which shouldn’t be unique, but currently is.”
As the sister company of Passion Animation,
the team also works closely with the wealth of
talent and experience there. “I think this puts
Strange Beast in a unique position to celebrate
indie animation talent, but with the support
and infrastructure of a more established
company and the resources that this brings.”
Overseeing the day-to-day running of
the studio, Sue spends her days working
with producers and directors on pitches
and productions, identifying opportunities
for their artists and curating their roster
and website. She argues that animation is
a brilliant tool for making difficult subject
matters engaging. “By this I mean ‘difficult’
in the broadest sense. That could be a charity
wanting to portray potentially triggering but
important stories in a sensitive and accessible
way, or it could be some fairly dry information
that leans on animation to sustain interest and
help express meaning,” she says. “I think these
are qualities unique to animation, and difficult
to replicate in live action.”
London-based filmmaker Anna Ginsburg
supports this view, and her animated
documentary style films often tackle sensitive
subjects. “It’s the medium of possibility.
Adding animation to real voice-interviews
is an approach that’s increasingly popular.
Visualising the internal and emotional using
drawings, shapes and colour is often more
impactful than visualising such things using
film footage,” explains Anna, who brings
candid voice recordings to life with expressive
animated visuals. Her latest film Ugly, released
for World Refugee Day, was nominated for Best
Animation of the Year on Vimeo. “Empathy is
more able to flow from the audience to the
subject, because the animation serves as a
protective layer,” she says. “By focusing on the
visualisation of their words we’re more able to
fully absorb what they’re saying.”LIVE ACTION WITH ANIMATION
Mixed-media projects are also on the rise.
They’re being used for campaigns that
want more of an anthology style, bringing
together multiple diverse aesthetics, says
Kitty. Streaming services and different online
platforms have diversified the animation
space, and it’s exciting to be a part of that shift.
“We still get most of our commissions through
advertising, branded content and music videos,
but we’re also engaging in more longer-format
work than ever before. This is a combination
of series development led by our directors, or
through things like animated contributions to
documentary projects.”
“Animation visually explains a lot of feelings
that can’t really be explained otherwise,” says
Chicago-based filmmaker and animator Shane
Beam. “My animation visually explains a lot of
my feelings that would be balled up and ignored
otherwise. Literally anything is possible in
animation, so it just hits differently than real
life and is able to reach places we can’t.” Kitty
agrees: “The existing laws of physics don’t
need to apply to animated worlds, and that’s
an infinitely fascinating thing.”
With offices in London and New York City,
Golden Wolf specialises in youth-oriented
content for clients in industries such as gaming,
entertaining and sports. The company recently
produced a TV advertisment for whisky brand
Crown Royal with Anomaly, which featured a
mix of a bunch of different animation styles.
“It was an opportunity to combine all of
the different methods of animation that we
do into one spot, including 2D, 3D, motionANIMATION NOWSHAPES AND
OBJECTS
USING DYNAMIC ANIMATION TO FILL THE
FRAME AND CONNECT WITH THE CUSTOMERBrands are using animation as a form of
communication, with bright and colourful
visuals as a backdrop or environment to
showcase products. Capturing the energy
and excitement around flavour (for drinks
advertising) or experience (in the form of
fashion, for example) appeals to brands
that want to engage with their audience.
Buenos Aires-based multidisciplinary
creative studio Not Real focuses on art
direction and animation. Represented
by Jelly London, it recently produced
a series of animations for Nike Air Max
React & Air Max Plus entitled Gumball, a
candy-coated CG delight for the sneaker
brand’s newest collection which was
released on National Bubble Gum Day.
The studio designed a playful
environment of multi-coloured, smooth,
“candy-coated” shapes to represent
the gumballs – air-filled 3D bubbles of
different shapes in foam and rubber-
like materials. “It’s a modern take on a
children’s’ playground based around the
‘gumball’ featuring soft, rounded shapes
in foam and rubber-like materials, and
created entirely in CGI,” says executive
producer Sue Loughlin. “There’s been a
trend towards colourful and fluid work,
with elements of fun. There’s a lot of
dynamic movement going on currently:
fast-moving animation that uses the
whole three-dimensional space within
the frame.”
All content was rolled out and shared
within Nike stores across the UK as
well as the social media accounts of
stores selling Nike products, including
FootLocker, Footaction and Champ
Sports. “Animation is so varied and so,
for a brand, it has a massive appeal as
a form of communication that will
speak instantly and directly to the
customer,” says Sue.