I’ve always been utterly charmed by the films of Aardman Animation, and I’m always eager to see what they’ll do next. From the Wallace & Gromit films to the sly Chicken Run to even their CGI stuff like Flushed Away and Arthur Christmas, their movies feature a warm blend of comedy and heart that always make for a memorable experience. Their latest film, Early Man, seems to follow in that line, and earlier this year, I got to visit Aardman to see the development of the movie.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Early Man, the story follows Dug (voiced by Eddie Redmayne) and his small tribe of simple but well-meaning cavemen. When their land is invaded by the citizens of the Bronze Age, Dug challenges their ruler to a game of the Bronze Age’s most cherished institution, soccer. If Dug’s inexperienced tribe wins, they get to keep their land, but if they lose, they lose everything. Based on what I saw, it’s far more Shaolin Soccer than The Croods.

During my visit to Aardman, I learned 25 cool things about the production. Read on to learn more about Early Man, which opens February 16, 2018. Click here for my interview with director Nick Park.

• We began our visit with reel showing the past 40 years of work from Aardman, which has shot all of their movies in Bristol, England.
• The way their production schedule works, they have about 30-40 units working at the same time. Each unit spends an entire day creating one second of animation. So at the end of the day, you ideally have 30-40 seconds of new footage of your 80-90 minute movie.
• This is Nick Park’s first film since the Oscar-winning The Curse of the Were-Rabbit.
• This is Park’s most ambitious project to date due to the large amount of characters, and the more “epic” look.
• The film has been shooting since September 2016, and it opens in the U.K. in January.
• Dug, the protagonist, is very optimistic, naïve, and full of energy. His pet hog is named Hognob, and although Hognob doesn’t talk (Park does all of Hognob’s sounds), it’s not the same dynamic as Wallace & Gromit.
• Bobnar is the chief of Dug’s tribe and is voiced by Timothy Spall. He’s an affable leader, more like a dad than a chief. He always wants to play everything safe, which puts him at odds with the more daring Dug. He’s the oldest member of the tribe at the ripe old age of 32
• Park wanted the tribe members to have an “earthy” look, to appear that they’re made of clay.

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  Other members of the tribe include Asbo (Johnny Vegas), who’s a nervous ball of energy; Grubup, who wants to eat everything; Magma (Selena Griffiths), who’s an overbearing mother to Treebor (Richard Ayoade), a gentle giant; Eemak, who no one can understand what he’s saying; Gravelle, who struggles with prehistoric life due to being a hypochondriac; and Barry (Mark Williams), a very simple caveman whose best friend is Mr. Rock, a tablet with a smiley face on it.
• Outside the tribe, in the Bronze Age, the prominent characters are Goona (Maisie Williams), the female heroine who’s feisty and has a great sense of justice, but who’s limited and suppressed by her Bronze Age world; and then there’s the villain, Lord Nooth (Tom Hiddleston), the manager of the Bronze Age town, who only cares about money and Bronze. His sidekick is Dino, a simpering butler who does have some morals.
• When the movie begins, life in the tribe’s valley is good. The valley is surrounded by badlands and beyond that is the volcanic area. The Bronze Age invades quickly with everything they’ve got including armor-clad woolly mammoths. The tribe has to flee towards the badlands, but Dug fights backs, gets caught up in the Bronze Age army, and taken back to their territory.
• Once there, Dug sees all their modern inventions, gets swept up into a crowd, and sees the stadium where they play football. The Bronze Age reveres football like it’s a religion. However, Dug gets exposed, and is forced to challenge Nooth to a game of football where he can win his valley back. Dug tries to teach his tribe how to play football, but struggles, and when he and Hognob go back to the Bronze Age to get more balls, they meet up with Goona, who agrees to help him.

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  With the premise explained to us, we were then shown three clips that were in various stages of development.
• The first clip has us meeting the tribe, which is very cute as they struggle to hunt a rabbit for dinner. It’s immediately endearing and you can see why you’re going to root for these underdogs.
• The next clip had us meeting Nooth, which has Hiddleston doing a French accent (it’s delightful). Rob Brydon voices a message bird that functions as early version of Skype. In the scene, the queen (via the message bird), is displeased with the wager Nooth has made with Dug.
• The final clip has Dug stealing balls and meeting Goona while Hognob massages and sings to an unsuspecting Nooth. It’s incredibly silly, but still funny and charming.
• We then leave the screening room and learn more about the production. There are 35 animators working across 37 unites, and they’ve never had this many sets before. The Pirates had about 30 and the Shaun the Sheep series has about fifteen. When they wrap on Early Man, they’ll go straight into production on the Shaun the Sheep sequel.
• We move to the model-making workshop, which has 22 people working in it. There, we learn how each model can be broken apart and put back together to display different movements and expressions.

The production is spread across four studios, each the size of an Olympic swimming pool.

We then move to the art department where we get a look at what the soccer stadium exterior will look like. It’s a 22,000-seat stadium, and it’s the only part of the film that will be rendered in CGI since doing it practically isn’t feasible. The exterior of the stadium is to scale for the characters, but they cheat a bit on the size of the interior.

We then move to one of the sets where we see characters entering the stadium and a pair of guards ringing a gong. It’s 340 frames and capturing it will take two days. The animator tells us it requires more concentration than patience, and some shots take longer than others. For example, the 40-second shot of Hognob massaging Nooth took 9 weeks.

The most interesting aspect of the production for me was the boards. The corkboards are on a swivel with each board representing a month. Look at a board and you’ll see a grid. On one axis, you have the day of the month and on the other axis you have the set. The square where those two meet is the shot that’s supposed to be done for that day. Every single shot (in storyboard form) is pinned on the board, and rubber bands show the movements of the animators. It’s a fascinating way to keep track of where everyone is supposed to be and what they’re supposed to be doing.

As animator Will Becher explains to us, they’ve got to get it right the first time, every time because there’s simply no room for error.

Closing Thoughts

My visit to Aardman was as wonderful as I’d hoped. I’d only visited one stop-motion studio before when I went to LAIKA for The Boxtrolls, and while there were certainly similarities in their work-style, each studio had its own personality even though they both make outstanding movies. As for Early Man, everything I saw made me eager to see the finished project, and I’m confident that Aardman has yet another winner on its hands.