Animation at National Media Museum, Bradford

An actual original paper cut by Lotte Reiniger. If you look at the tree in the top left hand corner you can see some damage which shows that it is paper rather than a black and white print and perhaps you can just about see a shadow too.

The original “Smash” Martians puppets from a TV commercial I remember from my childhood.

The Wombles – of course

Only surviving Wallace & Gromit Set as all the other were destroyed in a warehouse fire while this museum set from “The Wrong Trousers” survived because it was at the National Media museum in Bradford.

some early optical illusion/animation toys.

The photos above are some of the exhibits from the animation section at the National Media Museum in Bradford.  I had a quick look in before an artists networking meeting at Kala Sangam yesterday.  Obviously the quality of my photos is not that great but if you have never been before it is well worth a visit and can see the originals properly for yourselves.  It is an excellent resource, brilliant for kids and is free to get in.  There is also a picnic area if you want an extra cheap day out as well as the IMAX cinema if you want to splash out a bit.  For a trip down memory lane they have old computer/arcade games that you can play and also a section on TV and old TV adverts.

I used to go as a child when it was called the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television and it has lost none of its charm.  In fact they constantly have new exhibitions, activities etc. and are a central part of the Bradford Animation Festival which showed Lotte Reiniger’s feature length silhouette animation film “The Adventure of Prince Achmed” with a specially commissioned live musical score back in 2014.  This film with live musical accompaniment is being shown again in July this year at the Horse + Bamboo Puppet Festival (CLICK HERE for more details).

An RTS NW Puppet Showcase at The Lowry

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Tim Austin and I were lucky enough to be invited to the “No Strings Attached” showcase launch event hosted by RTS NW at the Lowry which was a celebration of the new “Furchester Hotel” series on CBeebies and of North West puppetry in general.

Before we went in we had time to look at the Lowry’s exhibition on TV puppetry with many of our personal favourites making an appearance (see pictures above).  It was a real treat to see the original puppets up close and see how they were made.  I was surprised to see that Basil Brush’s front teeth appeared to have been made of wood!

We also had a very brief conversation with Joe Godwin (director of CBBC)!

At the main showcase event,there were two puppeteers from “The Furchester Hotel” (Andrew Spooner – Fergus & Sarah Burgess – Phoebe) with their puppets plus one of the puppetry interns who had been working with them.  Other speakers included Phil Chalk from Factory Transmedia who created “Strange Hill High” (a part rod puppet part CGI tv series) and also a fellah called Ian Mackinnon, who’d worked with Cosgrove Hall back in the day as well as on modern Tim Burton films such as “Corpse Bride” and “Frankenweenie” plus the puppeteers of Hacker (Phil Fletcher) and Dodge T Dog (Warrick Brownlow-Pike) with their puppets.

They were all invited to talk about their work at some length and we were able to watch some clips of them in action on a projection screen and at the end we were invited to ask questions.  Right, right at the end I went up to nosy at the puppets close to and had conversations with the puppeteers as well.

 CLICK HERE for a link to the RTS facebook post about the evening and they have more photo’s there too.