±±¾©Èü³µpk10

Thanks to the Equity dispute, more agencies are turning to

animators to create replacements for celebrities. Charlie Paul at

Eclipse has been animating for more than ten years, having started out

working with Tony Hart on Vision On in the 80s. ’I wanted to be a

presenter but in my presentation I included animation and it seems they

were more impressed by that than my presenting skills,’ 35-year-old Paul

says.

Paul has created some of advertising’s best-known animation with work

for Nurofen, the Samaritans and Right Guard. Nowadays he tends to

concentrate on creating techniques.

Although Paul generally uses paint on film, he recently created a

technique called ’Vaso-vision’ which softens footage of real actors. He

first used the treatment on the Nurofen ad featuring the man arching his

back in pain surrounded by swirling images. It was achieved by stippling

Vaseline on a pane of glass and projecting live action footage through

it. The technique was originally used in photography but after testing

several methods, Paul used it for animation.

His first film, for the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society in 1989,

won 14 awards including gongs from D&AD, Creative Circle and BTAA. The

film was created on just one canvas. ’It was hard to put together

because you had to keep adding to it before the paint dried. It would

have been awful if the client had said ’can we go back and re-do that

bit?’ because there was no way we could,’ he explains.

One thing that annoys Paul is animators’ reliance on technology such as

Henry and Flame. ’I use machines mostly for adjustments, and although I

find myself using them more, I’m more of a hands-on person. People use

machines too much and don’t invent anything. Flame will never replicate

human judgement,’ he says.

Although most of the work on Paul’s reel is pure animation, he enjoys

working with live-action, particularly with people. ’Animation is a

lonely occupation.

You often find yourself working flat out in a studio on your own for two

weeks. I do enjoy the bustle and the excitement of live action,’ he

says.