The SAA are very pleased to be supporting the World Illustration Awards by sponsoring The SAA Agents Award for New Talent.
animation 
Jean-Pierre Le Roux was commissioned by 360i to create a series of cool characters for Coca-Cola Freestyle. Jean-Pierre illustrated and produced six animations for this exciting social media and web campaign, which is live now.
Bestselling author/illustrator, Jonny Duddle and Cyber Group Studios, presented the Gigantosaurus trailer based on Jonny's picture book at Cartoon Forum 2015 in Toulouse this month. The forum is an event where all the great and the good of the European animation world gather together to pitch their projects to broadcasters and investors.
The campaign aims to keep children safe on UK's beaches and comprises of a safety pack called 'Hold Tight, Hand Up!' and a music video to support the message. Targeted at the slightly older child who loves to bodyboard, the free pack is full of top tips for parents, a wave guide for children and animated stickers they can attach to bodyboards and beach bags. Duncan created the cool characters and all the art for the different goodies in the pack. The animation was also designed by Duncan; he then directed two 2D animators from Sun & Moon Studios in Bristol with Proximity providing the music and VFX. Watch the video here.
We are big music fans here at HF which makes this project by Paul Blow for VH1 even more of a pleasure to bring you. Paul was asked to create the visuals for a new animated short for VH1.com titled “The Complete History of Heavy Metal: Fingers Bloody Fingers” which tells the amazing story of the one and only Toni Iommi.
This instalment sees Paul’s wonderful mark making brought to life by animator Kee Koo as the infamous guitar player explains how he made the best out of a bad situation. Be sure to see the short here – https://vimeo.com/120351437
Little fun fact: Did you know Tony’s middle name is FRANK?
Paul Blow is represented by Handsome Frank
Commissioned by Sanrio and The Japanese American National Museum, Tado were asked to create this animation to celebrate Hello Kitty's 40th anniversary. Taking about two months to complete, everything was created in Tado's basement in Sheffield, with a bit of help from their friends Alex Veitch (lighting advisor), Nick Hunter (wood-wizard) and Ben Ridley (music and sound design).
The animation can be viewed here: https://www.debutart.com/news/tado-hello-kitty-40th-anniversary
Tado is represented by Début Art
Illustrator and flash animator Luella Wright was asked to provide the background illustrations and animations for Justin's World, a series of interactive learning and play apps presented by Justin Fletcher, the nation's favourite pre-school entertainer. These were selected as 'editors choice' by Apple and No.1 in the education category.
“The illustrations deserve a mention because you can tell that they have been done with love and care. The texture in the smallest of things, such as the leaves, is beautiful...Parents and children will delight in working through the story. The app is a feast for little eyes, ears and brains!" - The Educational App Store
Luella Wright is represented by Phosphor Art.
Kristyna Litten's delightful penguin character features in Aardman's recent animated ad for iglü mouth ulcer gel ordered through agency Bray Leino. The gel works by forming a shelter over mouth ulcers and sticks in place to soothe the pain and help it heal. Aardman Animations used a simple 2D drawn animation to tell the story of a penguin whose whole world is thrown out of kilter. Kristyna worked closely with director Steve Harding-Hill to develop this very cute but hapless penguin.
Check out the video on Bray Leino's page on You Tube
Kristyna Litten is represented by Arena
The very talented Aleksei Bitskoff (represented by Arena) is responsible for designing NatWest's new piggy characters, Pigby and Friends for the launch of their children's savings account. NatWest ran a competition for kids to design a piggy bank, the winner was 13 year old Kwamina Longdon and, with the help from the folks at Aardman Animations, Aleksei was asked to base his characters on Kwamina's drawing and develop them further to include a fashionista pig, a skater dude, an artistic pig, a nerdy one and a sporty one, along with Pigby "the little helper" who loves saving money.
Nathan Aardvark played Art Director and Lead Illustrator on this Emmy Award winning title sequence for Starz's 'Da Vinci's Demons.'
The recent Emmys saw Nathan and the team crowned with the 'Outstanding Main Title Design' award for the show. Talking of the commission, a very proud Nathan says "The job was to create short animated illustrations to go on top of footage from the show. I was supplied with various clips and painstakingly sketched over the top of each frame....frame by frame! In the end I had hundreds of drawings which were then composited later in post production. I tried to keep it close to the classic style of Da Vinci as much as possible."
Another cool feature of the title is the crab cannon; when the music is played backwards the melody is the same. Watch the titles.
Nathan Aardvark is represented by Illustration
Francisco Miranda recently received the Pictoplasma Residency Award from The General Public Gallery in Berlin, where his superb work has received great critical acclaim. Here are some photographs from the exhibition, click here to see the animation Francisco created in celebration of his residency.
