And Relax...

(Drawing I did for Anne Wood to celebrate finishing episode 52 of Abney & Teal).

Making Abney & Teal

Here are just a few photos from the making of Abney & Teal. Once the episode production line started churning I generally forgot to take many photos so it's just a tiny snapshot of year one of four years work by the whole Ragdoll team.


My desk at Ragdoll studios in Stratford upon Avon. I must have been working late on Abney's hut.


Set construction from my painted parts was a model of simplicity.


An early experiment with a rod-puppet Abney. That's Tahra Zafar on the right, who made all the real-world puppets for the show. (www.tahrazafar.com)


Teal in construction, before her dress was made less "tasteful."


Original Poc-Poc. Eventually they were re-built in the computer using the textures from these puppets. (The style of their animation was developed from some earlier footage of me moving little home-made clay versions with magnets in them. This gave them the motion-blurred shuddery feel they sometimes have.)


Photographing Teal and Abney from a gazillion angles.


Another model of simplicity. The amazing Davide Arnone (www.davidearnone.co.uk) and I spent three weeks (seriously, three weeks) adjusting Abney's ears because they didn't come out right in the photos. I think there were something like four positions per single ear for every one of thirty-six angles of the head.


Another incarnation of my desk at Ragdoll.


Tim van Eyken in his socks.
(At Pinewood studios experimenting with Bop sounds).

Lisbon

Early Abney & Teal development drawings

Some of the earliest development drawings, ranging from three to four years ago before the show went into production (and before some of the characters were finalised). Plus a few early storyboard panels from before I learned that it's better just to scribble away on the computer (or let brilliant Steve Roberts or Matilda Tristram draw them).

An era out the window

New episodes of Abney & Teal go out every day this week, with twenty or so more to follow not long after (though I don't know exactly when). I'm very very proud of the episodes in this second batch -even if one of this week's features some of the earliest animation we ever did (the rest are all brand spanking new and of a quality only hinted at in the first batch).

I'm still hanging around at the tv-studio for another couple of weeks to oversee compositing and sound on the last four episodes. A last chance to watch spring be amazing not only from my window in London but from the window of the train going through the Chilterns. I did have to pipe up and stop some passengers from giving the plot of The Bridge away on this morning's journey though.

I've been painting some things seen through the aforementioned windows: