The Animation House is looking forward to a full and exciting summer, with projects from as far away as Germany, Mexico and South America. The bulk of these commercials employ classical animation, but there are a couple that will require some unusual creative solutions.

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From writer Bill Lower and art director Ed Sutton of Maris, West and Baker in Jacksonville, Mississippi, comes a charming concept for River Oaks Hospital’s new ‘Baby Suites.’ The idea is to reflect the dignity that these suites will offer expectant mothers through their natural surroundings and security.

Working with co-animation directors Bob Fortier and Terry Godfrey, the creatives have designed two 30-second commercials that will use flower petals to represent the mother and baby. The characters were created by using highly realistic silk flower petals arranged over a specially designed (articulated) ‘skeleton.’

The three-dimensional figures are impressionistic and somewhat abstract, thereby giving them a unique charm. The articulated armature will allow animator Lesley Headrick complete control of the soft and gentle movements of these ‘flower people.’ The grace of the movements will be further enhanced by overlapping dissolves that will link each individual pose. In turn, each scene will be shot from a variety of angles and then selected editorially with the same actions overlapped by multiple dissolves. This means that to create the 30-second commercials, several minutes of stop-motion animation will be required.

A limbo environment with a soft black light to maximize the translucent quality of the silk flowers, but not revealing the under skeleton, provided cinematographer Graeme Mears with an interesting challenge.

Working on this project for The Animation House is producer Christine Davis, technical director John Burtcher, production manager Lucy Snyder, and model builder Monika Storr. Post-production will be handled at Command Post with Harry compositor Dave Giles.

The Animation House is also in production with a psa for Oxfam Canada that will employ an equally original visual approach. It is in conjunction with Gee Jeffrey and Partner’s writer Brett Channer, who developed the premise that when you give a person the right knowledge they become self-sufficient. It is a simple and direct story, requiring a simple and direct animation style, but at the same time it must be engaging enough to catch and hold the viewers’ attention.

‘I wanted to work in a medium that was as basic as the message itself,’ says Fortier, Animation House creative director. He decided that the idea of actually animating in ‘sand’ reduced the process to a wonderfully primitive and basic visual language. This direction is based on the child-like pictograms that we all drew at the beach as children.

Even though the message is simple, the images necessary to tell the story are quite sophisticated and complex. By producing the animation in traditional format but in a primitive drawing style, and then combining these elements with a stop motion/live manipulation of sand, the desired effect is achieved.

Sand has a universality in that it is a common element to all countries. Our perception of sand is its lack of fertility, so it’s the perfect contrast for a message of hope and growth. The medium of sand dictated a very simple drawing style which, upon further investigation, revealed an obvious link to native and aboriginal sand paintings. The whole project is developing a wonderful order and synergy.

Working on this project for Gee Jeffrey and Partner is creative director Allan Gee, and producer Kelly Cavanaugh. Adding their insight, for The Animation House, are producer Davis, technical director Burtcher, and pm Snyder. Post will be handled at Command Post and Transfer with Harry compositor Giles.