Category Archives: Uncategorized

St Leonard’s Surgery – Wellbeing Project

Yesterday saw the first of two sessions I’m leading at the surgery, as part of a project with Magic Carpet. It was a lot of fun, with much chatting and laughter as well as some very lovely monoprints  being made by all the participants, (and some rather hilarious caricatures of me and Amelia by Fran):

Animation Club – 2

Some mini-films the kids made at last night’s animation club, using all their own characters and backgrounds. Animation is so good for unlocking children’s imaginations. We use Stop Motion Studio Pro on my iPad mini – it’s a brilliant free resource. We’ll be adding sound next week (all in the app) 🙂 Smart!

Animation Club at Teignmouth Library

After a jam-packed session at TAAG on Tuesday, next on the bill is Animation Club at Teignmouth Library, kicking off next Monday from 4-5pm. See below for more details 🙂   Our theme will be Mythical Creatures (aka monsters!) and the kids will get to create and animate their own special mythical creature, making upContinue reading “Animation Club at Teignmouth Library”

Simon Otto – Character design in “How to train Your Dragon”

I’m a massive fan of both “How to Train Your Dragon” films, mainly because the characters are so well developed, entertaining and believable, and character design and development are an important element in the animation and comics workshops I run.  So I found this interview with Simon Otto, head of character animation at Dreamworks, reallyContinue reading “Simon Otto – Character design in “How to train Your Dragon””

We need to keep arts teaching in state schools!

Rufus Norris, Director of the National Theatre made great arguments for keeping arts teaching in state schools in his recent Guardian opinion piece, here it is if you didn’t see it. Arts are VITAL for children’s development, improving observational skills, lateral thinking/problem solving, fine motor skills, to name only a few benefits. All private schoolsContinue reading “We need to keep arts teaching in state schools!”

February – March Animation Workshops in Teignmouth

Two  Small World events are coming up in February: a one-off animation workshop during half term celebrating the release of the new Aardman film “Early Man”, and an animation club kicking off at Teignmouth library after half term 🙂 “Early Person” Animation Workshop To celebrate the release of “Early Man” come and create and animateContinue reading “February – March Animation Workshops in Teignmouth”

Happy New year from Small World

Having finally emerged from a post-xmas and new year slumber, Small World projects have now started in earnest 🙂 Last week saw the start of The Alice in Wonderland Drama project for magic Carpet in Honiton. I’m helping the guys design and make animal puppets and masks to use in their performance. During the firstContinue reading “Happy New year from Small World”