Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1530710
arate pipeline into edit, but it's all automated. Thankfully, we don't have to worry too much about physically lining them all up. Do you have a specific digital camera that you prefer? WB: I don't think it's a secret…they are Canon, I'm pretty sure. That's what we've used as far as I can remember, since the beginning of the stills process. As for the digital VFX, I would imagine you have to determine what is going to be added in post early on? WB: It's a blurry line, to be honest. It's never that clear cut. In es- sence, we go with whatever looks best for the film. It's much more about the sort of aesthetic. The practicality of trying to create ef- fective water on a large scale doesn't really work, so at the beginning of the film, we did lots of tests. Wherever we can, we do in-camera. There are various points in the film where water is created by our assistant animators using hair gel, wax, Vaseline—all of those things. Also, in this film, we used this resin that you could cure, so it's com- pletely crystal clear, but you could sort of sculpt it. For example, when the jam gets splattered on the toast at the beginning, we sort of built see-through bits of jam with this resin, so in the beginning of the film, we've got some in-camera effects. But things like fog, water, fire, they're really hard to do…If you want it to look realistic, the best way for those kinds of effects is VFX. Does Aardman have in-house visual effects capabilities, or does that go to an external facility? WB: It varies film to film, but on this one, we had it all in-house. They can scale up to do a feature film. There [are] other departments at Aardman that make commercials and digital. It's actually a huge business [with] lots of different sides to the company. But…Nick and Merlin, they wanted to have that very authentic feel to the VFX, so it really sat well within the worlds of Wallace and Gromit, and to be honest, going to an external supplier of VFX for the film industry probably wouldn't have given us that. So we were really keen to keep the in-house nature, and work with people that understood the style. What becomes of all the assets aer production wraps? Do you keep them in storage or a library? WB: We try and keep what we can, and we've actually got two ar- chivists who work at Aardman, and it's a full-time job. They archive everything that we make. But the bigger sets, we can't keep. It's just going to cost too much. So we tend to sort of have smaller sets, and all the props will be kept. Some of those really expensive larger sets, we just have to strike them. And basically we try and recycle what we can. We're much more conscious now as a company of the environ- mental impacts of filmmaking. There's a couple of exhibitions that do tend to go around. I was in New York with Nick, and we take the puppets with us, so the actual real film puppets, they tend to have a bit of a life aer the film. What scale are the characters? WB: I reckon Wallace is just over six inches. Norbots, probably three to four inches high. They're really specific sizes, and that's because we don't have different scales in this film. We've got one scale. That's partly because we want to build the whole world. We don't want to build lots of versions. But that means we've got to have a scale that works for those really wide shots, but also the extreme close-ups of Gromit and his brow when he's changing expression. We've physi- cally got to put a camera right there next to this tiny puppet, and the animators are going to animate that by hand. So it's not just the typical action-hero/1:6 scale? WB: They're all slightly different. And I don't know exactly why that is, but Shaun the Sheep's world is slightly different to Wallace and Gromit, which was slightly different to The Pirates. They've all got their own bespoke scales…The other thing is, Wallace and Gromit's world—all their props are slightly oversized, even for them. It's just part of a sort of chunky world that they live in. The mugs are huge… His hands are massive as well. If you see Wallace's hands, they're ac- tually really chunky, so everything's got a very unique look about it in this world. What's next for you? WB: I'm actually excited! I'm working in the Aardman Academy, where we bring people in to teach them animation skills, but also teach filmmaking. I'm preparing for a filmmaking course where 12 people from around the world have applied with a film idea, and they pay to come and make it here. They basically make it under the su- pervision and the support of Aardman. It's a really exciting prospect because it sort of it feels very fresh and new.