Merry Christmas - High Score!!

Hi folks!

Well, It's 9.30pm on Christmas Eve here in New Zealand. The world outside has suddenly gone very quiet. It doesn't seem to matter what age I am, Christmas just works for me. I get that strange feeling like I should be in bed with the covers pulled up tight so Santa doesn't see I'm still awake and excited about morning. Guess that makes me a Christmas nerd.

I really hope everyone has a safe and merry Christmas.
But before I go, the Muks and I want to leave you with a special message from the Sparkle Friends.



Oh yeah, and Merry Christmas to the other Muks, Jeremy, Alex and Tim. Cheers for a great year fellas. I look forward to more cartoon shinanigans next year. Tis an honour to work with you.

- Ryan

Mukky Christmas!

Hi Everyone.

Well, it's the end of the year already. How strange. I'm sure we missed out a few months. Does anyone remember August?

2009 is looking to be a corker for Mukpuddy. We have a 4th series of Sparkle Friends kicking off the year, followed by a few new projects that should be pretty exciting.

Thanks to everyone who has supported us over 2008. We hope you all have a safe and merry Christmas.

Oh yeah, it wouldn't be a Mukpuddy Christmas without a boozed up Santa.

Something new... finally!

Sorry it's been a while but here's something we just whipped up, it was an idea Jeremy had the other morning so we decided to make it...

More new stuffs coming soon!

DIRTY 30!!!!

Can it be? Is it true? Surely not! The 30th episode of Sparkle Friends already? Yes it is.......so stop hassling me ;) <---- (That's a winky face on its side. Just so you know I'm not really angry with you)

This episode was a hard one to make in the short amount of time we have to make them. Mainly thanks to Alex's gargantuan backgrounds slowing everything down. But we forgive him because they look bloody swell!! Nice one.

We've started throwing around ideas for a 4th season. So if all goes well, we'll be back working on more soon and you'll be seeing new episodes sometime next year.

Oh....another thing....this episode also features a pretty nifty Gungi plush that you may have seen us post about a few weeks ago (also see photo below!). If you want to enquire about purchasing one drop an electronic mail (email for those hipsters) to Alex and Karla of Geek Freeks fame. They'll see ya right!

Sparkle Friends goes Noir...

So... we're nearly at the end of this years run of Sparkle Friends and it feels kinda weird! To see where Sparkle Friends started and where it's ended up is very cool. It's pretty much a totally different show, at least in how we make it!

For some reason this episode didn't feel like it was going be a fun one to make. We cut together the animatic and it just didn't seem to be firing like the other episodes. However, due to fast approaching deadlines, we rushed it through and gotta say...it surprised the crap out of us! It turned out to be a bunch 'o fun and people seem to really dig it!! Much credit to Jeremy for scripting a nifty little mystery. Bravo!!

Mukpuddy on 20/20!!

Last year after we won the Auckland 48hours we were contacted by 20/20 New Zealand and they said they wanted to do a story about us.
It has taken a while to come together, but that's partly due to us having so much on. What with our trip to The States, new Sparkle Friends, more 48 Hours stuff, the It's The Pughs pilot - it's been a pretty full-on year!
So last night it aired on tv here and we couldn't be happier. We're very grateful they found us interesting enough in the first place, but also happy with how cool the finished piece is! We were really nervous about being on telly but now it has been and gone and we're super stoked.
So, a big thanks to Cara, Pete and all the 20/20 team, you guys rock! Check it out..... WATCH US!!!

Witchy-Poooo...

This episode is definitely one of favs, for one gag in particular, and I think you'll know which one it is once you've watched it. Once again Ryan provided an awesome voice for our additional character, even though he couldn't quite get the "whistles" down when he was in the voice recording booth...

How Now Sea Cow!!

So one thing we've noticed about cartoons these days... not enough Sea Cows!






ALSO...
Here's some cool artwork we received recently. It was for a competition where kids could win the hand made Gungi Plush Toy by drawing themselves as a Sparkle Friend with Gungi. It's such a blast seeing how kids interpret the characters...

Mo Shmo!

Once again this episode was a monster to make but it was well worth it and has turned out to be one of our absolute favs! When we watch these back it's really hard to remember how the hell the story evolved into something so frickin' weird, but thankfully it totally works! We even enlisted the help of our good buddy Rich Simpson for a cameo at the start, as the world's next great action hero...

As always, here are some sketchy-poos....

Super Spew Action!!!!

Ever since we started making Sparkle Friends we've wanted to do a super hero episode but could never really figure out how it'd be possible to simplify an idea down to 3 minutes. Well with the introduction this year of the new Sparkle Friend, Tu, we thought we'd give it a shot! We actually made this episode 2nd as we knew it'd be a "beast" due to the city backgrounds we'd have to make up and other such carry on that makes it hard to put together one of these in a week! The city shot at the start was a killer and definitely stretched our deadline to its max!!

Robots Rule!!

Yip, here's another one! Hope ya like...


And some drawings...







ON A SIDE NOTE...

A little while ago the peeps over at Dumm Comics asked us to contribute a comic to their weekend slot. We're super stoked to be considered as all of the artists over there are pretty much our heroes. It's a little daunting but hopefully it'll go well - you'll be able to check it out this weekend so be sure to head on over!!

Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner couldn't do this...

This episode was another really fun one to make - the crazier ones always seem to be. Ryan did another awesome job voicing the scene stealing 'bodyguard' and it all stems from an encounter Jeremy had with a shoe store security guard on our trip to the US last year! The Guard took his shoe protecting job very seriously and quickly put an end to Jeremy's photo taking in a very tough yet casual fashion.

With gun on hip and no eye contact, he smugly but firmly remarked:

"No taking photos of the shoes please. Thank you for understanding..."

Ryan did a spot-on impression so we knew we'd have to put him in something one day, and that one day has arrived...

Here's the shoe store where the inspiration began....

And here's the post shoe store laughing...

Here are some production sketches....

And here's the final episode