£2 Million For 24 Minutes: The Painstaking Creation Of Snowman And The Snowdog

£2 Million For 24 Minutes: The Painstaking Creation Of Snowman And The Snowdog

At 24 minutes long and costing £2 million, the amount of work that has gone into producing The Snowman The Snowdog is mind-melting. It’s no wonder that Channel 4 have poured so much promotional energy into the sequel to the 30 year old original The Snowman. 200,00 individual drawings have been “painstakingly” put together by 40 artists, Radio Times reveal, many of whom worked on the original.

Raymond Briggs, the creator of The Snowman has reportedly given his approval to this ostentatious effort at a follow-up and the co-producer, Ruth Fielding has said “The look of the film is based on his original drawings.” Explaining the detailed process that has gone into creating the new show, they reveal that an animator has drawn the characters in pencil and that image has then been coloured with Caran d’Ache crayons (at an expense of £14,000). Using this process, a team of two is able to create five seconds of animation in a week.

The same Snowman features in the sequel as we saw in the original, but is now joined by a Snowdog. Their adventures see them flying over London and on towards the North Pole. It’s a tear-jerker, too, so don’t forget the Kleenex if you’re planning on helping Channel 4 bosses breathe a huge sigh of relief and watching it. Even Joanna Harrison, who co-wrote the story says the ending makes her cry. Though we reckon a 14 grand crayon bill is enough to make anyone weep.