Laika's Behind the Scenes of the Boxtrolls Mark Shapiro

No studio has ever gotten me to appreciate stop-motion like Laika did (Shh shh, I love you too, Aardman), while it is still a considerably new animation studio compared to so many others, for some reason Laika continues to win me over with each feature film they have been releasing over the last few years. And whilst have already caught "The Boxtrolls" back at home during the summer, I know this was going to be a real treat for me.

In the late 1990s, Will Vinton Studios sought funds for more feature-length fils and brought in outside investors such as Nike, Ink owner, Phil Knight. It was in 1998 that Knight made his initial investment and his son Travis started working at the studio as an animator. In 2002, Phil acquired the financially struggling studio to pursue feature-length productions, and during the following year, Henry Selick, director of The Nightmare Before Christmas, joined the studio as a supervising director. It was by July 2005 where Laika became the successor to Will Vinton Studios.

Mark Shapiro had joined the studio in 2007, where he manages brand strategies, including the marketing efforts for Laika's corporate identity as well as the company's feature films. Before then, Shapiro's diverse marketing and communications career had taken him across the US, working in brand development, advertising, public relations, film production and writing for companies including Nike, Town & Country Magazine and Upper Deck.

I don't want to talk too much about this film and its behind the scenes (Honestly I would like to save it for future blog posts that I can use for other modules), so I will just try to talk about the bits that interested me the most (Which was nearly everything, ugh). 

Green and blue screens were used throughout the film, particularly for the more action based scenes, it is just exhausting wondering how many times they have to switch between real settings and blue/green screens. Even if a more action based sequence was to take place in a proper setting, blue/green props have to be used for when they are animating a character jumping off a railing (And of course they have to make it look believable).

Compositing was also used for crowd scenes to save time, and frankly, it is really well done, especially since you will have to squint real hard to notice that the characters all the way at the back aren't actually moving.

It was just so amazing getting to know the techniques that were used to create the certain effects in this film, especially when it comes to the water and fire (Because at times, they really do look real). For the water in the sewers, rotating lights were simply placed under a textured shower glass, creating the illusion of light reflecting off water. Unlike past films, the fire couldn't be done in the same way (Where a more cartoony fire was actually 3D printed in "Coraline"), and a more realistic look had to be achieved, to do so, a mini ipad fire app was specially built, that would later on be placed into the little compartment of where the fire should be (Such as behind the grill of the machine used by Snatcher), and is after that enhanced ever so slightly with CGI.

I think we all know by now how much effort is put into every single one of their stop-motion puppets (Dozens of copies are even made of each of the characters), there are actually separate departments that specialise in areas such as clothing and hair (I wouldn't be too surprised if there was a little one for applying make up too, hehe). It was also interesting to know that these folks came from different backgrounds, for the hair department, the ladies that comprised of it actually came from a jewellery making background instead (Really makes you think).

And while the costumes were made from scratch with real fabric, wires were still placed under them so that they could be properly posed during the animating process, which must have been incredibly challenging, especially when attempting to achieve the realistic movement of flowing fabric.

As I mentioned before, I continue to remain astounded by how much love Laika puts into each of their films, and another aspect that also stands out about them is how they are more than happy to show us their process in whatever way they can, be it in trailers, behind-the-scenes, and even in the films themselves. It's a wonderful way to give better insight into the world of stop motion. They might have struggled a little in the beginning with "Coraline", but they clearly have come a long way since then.