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

All the twos Titty2!

We've made 22 of these things... how weird!! Not much to say about this one really except that it was heaps of fun to make so watch it with eyeballs! Oh and Ryan is the voice of the hunter and did a bang up job!!

IN OTHER SPARKLE NEWS!!!

The peeps at What Now wanted to run a Sparkle Friends competition and we suggested kids draw themselves with Gungi as a Sparkle Friend, and that they would win a "one-of-a-kind" Gungi Plush Toy!! They liked the idea and we got Karla to sew it!!

Check out more pics here!!

2008 = New Sparkle Friends!!!

So after last years 10 episodes almost killed us, we thought we'd never be doing any more ever again, but after some careful thought and contract negotiation we decided we couldn't let the kids down came up with 10 new storylines!!
We still only get about a week on animation per each episode but we really tried to step it up this year and reckon these are, hopefully you'll agree, our best episodes to date. This first one was a bit tricky to begin with as we had to try and come up with an origin for the newest Sparkle Friend. At the end of last year 2 of the presenters, Richie and Tamati, left the show What Now, and thus we were down 2 Sparkle Friends. They then introduced a new presenter, Tumehe, and we had the task of fitting him into the Sparkle Friends "universe", which, thankfully, has been far easier than we thought as he's a really funny dude that really gets what we're trying to do.

Here's some of the design process...

And here's some process work from the episode...

Another cool thing about this years episodes is the show's new title sequence. It was a lot of fun to make and really makes it feel like a proper cartoon! We even managed to call in a favour from NZ Hip Hop superstar P-Money, to create a Sparkle Friends theme remix.

So here's the finished episode...

And it just keeps coming....

That's right we have even more new stuff to show off!! So here it is... being the reigning Auckland 48hours champs we were asked by the organisers of the comp to put together a short explaining what the 48 hours is. They then asked us if we could make it anaglyph 3D. So having never made anything like that before we, of course, said "Dam straight we can"!! It proved to be a bit tricky at first, seeing as we had to keep in mind that it was going to be projected onto a movie screen but full credit has to go to Tim who, as usual, figured out how to do it!!

The response has been really cool, and for those who didn't get to see it in 3D (it was an Auckland exclusive) now's your chance to check it out!! And if ya don't have 3D glasses, just use the ones we've supplied below!

The Monster's Guide to V 48hours in 3D! from Mukpuddy on Vimeo.

And here it is in 2D...