Christmas Present - animating magic

Written By David Bunting
James McKay’s concept sketch

James McKay’s concept sketch

Our first reveal of Christmas Present is a shot I’ve kept closely guarded, but now it’s in the trailer, I can finally talk about it. The idea of revealing Christmas Past and Present with the bed curtains was established on my first script review with Art Director James McKay. Also, established then was our basic colour language, starting the film heavily desaturated (no colour in Scrooge’s world), and progressively upping the colour with Christmas Future, bringing the first vivid burst of colour into Scrooges monochrome world. I called this our ‘Wizard of Oz shot’, a respectful homage to Dorothy stepping out into magical technicolour.

Wizard-Of-Oz.jpg

We also set out the basics of our animation language. With a small budget, we couldn’t afford much animation, and I hit on the idea of using animation to herald supernatural events. James showed me the classic French shot ‘La Jetée’, which uses this concept to incredible effect and helped further inform our style. Here’s our animation progression reel for the shot.

Christmas Present animation Progression reel Layout and character keys, James McKay FX Animator, David Bunting Assistant Animator, Kat Owens Compositor, Chloe Waite
David Bunting

I’ve been making animations since I was nine years old, filming on a Super 8 camera! Since then, I’ve worked across television, film and independent projects, collaborating with studios and broadcasters including Disney, BBC, Channel 4 and Netflix.

I studied Animation at Senior College Ballyfermot in Dublin before training in Visual Effects at Walt Disney Feature Animation in France. That led to work as a classical drawn effects animator on films including Disney’s The Tigger Movie and the title sequence for Thunderbirds.

A love of storytelling drew me into storyboarding and filmmaking. After training at Aardman Animations, I worked with studios including Aardman and Blink Industries on series such as Shaun the Sheep, Dennis & Gnasher Unleashed and Alley Cats, collaborating with talented teams across the UK animation industry.

Alongside commercial television work, I develop and direct independent films - most recently the award-winning animated documentary No One is an Island(2024) - that allow me to push my artistry and tell more personal stories. Through comedy, drama, or quieter moments of reflection, I’m fascinated by animation’s ability to bring people of all ages together — communicating stories through character, rhythm and visual language.

At heart, I’m still driven by the same thing that started it all: the simple magic of drawings coming to life.

https://www.buntinganimation.com/
Next

The Christmas trailer is out!