This month audiences can screen Jingle the Dog – A Christmas Story on the Planet Classroom Network. This film is curated for the Planet Classroom Network by KIDS FIRST! Film Festival.
Jingle the Dog – A Christmas Story, from directors Christopher and Erin Bishop, is a heartwarming tale about a happy, clueless pet who has a wild Christmas adventure when he is thrust into the real world.
In this 2D animated short film, Jingle goes on a challenging journey to make his way back home and be accepted again.
The Global Search for Education welcomes Directors Christopher and Erin Bishop.
Why did you decide to produce this as a silent film with music only?
The marimba is a beautiful sounding instrument, and since there aren’t a ton of pleasant pieces to hear on it, we originally created the music on the marimba only. There were no initial plans for a video.
Then we came up with the idea of a Christmas dog and developed the story around the music – this would be a way to promote the music. However, Jingle the Dog really became its own product, and so we put a great deal of work into integrating the music with the animation.
We also wanted this to be available in any country without language restrictions, so we wrote the story in a way that wouldn’t require speaking parts.
Can you share any stories from your creative process in terms of how you selected the style of original art and original music you opted for, and also, how long it took you to put it all together?
Jingle the Dog was a multi-year long process. It took almost 2 years to come up with the Christmas music, as we wanted original sounding styles of Christmas folk tunes.
For the cartoon, we chose Modeo Media (the animation company) after looking at examples of their artwork. Ultimately we wanted a medium-large hound dog as the main animal, and then we described the personalities of some of the other animals to our artists.
We were going for a look similar to Hanna Barbera cartoons (like The Flintstones) to keep costs down. We wanted it to be cartoony with black outlines. We worked with Modeo Media to come up with backgrounds that were layered to give some depth, and we used camera movement (zooms and pans) as a way to add more animation with less programming.
The illustration and animation process took a little over a year, and we did some of the finishing animation ourselves to get it really in sync with the music.
We debated about whether or not to add sound effects, as it might take away from the music, but ultimately decided that it would make the cartoon feel much more alive. We also added some percussion to the tracks to help change the feel to match what’s happening in the scenes.
What is your favorite scene in the film and why?
The 6th scene, the one with the wolves, is our favorite. The music is completely original (not based on any existing Christmas folk music), and the animation is incredible.
There are intense emotions brought out in this scene – fear of the wolves, close calls, overcoming that fear to save your friends – and the emotions are tightly integrated with the music.
The moral of the story – what do you hope your target audience will take away from your film?
There are misunderstandings in real life all the time – but if you keep your integrity, others are likely to overlook your faults or even realize that they were wrong about you.
What are you working on next?
We’re working on a YouTube series featuring a 3D fairy who narrates children’s storybooks. The goal of the series is to inspire kids to read and to also encourage parents to read to their children.
Thanks Guys!
C. M. Rubin with Christopher and Erin Bishop
Don’t Miss Jingle the Dog – A Christmas Story, now streaming on the Planet Classroom Network. This film is curated for the Planet Classroom Network by KIDS FIRST! Film Festival.
Related posts:
The Global Search of Education: Director Sebastian Law on Stories From the Past that Inspire Him
The Global Search for Education: Director Carlos Douglas Jr. Talks About His Film, Kenya’s Symphony
The Global Search for Education: Director Hasan Najmabadi on Aparat and His Lifelong Love of Movies
The Global Search for Education: Ana Maria Medici Talks about Dear Mrs. President.
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