Commissioned by the BBC and produced by Hello Halo Kids our role on season 02 of this wonderful show was the same as for the first season. This included designing and creating all of the 2D elements. This included all of the design, look development of all environments, characters, assets, logo, titles and end credits – and of course, all of the animation!

Our first step was to create the overall style and tone for the show. Key reference points for the mission elements were 1930s comics which had clean lines, ‘grown-up’ colour palettes and a more mature aesthetic – which we thought would work as a nice counterpoint to the pre-school target audience.

The characters are based on their real-life selves and so the design team had great fun creating 2D versions of the 5 superhero dogs (and it seems the real-life owners had equal fun seeing their companions being brought to life through animation!)

We provided all of the animation for this 15-part series, totalling nearly 40 minutes of animation across the entire series.

The format for season 2 remains the same, after the high energy opening titles, each episode opens with a fun sequence where each dog is chosen for its mission. What follows is a unique story sequence as the dogs lay out their mission for the show, and then towards the end of each episode, a more exaggerated version, recapping what actually happens, interspersed with celebratory moments as the dogs progress their mission.

Each dog has its own wild and wonderful hero song – 20 to 30 seconds of pure joy and delight! There are inanimate objects brought to life, and of course special FX to showcase the incredible superpowers of the dogs.

All animation was created with Toon Boom Harmony and the final sequences composited together in Adobe After Effects. This is where we combine the animation created in Harmony with the background artwork and bespoke transitions and 2D special FX.