2015 saw the 500th anniversary of Hampton Court Palace. To mark this, Historic Royal Palaces launched Movie Maker Mission (MMM), which brought Aardman and thousands of children together to co-create an animated yarn, telling 500 years of history in five minutes. The project sought to be collaborative in every respect from storyboarding to soundscapes and to provide a regular and accessible programme of high-quality and creative learning activities for schools, families and young people throughout the year.
11,000 children and young people contributed to the film. Working with professional presenters and animators participants learned animation and drawing techniques, met characters from the past and explored the historic stories, spaces and artefacts before creating pictures, sounds, voiceovers and music for the film. Audiences participated online via the MMM website where there were competitions, an interactive timeline, blog posts and downloadable activities.
A big challenge was asset production: equipping participants with the skills, tools, stories and stimulus to produce assets that were creative and authentic whilst meeting production standards and timetable. As the assets were created, they were fed through to Aardman, who began the painstaking process of selecting, cutting and pasting thousands of images, sounds, voices and music onto the master storyboard. The result is ls"Royals, Rascals and Usrs" ndash; a childrs"s eye perspective on some of the palacers"s best known personalities: from King Henry VIII to Sir Bradley Wiggins, who won Olympic gold at Hampton Court in 2012.
The film was shown at the palace in a special 360 degree ls"igloors" cinema, screened at International Film Festivals, in cinemas and online.