Peter Peake is ready to lose. His film Humdrum is nominated for an Oscar for Best Animated Short, but the 29-year-old director/animator—who freelances regularly at Aardman Animations, Bristol—doesn’t fancy his chances.
"I think the Old Man and the Sea’s going to get it, from the buzz that I’ve heard," Peake said cheerfully. "But it’s so surprising to be going, and you can’t rule out the chance that you might actually have to stand up there!"
The story of two bored shadow puppets, the seven-minute film has been a hit on the children’s film festival circuit throughout Europe and the U.S. Humdrum has pocketed almost two dozen prizes, including the McLaren Award for best animation at the Edinburgh International Film Festival, the Grand Prize at the ’99 New York Children’s International Film Festival and the Public Choice Award at the British Animation Awards on March 9.
Though Peake is modest in his expectations, the track record for Aardman Animations is encouraging: It is generally regarded as England’s most famous animation studio, and also the home of Oscar winners Wallace and Gromit. With Aardman’s seven Oscar nominations and three wins (for animator/director Nick Park’s Creature Comforts, The Wrong Trousers and A Close Shave), Peake is a strong contender.
Humdrum’s look is also a departure from the clay-based, stop-motion animation for which Aardman is famous. Instead of the bold colors that characterize many of the studio’s productions, Humdrum has a muted palette that keeps with the appearance of the shadow puppets themselves.
Peake’s road to the Oscar nomination was paved with clay. At the Bath College of Higher Education, Bath, England, Peake majored in graphic design but specialized in animation. He recalled, "When I took it up, there weren’t any animation shooters there as such." While this posed some difficulties, "I had all the equipment to myself, so I didn’t have to fight with any other students for studio time! By the third year, I was
doing it full-time. I didn’t get any kind of formal training, but it’s [equally] valuable to have the time and space and equipment to make your mistakes," Peake said.
"The first few projects had me trying as many different things as I could just to work out where I wanted to go. And then my third and final film was purely 3-D. By that stage, I’d worked out what kind of animation I wanted to do."
Lucky man
Within a month of graduating in June of ’92, Peake was hired as a freelance animator/director at Aardman, where he has been ever since. He dismisses the tribute to his talents as luck: "I turned up with my show reel and it was really good timing, because Aardman was doing commercials for Frisps Crisps, ["Firing Squad," "Psycho" and "Train" via GGT Advertising, London], and the agency actually wanted to use newcomers on these spots. It was quite a rare chance! I haven’t heard of that happening since. It was great for me; I got my foot in the door straight away."
Peake has made a number of spots through Aardman, including Ruffles Potato Chips’ "Poker," "Tug of War" and "Neighborhood" for Young & Rubicam, New York, and Dairylea Dunkers’ "Dynamite" and "Bell" for J. Walter Thompson, London. The latter featured Pib and Pog, Peake’s Plasticine heroes from his first eponymously titled film. Peake added that the Mr. Potato-Head look-alikes are expected to return to spots in the U.K. later this year.
Peake is currently exploring new techniques: He’s spent the past six months mastering the Web animation Flash program from San Francisco-based Macromedia, in conjunction with the lip syncing program Magpie created by Third Wish Software & Animation, Portland, Ore. Peake is enthusiastic about Web animation: "I’m starting to look at good quality bits of animation on the Net, and I think that’s really exciting that you can get your animation out there to what really is the biggest audience."
He has also completed a two-minute test piece which, he said, "I’m really happy with. Now I’d like to find someone in commercials or short films who’s interested in this style. I’ve got a sketchbook full of ideas for films, and at the moment I’m approaching people to see if anyone’s interested."
While he expects to see more computer and Web animation in the near future, "I really hope the 3-D stuff doesn’t suffer, because I enjoy working in that way a lot more. It’s a lovely way of making films, being part of a crew rather than staring at a screen [by yourself]."
Despite the nomination and critical acclaim, Peake has yet to be inundated with offers. "It’s not a case of ‘the phone hasn’t stopped ringing!’ I’m still looking for a big juicy offer," he said ruefully. Disney, you have been warned.
Being an Oscar nominee hasn’t made Peake turn his back on spots, either. He laughed, "Hopefully commercials will still come in through Aardman so I can go and get back in touch with the Plasticine!"
Aardman’s rep in the U.S. is Nancy Jacobs.
