989)
A Grand Day Out (1989)
The Wrong Trousers (1993)
A Close Shave (1995)
The Morph Files (1995)
Chevron Cars (1995)
Al Dente (1998)
Rex the Runt (1998)
Angry Kid (2000)
Chicken Run (2001)
Wallace & Gromit's Cracking Contraptions (2002)
Project Zoo video game (2003)
The Non-Voters for the BBC Election coverage (see external links) (2005)
Planet Sketch (2005)
The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005)
Flushed Away (2006)
Crood Awakening (2008)

Tortoise Vs. Hare (unknown, possibly cancelled)

Warehouse Fire

On the 10th of October 2005 a fire at Aardmans storage warehouse destroyed with over 30 years of props, models, scenery and awards collected by the company. This warehouse was used for storage of past projects and so did not prevent the production of their current projects at the time. It was discovered that the cause of the fire was an electrical fault. ^* Nick Park was quoted saying Even though it is a precious and nostalgic collection and valuable to the company, in light of other tragedies, today isn't a big deal.^*

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 trilogy. 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.

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)

External links