To begin designing my sets, I first went out looking for inspiration. As my film was predominantly set in the woods, I headed to local wooded areas such as Leigh Woods, and Randwick Woods back in my home town... I took a load of pictures trying to capture shots that had the same composition and depth that I wanted to replicate.
It was also recommended that I go and take a look at Puzzlewood, on the outskirts of the Forest of Dean... This place was absolutely astounding. Puzzlewood is a twisted knot of roots and rocks, with geology unlike anything i'd previously seen... And it certainly was an inspirational place. Below are a selection of photographs that I took while out scouting for inspiration.
It was also recommended that I go and take a look at Puzzlewood, on the outskirts of the Forest of Dean... This place was absolutely astounding. Puzzlewood is a twisted knot of roots and rocks, with geology unlike anything i'd previously seen... And it certainly was an inspirational place. Below are a selection of photographs that I took while out scouting for inspiration.
I then went to speak to Matt Perry, the in house Art Director at Aardman, about the best way to go about making a forest. He recommended various ways, but stressed that it might be quite difficult to make something enormously detailed with my budget and timescale constraints. He felt the best way to go about it would be to consider my set design as though I were designing for the theatre. And that it would be more efficient if I had moveable set pieces that could be moved around and reused for various shots as opposed to a rigid set. He seemed really enthusiastic and interested in my project, and even let me make use of a whole host of old Aardman trees from the Curse of the WereRabbit. He also introduced me to a lady named Helen Javes, who is a senior in the Art Department there, and an exceptionally talented set dresser. She gave me a whole host of tips and tricks that would help me to create a believable forest and showed me how to use jesmonite to create authentic looking dirt. She also took me up to the art departments store room and and let me use pretty much anything that was up there, though sadly, i'd already bought most of the things i'd need to dress my set already (making me wish i'd talked to her earlier!). I still found a lot of useful things in the stores though, like hedgerows, flowers and bushes etc. And they all helped.
So in the end I went with what Matt Perry recommended, and I carved 8 foam hillocks which I then covered in grass (brown fur painted green with acrylics), firmly glued trees into, and then dressed them up with fungi, bushes, flowers and moss etc. I could then move them around at will to suit each shot.
To build the boys house, I recruited a friend of mine who is a talented woodworker. After i'd drawn a rough sketch showing what I wanted he was able to replicate it perfectly. Once he'd got the basic wooden structure to me, I then had to dress it up to make it look like a stone cottage. I did this by sculpting some basic bricks and taking a mould of them. I then used a fast cast resin to make lots and lots of copies of these bricks, and stuck them to the walls of the house. When this was done I could paint them, age them and distress them and add details such as moss and lichen.
To make the grass, I bought 2 metres squared of dark brown fur. I then painted this fur using green acrylic paint, taking care to not allow the paint to spread right through to the base of the fabric. I needed the paint to just colour the tips of the brown fur. Doing this meant that their would be an underlying layer of brown fur, which under camera, looked like dirt. This grass looked great, and I was happy with the results, but it meant that I had to be really careful not to touch the grass too much as it would cause really distracting boiling.
So in the end I went with what Matt Perry recommended, and I carved 8 foam hillocks which I then covered in grass (brown fur painted green with acrylics), firmly glued trees into, and then dressed them up with fungi, bushes, flowers and moss etc. I could then move them around at will to suit each shot.
To build the boys house, I recruited a friend of mine who is a talented woodworker. After i'd drawn a rough sketch showing what I wanted he was able to replicate it perfectly. Once he'd got the basic wooden structure to me, I then had to dress it up to make it look like a stone cottage. I did this by sculpting some basic bricks and taking a mould of them. I then used a fast cast resin to make lots and lots of copies of these bricks, and stuck them to the walls of the house. When this was done I could paint them, age them and distress them and add details such as moss and lichen.
To make the grass, I bought 2 metres squared of dark brown fur. I then painted this fur using green acrylic paint, taking care to not allow the paint to spread right through to the base of the fabric. I needed the paint to just colour the tips of the brown fur. Doing this meant that their would be an underlying layer of brown fur, which under camera, looked like dirt. This grass looked great, and I was happy with the results, but it meant that I had to be really careful not to touch the grass too much as it would cause really distracting boiling.
To put the finishing touches to my set I used spray paints to add mossy highlights to the grass, autumnal burgundys to the leaves and applied some hints of orange to the trees to make them look like they had lichen growing on them. This added some subtle contrasts in colour to my set and made it look a little more authentic. Spray Paint is quite hazardous, so I had to wear a dust mask preventing me from breathing in the fumes.
The little boys map was made using steel foil that I then sandwiched between a tiny printed map of Cornwall. The foil allowed for a really flexible range of movement, meaning that I could animate the paper so that it movement quite realistically. I made 3 maps in total, one to stay completely intact, another to be eaten by the beast, and another to tear into the tatters that fall from the boys hands after the struggle with the beast. The fact that the foil was steel also meant that I could use a small magnet to attached the map to the 3mm screw within the puppets hands.
The beasts kazoo was sculpted from Milliput, then painted with acrylics so that it looked more like a gnarled piece of wood. A 3mm screw was sculpted into the body of the kazoo, which meant that it could be firmly fixed to the puppets hand. I was happy with the sculpt, but I should probably have used a lighter material than Milliput as its weight caused some issues while I was animating. The length of the instrument meant that there was a lot of leverage on his wrist and the puppet could only just support its weight.
The rucksack that the boy wears was really quite tricky to make... I hadn't done much sewing before and was unaware just how difficult it would be to sew through leather. I quickly developed blisters on my fingers as it was incredibly difficult to push the needle through the thick leather. Once I had sewn the tiny bag together, I then distressed it with sand paper to make it look more used. I also filled the bag with lightweight sculpey so that when I gripped it, the bag was solid. This would avoid boiling and also provide a solid place to grip the puppet when he was wearing the bag.
The beasts kazoo was sculpted from Milliput, then painted with acrylics so that it looked more like a gnarled piece of wood. A 3mm screw was sculpted into the body of the kazoo, which meant that it could be firmly fixed to the puppets hand. I was happy with the sculpt, but I should probably have used a lighter material than Milliput as its weight caused some issues while I was animating. The length of the instrument meant that there was a lot of leverage on his wrist and the puppet could only just support its weight.
The rucksack that the boy wears was really quite tricky to make... I hadn't done much sewing before and was unaware just how difficult it would be to sew through leather. I quickly developed blisters on my fingers as it was incredibly difficult to push the needle through the thick leather. Once I had sewn the tiny bag together, I then distressed it with sand paper to make it look more used. I also filled the bag with lightweight sculpey so that when I gripped it, the bag was solid. This would avoid boiling and also provide a solid place to grip the puppet when he was wearing the bag.