Bottersnikes & Gumbles - Props and Set Pieces Design

Bottersnikes & Gumbles – Behind the scenes of animation.

Last year I had the pleasure of revisiting my roots in making sets for film and TV.
Making miniature sets is my absolute favourite job. Everything must be made from scratch and it is really incredible watching a whole environment spring to life. The level of detail that can be put in is limited only by the imagination of the concept artist and it is so much fun creating each individual part.

I was brought on board by Mighty Nice Animation to build the sets and major prop pieces for a gorgeous re imagining of the children’s classic Bottersnikes and Gumbles by S.A Wakefield.

Originally set in the Dubbo tip, the re-jigged version has been brought into the 21st century with some additions to the story lines and a more international flavour, but still holds true to the Australian children’s classic.

Bottersnikes & Gumbles - Props and Set Pieces Design

Bottersnikes & Gumbles – Props and Set pieces

Myself and Scott Tansely created from scratch a large number of miniature pieces for the production, which were then 3D scanned in ultra high quality, then pieced back in to a digital environment.
Pieces were hand made from a variety of materials, including timber, high density foam, tin sheeting, resin, clay and plaster.
Each piece was lovingly crafted, then painstakingly painted and aged to get the right junk yard feel.

Bottersnikes & Gumbles - Props and Set Pieces Design

Bottersnikes & Gumbles – Props and Set pieces

The Gumbles are known to seek out the best discarded stuff from the tip, and then patch, fix and reappropriate it to suit their needs.
The Bottersnikes are inherently lazy, smelly and dirty so the items they collect are quite different. They eat old mattress stuffing, and build big ‘steam punk’ contraptions.
The finished product looks amazing! All of our props with their rich textures and colours blend seamlessly into the digital elements creating a real feast for the eyes.

Bottersnikes and Gumbles is currently screening on 7two at 7.30 am EST.

Take a look at “The making of Bottersnikes & Gumbles” featuring some of my work.