Zey The Mouse animator teaches skills to younger generation

Norfolk animator Ian Harding is keeping a tradition animation technique alive by teaching his skills to a younger generation at the College of West Anglia next month. Here, Ian explains more

In a world in which AI and CGI are hailed as the technological future, one man from Norfolk is keeping a form of animation alive and is seeing his animated stories going from strength to strength through the medium of YouTube. Kings Lynn based animator Ian Harding, the creator of Zey The Mouse, is a fanatical advocate for the Stop Motion animation techniques that have given rise to so many classic creations from the past (such as Wallace and Gromit, The Clangers and Morph) and he loves to pass his knowledge on through courses and his enthusiasm to make sure that the art form will survive for years to come.

‘Keeping an old art form and medium alive, passing on the knowledge, and seeing a new generation exploring and creating their own projects is great, and very heart-warming,’ said Ian.

Ian, who has run courses in animation at the College of West Norfolk in his native Kings Lynn, spent two years volunteering at Norwich Puppet theatre from 2009 to 2011 during which time he made some of his initial films, but it was in early 2012, taking inspiration from the likes of the classic animated programmes Trap Door and Postman Pat, that he produced the first of his Zey The Mouse animations and set up Harding Productions.

Now, almost 14 years later, he is on to the 11^th episode in the series that has seen Zey variously go out into space, back in time and in a recent streetwise episode learn to skate at a skate-park – among other things. As well as creating Zey and his fellow characters, Ian loves building the film sets utilising wood, paper, card and wire mesh to do so.

The interest in his work is such that, in one week, one of his courses at The Forum in Norwich attracted 2,488 visitors, during which children were able to create their own characters and learn the basics of animation in an afternoon.

Equally, his Zey series of animations have now had almost 48,000 YouTube views. It is a painstaking process to create each episode which, as Ian says, ‘can take up to a year to produce an episode resulting in long nights and careful movements one step at a time. It’s a passion close to my heart and when my mind is filled with lots of creative ideas it’s great to put pen to paper.’ He also likes the fact that his courses give young people the chance to switch the computer off and work with something physical.

However, it is not totally a one-man operation in creating Zey as Ian has enlisted Jonathan Smith to write the scripts and is joined in providing the voices for his characters by Ross Patterson.

Ian’s work has been shown at BBC film festivals, on TV and in theatres, while he has been featured in many newspapers and magazines and interviewed on the radio over the course of the last decade. When asked what his dream would be he replied ‘to work alongside Aardman productions’.

In the meantime, Ian is currently busy working on the 11^th Zey The Mouse episode which he hopes will be completed before Christmas.

Ian Harding is running his next Stop Motion Animation course on December 17th at the College of West Anglia. Watch Episode 10 of ZEY THE MOUSE on YouTube.

Featured image of Ian Harding – supplied