Houses in Motion was called upon by Nick Jr. to produce a playful broadcast package that brightens its young viewers' winter with a Warm & Fuzzy' feeling. The integrated series of promos, IDs, and bumpers features stylized versions of established characters from the network's popular children's programming and introduces a new crew of adorable critters. Houses bringing their message to life through stop motion animation that echoes the characters' organic, handcrafted qualities.
The Brooklyn-based design and animation creative studio helmed the production, turning around over 20 stop motion vignettes and dozens of animated graphic elements in less than five weeks. A meticulous pipeline enabled the company to take the package seamlessly from conceptual development, storyboarding, shooting stop motion animation, motion graphics, and visual effects, meeting the tight deadline and delivering a final product that engages and entertains its young audience.
Nick Jr. came to us with a super fun concept that had a lot of moving parts and entrusted us with bringing their ideas together, says John Earle, co-founder of Houses, and producer and director of the package. We took the reigns of the project and jumped right in, evaluating the creative and setting up our animation, and postproduction teams - while putting in place the kind of efficient workflow and procedures that a package of this magnitude demands. Over a very short pre-production schedule, Houses came up with an approach that would allow the qualities of the 4 tall stars of the production to shine through.
After creating the boards, Earle prepped his shooting and postproduction teams, while keeping in constant communication with Nick Jr.'s fabricator, Julia Rosner in LA. Her artists made tweaks along the way to bring everything into the scope of Houses' production process and customized the characters and set pieces to Earle's specs just in time for the first day of shooting.
Young viewers were already familiar with Nick Jr.'s established characters, like Dora, Blaze, and Marshall, so Houses needed to stay consistent with their personalities. However, the studio crafted personas for each member of the new menagerie of animal characters, developing unique identities and traits with nuances that played into the storyline of the vignettes. The penguin became a confident diva; the polar bear emerged as a bit of a bumbling, lovable oaf; the best buddies, fox and rabbit, are carefree and always find something to chuckle about.
Earle mapped out an aggressive shooting schedule for the 20 vignettes, as well as some additional variation. Houses in Motion's fluid production capabilities allowed the turnkey studio to shoot four to six vignettes each day, and stay on schedule.
The fantastic team we assembled enabled us to make this a reality, says Earle. Our longtime collaborator, Chris Webb was our first choice for DP. Chris' studio is designed to accommodate a stop motion production of this scale. We know we can always rely on him to elevate a project with his technical dexterity and creative problem solving.
Webb proposed a magnetic tie-down rig for the puppets, which worked flawlessly and saved precious time. It allowed the team to reuse the same sets without having to change out damaged surfaces after every scene - and enabled quick reconfiguration of the environment for the next set up, keeping the production running at a good pace.
Houses views stop-motion animation more like a performance than a craft, says Earle. After discussing the personality and history of each character with our animators, they quickly got inside their world and were able to find the essence within these puppets.
The team blocked out shots together referencing their shooting boards, and the action began to set its own pace. Earle and his team were able to set up a scene, frame it up, block it out, and get the go-ahead to begin shooting - in just a few minutes. Then the animators began the exacting process of bringing these characters to life, manipulating their movements, one frame at a time. During the shoot Houses in Motion's art department was at the ready, prepping characters and set pieces. Occasionally, while dressing a new scene, they found that additional elements were needed. Earle would bang out a quick sketch, and a few moments later, they'd have it on set.
As soon as the first day of shooting wrapped, the raw frames were brought back to Houses studio, and the postproduction process began. Files were processed in Adobe Lightroom, allowing for initial color correction, and conforming the images into high res sequences that fed smoothly into its Adobe After Effects compositing software Houses' compositors jumped right into rig removal and cleanup and kept pace with the shoot.
Once the cleanup was completed Houses in Motion focused on adding additional elements and animation, like falling snow, lighting effects, and snowballs for one of the characters to juggle. The visual effects were kept subtle to ensure that they wouldn't overpower the handmade feel of the stop motion, so there was a lot of dialing back to maintain that understated look. A little twinkle emanating from the tree lights went a long way, and just a touch of falling snow was all it took to keep most of the scenes playful and alive.
While VFX and editorial on the stop motion animation continued, the team also began gearing up to work on the comprehensive graphics package. Nick Jr.'s designers provided a variety of 2D elements, which Houses' animators brought to life. The motion design was kept gentle but lively to create a subtle playfulness tailored to Nick Jr.'s pre-school demographic. Dozens of setups were created and versioned out to deliver over 70 unique elements for the graphics package with th
Most recent headlines
09/11/2025
Dalet today announced a transformative leap forward for media operations: Agentic Artificial Intelligence (AI) that unifies the Dalet ecosystem under one natura...
23/10/2025
A deadline is looming for a new carriage deal between Verizon's Fios TV and Nexstar, with both Verizon and the pay TV-backed American Television Alliance bl...
23/10/2025
NEW YORK During a high-profile session at NAB Show New York, new survey data was shared that revealed significant public concern over artificial intelligence (A...
23/10/2025
BELLEVUE, Wash. and NEW YORK Fox Weather has tapped T-Mobile has as its preferred communications provider and announced that all Fox Weather reporters are being...
23/10/2025
PBS and Amazon Web Services have announced the network is using generative AI to provide enhanced search results to viewers on the PBS App and PBS LearningMedia...
22/10/2025
Prime Video Inks Deal To Present NFL Black Friday Game Worldwide By SVG Staff
Wednesday, October 22, 2025 - 10:06 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story ...
22/10/2025
NBA Tip-Off: ESPN Goes 1080p HDR End-to-End, Flipping HDR Switch on REMI and REM...
22/10/2025
FloSports Empowers Division II, III Athletic Departments With Turnkey Production...
22/10/2025
Wall Street Video Summit Debuts, Bringing Together 200 Financial Enterprise Vide...
22/10/2025
Dueling Pianos: International Chopin Piano Competition Is as Competitive as a Ba...
22/10/2025
In 1995, a young Colombian artist released an album that would change Latin pop ...
22/10/2025
Over the past few months, a photovoltaic system has been installed on a three-he...
22/10/2025
The Orion spacecraft for NASA's Artemis II mission is stacked on the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket in High Bay 3 of the Vehicle Assembly Building at Kenn...
22/10/2025
L3Harris' Hybrid SATCOM is resilient by design, offering path diversity that eliminates vulnerabilities by routing data across the best available networks i...
22/10/2025
WASHINGTON, D.C. Organizers of NAB Show New York said they are expecting more than 12,000 registered attendees from about 100 countries along with 260 exhibitor...
22/10/2025
WASHINGTON, D.C The organizers of The 2025 NAB Show New York have announced that they are expecting more than 12,000 registered attendees from about 100 countr...
22/10/2025
Masque Sound, a leading theatrical sound reinforcement, installation and design company, supplied an extensive gear package of professional-grade equipment for ...
22/10/2025
Lightware, a global leader in signal management and AV connectivity solutions, is seeing strong market momentum for the UCX-3x3-TPX-RX20, a compact transmitter-...
22/10/2025
MELVILLE, N.Y. Chyron has released PAINT 10.2, the latest update for its telestration platform, adding support for SMPTE ST 2110 IP workflows, expanding brandin...
22/10/2025
WASHINGTON Run3TV today said NBCUniversal is joining as an investor in the ATSC 3.0 Framework Authority, which develops the Run3TV NextGen TV application platfo...
22/10/2025
ATLANTA swXtch.io will feature two new networking solutions extending the company's reach across more cloud and on-prem workflows at NAB Show New York, set ...
22/10/2025
The Warner Bros. Discoverys HBO Max streaming services has increased prices for all its streaming tiers effectively immediately for new customers. Existing cust...
22/10/2025
LOS ANGELES OpenDrives has signed a new distribution partnership deal with Versatile Distribution Services (VDS) to strengthen its channel and streamline how it...
22/10/2025
WASHINGTON, D.C The organizers of The 2025 NAB Show New York have announced that they are expecting more than 12,000 registered attendees from about 100 countr...
22/10/2025
Samora Pinderhughes Brings Immersive Sound to Berklee's Signature Series The artist and composer, who's worked with Herbie Hancock, Robert Glasper, Co...
22/10/2025
BMI Day at Berklee Celebrates Composer Fil Eisler and Awards Scholarship to Stud...
22/10/2025
October 22nd, 2025 TRIBECA ANNOUNCES STAR-STUDDED LINEUP OF MEMBERSHIP EVENTS F...
22/10/2025
Rohde & Schwarz and TRUMPF cooperate in drone defense Rohde & Schwarz and TRUMPF partner to deliver a comprehensive drone defense solution combining Rohde & S...
22/10/2025
European Broadcaster Upgrades To Grass Valley's NativeIP LDX 135 Cameras And...
22/10/2025
Everyone Gets a Better Deal on Verizon with New FOX One Perk The $15 FOX One streaming service perk is yet another way Verizon continues to add savings for cu...
22/10/2025
First Look Hidden Assets Series 3
Premieres on 9th November 9:30pm on RT One & RT Player
WATCH HERE Promo Link: Hidden Assets Series 3 | RT
The Crimin...
21/10/2025
NAB New York 2025: Although AES Show Is on Its Own, Audio Will Be a Major Part o...
21/10/2025
NAB New York 2025: Business of Broadcast and Media,' Future of Content'...
21/10/2025
SVG All-Stars: Ethan Folz, Senior Director, Digital Operations and Quality of Ex...
21/10/2025
NBA on NBC/Peacock: Livestream Offers Graphic Overlays, Predictive Gaming, Ancil...
21/10/2025
NBA on NBC/Peacock: At the Front Bench With Producer Frank DiGraci and Director ...
21/10/2025
NBA on NBC/Peacock: NBC Sports, NEP Build Ultra-Flexible Production Plan That Se...
21/10/2025
Indigenous storytelling has been at the heart of the work of the Sundance Instit...
21/10/2025
Top L-R: Mysterious Skin, American Dream Second Row L-R: Little Miss Sunshine, D...
21/10/2025
Last week, Spotify and Columbia Records transformed Pier 4 at the Brooklyn Army ...
21/10/2025
SBS Learn's Dharug Ngurra resource empowers classrooms to meaningfully celeb...
21/10/2025
As global operators simplify and evolve their digital platforms, NPS improvement...
21/10/2025
Critical Design Review completion is a key milestone on the path toward Wideband Global Satellite Communications certification for the network in 2026, opening ...
21/10/2025
New Australian undersea training range to implement and improve warfighting tactics, proficiency and safety; enable joint/allied training that contributes to pr...
21/10/2025
eds3_5_jq(document).ready(function($) { $(#eds_sliderM519).chameleonSlider_2_1({...
21/10/2025
September, the beginning of autumn, brought an expected revival to the TV market, largely due to the new fall TV schedules. The time spent in front of the TV sc...
21/10/2025
Broadcast Booms with 20% Uptick vs. August, Achieving Largest Monthly
Increase ...
21/10/2025
During September, streaming's share of TV viewing in Mexico settled at 24.5%, a marginal shift of -0.5 share points from the previous month.
Disclaimer: YU...
21/10/2025
RENNES, France BBright and GlobalM have conducted a technical trial validating Ultra HD interoperability across the entire contribution chain in the cloud, achi...
Houses in Motion was called upon by Nick Jr. to produce a playful broadcast package that brightens its young viewers' winter with a Warm & Fuzzy' feeling. The integrated series of promos, IDs, and bumpers features stylized versions of established characters from the network's popular children's programming and introduces a new crew of adorable critters. Houses bringing their message to life through stop motion animation that echoes the characters' organic, handcrafted qualities.
