Kerwhizz: On Air and Online

I thought I would take a break from work to tell you about Kerwhizz! The CGI quiz blue-zoo have been working on for the BBC since the start of the year is finally on air! Vegetable Valley Alley was on BBC1 at 3.05 this Monday and will be shown again at various times on both BBC and CBeebies along with a new episode each week.

They also have a webpage dedicated to it where you can play the quiz and race some pods, and check out the intro animation I did for the show titles!




I have to say, it is looking great and is such a nice show. I hope it entertains and educates some kids! :P

Right, better get back to animating it!

Bafta Nomination!

Stitch-Up Showdown has been shortlisted in the Short Form category for the 2008 EA British Academy Children's Awards! The winner will be announced on 30th November.

It's really great news to hear as it is a fantastic series and really does deserve to do well. It was also a lot of fun to work on and I am pleased I got the chance to direct the animation on it, and animate some of the episodes as well!!

Filminute 2008

Well after a lot of emails, pleading, posting and facebook group invitations to vote for Gym Jam in the People's Choice Filminute Festival category, I am afraid to say it did not win!!

:(

It's not all bad news though...

We won overall!!

The jury selected Gym Jam as FILMINUTE 2008!

He's what they said:

“It’s remarkable to have an animated film win against the live action and documentary entries,” says Ketchum, head of the jury. ”We’ve always believed in the Filminute format, in letting all the films go head to head against each other and may the best story win. And here we have it with STITCHUP SHOWDOWN – GYM JAM, a film that appeared on the majority of the juror’s selects and also lead in the voting for the People’s Choice Award at various points during the month.”

I'm pretty pleased about that. It's nice when something you have worked on gets recognised and enjoyed.




Congrats to all who worked on it!

Gym Jam

One of the Stitch-Up Showdown episodes I animated back in January has been accepted into two short film festivals!



The Filminute Film festival



Gym Jam is one of 25 films selected from a review of 1500 films, animations, and mashups from over 60 countries. Screenings are taking place at Selfridges, Oxford Street until 19th of October where viewers can vote for their favorite - or you can vote online!


RenderYard Short Film Festival



Gym Jam has been selected for the 1 Minute Challenge in the month of August and goes forward into the final selection of 12 films at the end of November this year. The 12 best films will then be available to vote on by their public on our You Tube page to decide the final winner at the end of December.

So if you watch it and you like it - give us a vote ;)

Thanks!

New website!

It's been almost 2 years in the making...
...but Blue-zoo finally have a new website!



If you navigate to the 'Work' section you can see some of the things I have been working on over the last 2 and a half years...

Including Stitch-Up Showdown, Clarks YoToY, Aquafresh, Monkey, Back To School, Those Scurvy Rascals, Binge Britain and The Amanda Show.

Silence..

Well... a good 13 months since I last visited these parts! Mind you it is pretty pointless having a blog if a) no one is reading it and b) you really have nothing to say. But hey, I am hoping that will change!

So what's happened in the last 13 months? Well, the 6 month blue-zoo contract turned into a full-time one. So now I don't even have to worry about ANY contract ending. I have a job until they sack me! Although I am trying to avoid that...

We have been working on lots of exciting things... Stitch Up Showdown being the one I was looking forward to the most! I got to be Animation Director on it and really push the stop-framey, snappy style of it. Of course as with all productions, when it finally started we were working to a very tight schedule, but I am really pleased with the way it turned out and everyone who worked on it did a brilliant job. It should be on Nickelodeon soon....

I was also lucky enough to write one of the episodes. It featured this cute little character 'Enzo' and it was a personality driven piece with no dialogue. I also got to animate it too.



Blue-zoo have just begun working on a new BBC HD TV series called 'Kerwhizz' which I have been supervising some of the animation on. It is visually stunning and you won't see anything like it on children's tv when it airs in March! It is 26 x 20" episodes, so blue-zoo has quadrupled in size over the last few months, and we have almost out-grown the new office we moved to back in October. I don't think we will be moving again soon though, last time was pretty painful ;)

I am also writing an episode of Kerwhizz! It was a bit of a leap from a 30 second cartoon gag to a 20 minute BBC TV show, but it's all going ok so far!

Well, that's about it for now. I have more news but I will save that for another day...

Spring Cleaning

I decided today to do a bit of spring cleaning to my site. I would like to totally revamp it one day, but for now I am just content with removing all the Blogger rubbish and adding a new page! Gasp!!

Well, there's nothing actually on it yet, but it's the one to the right over there called 'Commercial Work'. I am gonna add to it over the next few days (or weeks..) and it will hopefully contain a few movies of stuff I have been doing at blue-zoo, however varied and rushed out they may be!

Oh, and good news! I have now been upgraded to a fully fledged member of the blue-zoo team! :D