Who are Aardman?

Aardman Animations, Ltd., also known as Aardman Studios, or simply as Aardman, is a

British animation studio based in Bristol. Aardman is known for films made using stop-
motion clay animation techniques. Aardman films have made $973.2 million worldwide and
average $163 million per film. All the stop motion films they have created are among the highest
grossing stop motion films of all time and their debut stop motion film Chicken Run is the highest
grossing stop motion film of all time showing that they play a very large part in the stop motion
industry. The companies ground breaking
hard work has led to them getting ten
Oscar nominations since they started in
1972, four of which they won. The two
founders of the company began their
animating partnership at school where
they first met and became great friends.

Who are the founders?

Born in City of Preston Lancashire, 1958, Nick Park is an English filmmaker of stop motion animation
globally known for his stop motion animations such as Wallace and Gromit and Shaun the Sheep.
Nick Park went to study Communication Arts at Sheffield City Polytechnic (now Sheffield Hallam
University) and then went to the National Film and Television School, where he started making the
first Wallace and Gromit film, A Grand Day Out.

Peter Lord, born in 1953 in Bristol is a British film producer, director and co-founder of the Academy
Award-winning Aardman Animations studio, an animation firm best known for their clay-animated
films, shorts and particularly Wallace and Gromit. Peter Lord graduated from University of York
where he and David Sproxton founded Aardman as a low-budget backyard studio, producing shorts
and trailers for publicity.

David Sproxton is one of the co-founders of Aardman

Animations studio born in 1954, England graduated from
Collingwood College, University of Durham where before he
started being an animator, he produced segments for the
Vision on TV program where he and Peter Lord created the
character of Morph for Take Hart.

What is the history of Aardman?

Aardman was founded in 1972 as a low-budget project by Peter Lord and David Sproxton, who
wanted to realize their dream of producing an animated motion picture. The partnership provided
animated sequences for the BBC series for deaf children Vision On. The company name originates
from the name of their nerdish Superman character in that sequence. After creating a segment
called "Greeblies" using clay animation, became what was the inspiration for creating Morph, a
simple clay character. Around the same time Lord and Sproxton made their first foray into adult
animation with the shorts Down and Out and Confessions of a Foyer Girl, entries in the BBC's
Animated Conversations series using real-life conversations as soundtracks. Aardman also created
the title sequence for The Great Egg Race and supplied animation for the multiple award-winning
music video of Peter Gabriel's song "Sledgehammer".
From the start, Peter and David were interested in developing an adult audience for model
animation. Conversation Pieces commissioned by Channel Four Television in 1982 enabled the pair
to develop its innovative technique of animating puppet characters to real-life conversations. With
films like Early Bird (set in a local radio station) Aardman demonstrated that real people could be
characterized with insight, humor and sensitivity.

In 1986, Peter Gabriel suggested that they collaborate with director Stephen Johnson and the
Brothers Quay to create a new rock video. Sledgehammer went on to collect almost every award
that year. That original combination of rhythm, energy, style and visual flair was also harnessed to
provide the visual accompaniment to the late Nina Simone's My Baby Just Cares for Me and Robert
Parker's Barefootin'.

In 1989, the studio was again commissioned by Channel Four Television to create a series of five 5-
minute films, Lip Synch. This ground-breaking series further explored the world of animation based
on true characters and real voices and included Peter Lord's War Story and Going Equipped, Barry
Purves' Next, Richard Goleszowski's Ident and Nick Park's Creature Comforts, which went on to win
the 1990 Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film.

In 1993 Aardman passed another milestone with the completion of Nick Park's Oscar winning The
Wrong Trousers, Aardman's first 30-minute film.
Acclaimed world-wide and winner of over thirty
awards, The Wrong Trousers has become one of
the most successful animated films ever made.

In 1995 Aardman produced Nick Park's third Oscar winning film A Close Shave. An immediate
success, it confirmed the studio’s reputation as well as establishing Wallace and Gromit as
household names. In 1996, the studio produced Peter Lord's Oscar nominated 11-minute short film,
Wat's Pig (for Channel Four) as well as a children's series based on Morph, The Morph Files.

In 1998, Aardman won a BAFTA for Stage Fright, an 11-minute short film commissioned by Channel
Four Television. Steve Box, Nick Park's key animator on both The Wrong Trousers and A Close Shave,
directed Stage Fright.

The studio’s first animated television series for youth and adults, Rex the Runt, created and directed
by long time Aardman associate Richard Goleszowski, was first shown on BBC2 in 1998 and garnered
many top international awards. A second series was commissioned and shown on BBC2 in 2001.
Angry Kid, directed by Darren Walsh, was Aardman’s first series released exclusively on the internet
via Atomfilms.com. BBC Three commissioned a second series which played a major part in the
channel’s launch.

On 1 October 2006, right before the release of Flushed Away, The New York Times reported that due
to creative differences DreamWorks Animation and Aardman would not be extending their contract.
The deal was officially terminated on 30 January 2007. According to an Aardman spokesperson: "The
business model of DreamWorks no longer suits Aardman and vice versa. But the split couldn't have
been more amicable."[12] Unofficial reasons for
departure were weak performances of the last
two movies, for which DreamWorks had to take
writedowns, and citing the article, "Aardman
executives chafed at the creative control
DreamWorks tried to exert, particularly with
Flushed Away... The studio had another film in
development, Crood Awakening (eventually The
Croods), which had been announced in 2005, with John Cleese co-writing the screenplay. With the
end of the partnership, the film's rights reverted to DreamWorks.

On 10 October 2005, a serious fire at a storage facility used by Aardman and other Bristol-based
companies destroyed over 30 years of props, models, and scenery often built by the Bristol-based
Cod Steaks. This warehouse was used for storage of past projects and so did not prevent the
production of their current projects at the time. In addition, the company's library of finished films
was stored elsewhere and was undamaged. An electrical fault was determined to be the cause of the
blaze. Referring to the 2004 South Asia earthquake and tsunami, Park was quoted as saying, "Even
though it is a precious and nostalgic collection and valuable to the company, in light of other
tragedies, today isn't a big deal."

From 2006 to 2007, the Ghibli Museum in Mitaka, Tokyo, Japan, had an exhibit featuring the works
of Aardman Studios. Sproxton and Lord visited the exhibit in May 2006 and met with animator
Hayao Miyazaki during the visit. Miyazaki has long been a fan of Aardman Animations' works.

Wallace and Gromit’s A Matter of Loaf and Death was broadcast on BBC One on Christmas day 2008
and enthralled a record audience of 16.15 million. It was nominated for an Oscar in the Best Short
Animated Film category and went on to win the BAFTA for Best Animated Short Film. Every Wallace
and Gromit adventure has now won a BAFTA and they have all been nominated for an Oscar.

In 2009 Wallace and Gromit featured in ‘The World of Cracking Ideas’ a major exhibition held at the
Science Museum in London that attracted over half a million UK visitors to date. Timmy Time,
Aardman’s first pre-school television production debuted on CBeebies and the much anticipated
second series of Shaun the Sheep began broadcasting on BBC One.

In 2010, a new six-part TV series - Wallace and Gromit’s World of Invention was produced and
broadcast on BBC One – an accompanying website and game were developed, extending the
viewer’s experience across multiple platforms and went on to win the company its first BAFTA for
New Media.

As part of the studio's feature film deal with Sony Pictures Animation (SPE), Arthur Christmas – an
action-adventure comedy set on Christmas Eve was released in November 2011 and The Pirates! - In
an Adventure with Scientists — a delicious confection of piracy on the high seas, was released in
March 2012 and received an Academy Award nomination the following year.

In July 2012 Wallace and Gromit’s Musical Marvels, a live

orchestral event featuring bespoke animation and screening
of A Matter of Loaf and Death launched at The Royal Albert
Hall as a flagship family Proms event.

The following year, in another first for the companyy, the

Thrill-o-Matic, an original Wallace and Gromit theme park
ride opened at Blackpool Pleasure Beach as the company
continued to develop and realize the commercial potential of
their properties through promotions, exhibitions and live
events.

Production continues at the studio, with the fifth series of Shaun the Sheep in production, a half
hour special Shaun the Sheep: The Farmer’s Llamas being produced for Christmas 2015 and several
feature films projects in development.
As the studio’s reputation has grown both in the UK and overseas, so has the demand for its
commercials, branded content and digital work. Agencies appreciate the contribution that
Aardman’s directors and creatives can make to an original idea and the company has built up an
impressive client list including Chevron, BBC, Serta, Department of Health, Nike, McVities, Kellogg's,
Macmillan and Cartoon Network to name a few.

What have they produced?

Year: 1977 - Animated Conversations: Down and Out

Year: 1978 - The Great Egg Race
Year: 1978 - Animated Conversations: Confessions of a Foyer Girl
Year: 1980 - The Amazing Adventures of Morph
Year: 1983 - Conversation Pieces: On Probation
Year: 1983 - Conversation Pieces: Sales Pitch
Year: 1983 - Conversation Pieces: Palmy Days
Year: 1983 - Conversation Pieces: Early Bird
Year: 1983 - Conversation Pieces: Late Edition
Year: 1986 - Sledgehammer
Year: 1986 - Sweet Disaster: Babylon
Year: 1987 - Going Equipped
Year: 1987 - My Baby Just Cares for Me
Year: 1987 - Barefootin
Year: 1989 - Creature Comforts
Year: 1989 - War Story
Year: 1989 - Ident
Year: 1989 - Next
Year: 1989 - A Grand Day Out
Year: 1991 - Adam
Year: 1993 - Rex The Hunt: North by North Pole
Year: 1993 - Loves Me, Loves Me Not
Year: 1993 - Not Without My Handbag
Year: 1993 - The Wrong Trousers
Year: 1993 - Pib and Pog
Year: 1993 - Pop
Year: 1993 - Wat’s Pig
Year: 1993 - Rex the Hunt: How the Dinosaurs Became Extinct
Year: 1995 - A Close Shave
Year: 1995 - The Art Box Bunch
Year: 1995 - The Morph Files
Year: 1997 - Owzat
Year: 1997 - Stage Fright
Year: 1998 - Viva Forever
Year: 1998 - Rex The Hunt
Year: 1998 - Humdrum
Year: 1998 - Al Dentre
Year: 1999 - Minotaur and Little Nerkin
Year: 1999 - Angry Kid
Year: 2000 - Chicken Run
Year: 2002 - Wallace & Gromit’s Cracking Contraptions
Year: 2003 - The Presentators
Year: 2003 - Creature Comforts
Year: 2004 - The Non-Voters (BBC Election)
Year: 2005 - Planet Sketch
Year: 2005 - Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit
Year: 2006 - Purple and Brown
Year: 2006 - Pib and Pog
Year: 2006 - Flushed Away
Year: 2007 - Shuan the Sheep
Year: 2008 - Chp Socky Chooks
Year: 2008 - A Matter of Loaf and Death
Year: 2009 - Timmy Time
Year: 2010 - Wallace & Gromit’s World of Invention
Year: 2010 - Dot
Year: 2011 - Canimals
Year: 2011 - Authur Christmas
Year: 2011 - Gulp
Year: 2011 - The Itch of the Golden Nit
Year: 2012 - DFC’s World Funnest
Year: 2012 - Wallace & Gromit’s Jubliee Bunt-a-thon
Year: 2012 - So You Want To Be a Pirate!
Year: 2012 - Wallace & Gromit’s Musical Marvels
Year: 2012 - The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists!
Year: 2013 - Darkside
Year: 2013 - Sphere
Year: 2014 - Zombie Fairy
Year: 2014 - Ray’s Big Idea
Year: 2014 - Brand new Morph
Year: 2015 - Special Delivery
Year: 2015 - Angry Kid Revival
Year: 2015 - Golden Morph
Year: 2015 - Life’s a Treat

Finance

Aardman films have made $972.1 million worldwide and average $163 million per film since they
started producing films. In 2012 Aardman Animations spent way over budget when it spent money
on projects that never got past the development stage. However, the accounts just filed for the year
to the end of 2013 show that films The Pirates, in an Adventure with Scientists, Arthur Christmas and
Wallace & Gromit – The Curse of The Were-Rabbit contributed to its £18.7million turnover. Since the
company started in 1972 it hasn’t had many financial problems but it did have an internal scandal
after an employee was found to be using the company credit card for personal use. The personal
assistant Sarah Folan used a company credit card to spend around £5,000 for personal use before
her anybody noticed something was wrong and the 30-year-old was caught.

Who works there?

Aardman has many different people working there and many different jobs. There are the base jobs,
these are like the receptionists or runners, receptionists let people in and can do a lot of the paper
work that people may need to file, they also take calls and respond to different emails, they overall
keep the main desk flowing and make sure the entrance is always staffed. People that are runners
often bring important things from different places all over the office, they could also go collect
things that had been missed by other workers. other staff like this are the catering staff, these are
the people that make sure there is food ready for when the workers get there on their lunch break.

Other jobs like background designs would mean someone would paint the different sets that are
being used in the film that they are working on, this allows the designer to focus on one part of work
instead of having to do different things. Another one like this is the art designers that create
different characters, this may mean that they need to create one set characters many different
times over and getting different replacements and different facial expressions on the different
characters. Most of these designers have a key design director, these people will make sure they are
doing the correct work and always on top of what they are doing.

Organisational structure
From jobs that are advertised on the aardman website
there are a few things that make this place of work
different than normal, they work 9:30am – 6:00pm.
They also only work 4 days of the week, this is good
for people that work there as they get an extended
weekend or a break within the week. If I was working
there I would find this very good and like this more
than working a 5-day week job. From the jobs
advertised they also work less hours than a normal
longer housed job. The jobs that are advertised work
from 35-37.5 hours, this is less than the standard 40-
hour job that someone at a different job would be working. Overall the people that work there have
irregular hours and less days, this is overall good. They have a video on their website that shows a
tour of their offices, they have a room where employees can go to and chill out, this will overall help
the employees as if they need a break they can have it in a good environment, this will help them to
concentrate when they are working.