London 2012 Olympic mascots Wenlock and Mandeville were recently launched with a short CG animation, OUT OF A RAINBOW, written by Michael Morpurgo, produced by Barnaby Spurrier and directed by Mario Cavalli.
The mascots were developed and designed by Iris London over an 18 month period, while the production of the 3 min 45 sec animated film was completed at breakneck pace, from design and storyboard to completion and launch in just 10 weeks.
All pre and post production was done in London, with Cavalli designing the non-mascot characters, working with Teddy Hall on maquettes and Pete Western on storyboard. Production design and backgrounds were by Neil Campbell Ross, editing by Richard Graham, with final grading and output at UNIT.
The animation was done by Crystal CG, the company responsible for the Beijing 2008 Olympics animations and graphics, through their offices in London and Beijing.
Original score and orchestration by Tommy Hewitt Jones. Voice over was read by Simon Russell Beale.
Within 48 hours of launch, the movie on the official LOCOG mascots’ site had already clocked up 750,000 unique hits, while the same video was the ‘most watched’ on YouTube worldwide in the same period.
