We're a creative television post and production company specialising in animated and live action commercials, broadcast graphics, interpretative films and corporate dvd. Our work is broadcast worldwide - we've won many major awards - and work with many major global clients.

William, our very talented character designer and animator has just returned from a very quick visit to Channel 4 towers in London today. He has been shortlisted for Channel 4’s 4mations Digital Shorts awards which is a UK-wide competition to find the greatest animated and film talent across the nation. William was one of two creatives from Northern Ireland who were invited to pitch their ideas to the Channel 4 bosses.

This is what happens when you’re allowed to drink far too many sugary drinks.
William is busy testing rigging methods for some of our animated television work and has created these little tests in the process. We thought they were so good, we couldn’t not show them. If you didn’t realise, the weatherman audio is from the Monty Python radio show...

Click here and here - or the images above...

We love it when we get approached to work for big brands - and there aren’t many as big or as firmly established as Bushmills. We’re creating promo material for them and filmed the process of how to pour the perfect whiskey with the distillery’s master taster in great surroundings. Nice!

What happens when you give your team of animators a couple of days each to come up with a new character and to do something interesting with it.....? Here’s what.

Click here, here and here - or the images above...

We're really delighted to have been chosen as the sole producer for all the interpretative content for the new-look Ulster Museum in Belfast. This is a massive contract and consists of 42 individual film and audio installations across all levels and galleries. The Ulster Museum has been closed for some time for extensive remodeling and a complete refit and it is a real pleasure to be involved in such a landmark project for our own National Museum right here in our own city.

We're currently posting a new retail DVD celebrating the fabulousness of David Healy due to hit the shops this November. We've lots of new content - new interviews and commentary from the man himself, along with all his magical moments on the pitch. We're delighted that it’s being stocked by major retailers including Tesco, Sainsbury and Asda - as well as many high street stores!

The last 12 months has been a bit of a blur. A big bit of a blur to be honest. It's been our best year ever, so much has happened - we have 4500 sq ft of new studios in Linenhall Street and have installed the latest and greatest kit into them - we've doubled in size to 12 permanent staff - we've produced our first childrens' series - Sesame Tree, which went network even before it had finished airing on BBCNI and has since been taken by CBeebies - we've many new faces and have enjoyed some great projects over the last year. We're in the process of rebranding and will be unveiling our new look soon!

We're very pleased with these new commercials for our friends at Lyle Bailie. We used cel animation techniques to create these two bold, hand-drawn commercials to promote Essential skills for DEL - the Department of Employment and Learning.

View the work here and here

We were commissioned by BBC after winning a three-way pitch to come up with a concept for a commercial to promote BBC Radio Ulster's activities over the Summer months. We needed to highlight the fact that the station had covered events across Northern Ireland, with a variety of presenters, in a variety of genres. We came up with a 'scrapbook' concept, the idea being that it was a collection of memories. we used lots of real textures - folded papers, fabrics, painted backgrounds and scribbled typography. The camera takes a journey through the scrapbook and resolves with lo-fi style branding and tagline.

View the work here

We exhibited at IBC this year in Amsterdam. IBC is a huge show (and that's no exaggeration) of content producers, management and delivery, with over 49,250 visitors this year alone. Our work was really well received and we're developing concepts with a number of major corporations we met there.

Colin is just back after spending a week in the Kikuya area of Kenya. He went out to single-handedly write, produce, interview, shoot, record sound and light (no pressure then) a documentary about the poverty and need of the people there for a local charity he is involved with. Kenya is a beautiful country, unspoiled by westernism and with warm and welcoming people. The scenes of extreme poverty and corruption however are hard to swallow and accept. We're currently posting the documentary with a view to raising up to £250k to build schools and hospitals for these beautiful people with absolutely nothing.

If you would like to know more about the work, please do contact Colin for more details.

Here's a little story worth telling. Our clients, friends and visitors will know that we have a little jellybean dispenser, which in return for your hard earned twenty-pence-piece will dispense 6, 5, 4 or maybe less jellybeans for your enjoyment. Although we know it's been a complete rip off (someone once got one sweet for his 20p. Ouch) the only bonus is that the cash will go to a charity once all the sweets are gone.

So, after much stacking-of-hexagonal-coins, it's great to say that we raised £75 from all of you. But here's the amazing bit...

Every year, Inferno chooses a charity to support and this year, it's a local charity called 'Asterias' from North Down. Asterias help people with little hope in Kenya and build schools and hospitals to offer them a hand up. Colin our Creative Director is going out with the charity on 30 August this year to script and shoot a documentary for them for free with an aim to raise £250,000 for the charity. He is taking the £75 from the jellybean machine and is able to buy brand new leather shoes in Kenya for some of the children he will be visiting. A pair of shoes there costs just £2.50 and so, thanks to you all, he is able to buy 30 pairs of shoes for the poorest kids next week.

A bit of a reality check. Thank you all!

We've been busy. And we've been growing. We're delighted to welcome Seamus Devine, our new Operations Manager. Seamus has been working in the industry for the last 6 years, and previously ran 'About Face', a television production company in Belfast. We say 'see you later' to Vicky Bevis, who is off to work freelance on television programmes. A big official 'hello' too, to William and Gerard. William is our resident comedian and a big fan of inappropriate dressing. He's still holding out for a late summer with his bermudas. Gerard is with us on placement from his University of Ulster degree and is a bit of a whizz with amazing things like zBrush!

We have a sister company called 'SixteenSouth' which makes wonderful television programmes for children.
You can imagine our delight when we won a 14-way pitch to be commissioned to create, write, produce and deliver a brand new programme called 'Sesame Tree' for Sesame Workshop in NYC. You can imagine the fun we had creating a brand new family of characters, all relatives of their frends on 'Sesame Street' and in the other international Sesame productions throughout the world. Imagine working with Jim Henson company to develop the characters, and for them to turn our sketches into real, furry muppets. Our muppets!

Imagine then, the delight at the really good viewing figures on BBCNI - and then - the fact that it was taken by BBC network - and then by CBeebies, the BBC's children's' channel - where it attracted phenomenal ratings - reflected in the fact that the website which accompanies the series received 2.6 million hits in August alone.

We at Inferno were heavily involved in the character creation, set design, graphics and opening sequence, in which we commissioned Duke Special to write a new theme song for us.

View the work here

We've just completed a great cinema commercial to highlight the problems of cyberbullying to teenagers. We shot it on Super 16mm and have emphasised the film grain in post. We graded it in-house to be cold and frosty and composited abusive and slang words spiraling around the young girl - to highlight the fact that cyberbullying is something kids can't easily escape from. Soundscape was created using alert sounds from mobile and online social networking sites.

View the work here

We were chosen to write, create and produce all of the screen-based interpretative work for the new Thompson dock and Pumphouse. This is the dry dock that many ships - including Titanic - was brought into for repair and fit-out. It was a fantastic project to work on - and highly challenging too. We needed to research, source and license footage from many sources (including an old man who found an old VHS in his attic that he bought at a car boot sale years ago for 10p We created a very long and complex modelled sequence showing Titanic coming up the lough and towards the dock. We show how the cassion gate works, the hydraulic accumulator and how it was all driven by pressure - we show the travel of the water out of the dock - how the underground piping system emptied the dock in an amazingly short time. We also scripted and shot a 5 minute monologue of an apprentice's account of the shipyard in its heyday. We shot it on black to project onto a huge while tile surface in the pumphouse - and along with an excellent dub, looks and sounds wonderful in its installation. The floor rumble mats which the visitors stand on allow them to actually feel the dock gate opening!

View the work here, here and here

We've just delivered the new campaign for Lidl. It was amazingly good fun, with a brilliant lead, cast of 20 and 25-stong crew.
It was a bit of a mammoth task - shooting again on Super 16 (which we love), we shot 9 fully scripted commercials over 8 days.
We took it to Windmill lane for online, grading in 2K from neg. We're delighted with the results.

View the work here

We have just won a fabulous commission to produce and deliver a set of 9 commercials for Lidl.
We're working to create a completely new image for the brand in Northern Ireland, shooting drama based comedy on Super 16mm film with exceptionally high production values. We're not actually creating a set of local commercials - we're creating a soap - based around a central character and her family and friends. The scripts are fabulous and we're enjoying every minute of pre-production.
Airing in August.

We're delighted to win a major tender to produce a series of films retelling the stories of some of Ulster's most amazing myths and legends. We're thinking midnight shoots in graveyards with blue-gelled HMi and smoke machines....
Oh, work can be so terrible at times......!

View the work here

We're just back from a four day shoot at Carrickfergus castle where we were filming a series of six films showing life in the castle through the ages. How often do you get to fire a real cannon 22 times? Or play with genuine WW2 jeeps, searchlights, gun cannons and a host of actors and extras in full costume? Or create a 'morning after the night before' mediaeval banquet? Great crew, great cast and a superb supporting cast of prop suppliers and costume experts. Thanks everyone.

Currently in picture edit, we will post the work when it is cut and graded.
Meanwhile, some production photographs in the Album.

View the work here

Northern Ireland's Design community is in mourning this week at the sudden and tragic death of Alastair Eves.
It was with real heartfelt sadness that we at Inferno learned of his passing. To us, Alastair was a lovely person, a gentleman, and a real champion for the Northern Irish design community, promoting the benefits of design within Invest NI and further afield. If only there were more like him.
Our thoughts and prayers are with Alastair's family, and we take comfort in the fact that his Christian faith may be a source of strength and comfort for his Mrs Eves and their children.

Inferno was approached by a Dublin design agency to work on the rebranding of Aer Lingus, Ireland's national airline.
The client had flat artwork and wanted to create a 3D version of the famous shamrock brand to be used across all media. Because it will appear everywhere from letterheads through to tailfins, we had to create it as vector artwork - which meant complex gradient masks to re-create the 3D effect.
The new branding was launched this week - the client is delighted - and so are we.

We've just added the latest McAuley TVC shot on 16mm on location. We're very happy with the work. Client is too, though they can't make enough kitchens to cope with the demand!

View the work here

Colin was asked to speak at Belfast's Pecha Kucha in The Stiff Kitten on Thursday 29 March.
Pecha Kucha is a worldwide event held in most major cities across the world where designers from all disciplines get together and invite local experts to speak about their work and life. Each person shows 20 slides, which automatically advance after 20 seconds.

Colin's slides are here for download
Global Pecha Kucha website

We're once again on the search for more new talent and this time are looking for an experienced animator with experience in 3D packages including Maya, Max, Combustion and After Effects. You must have a strong showreel and produced a high standard of broadcast work. Drop us an email if you fit the bill...

We're delighted to feature in this year's Institute of Designers in Ireland's Design yearbook.
Some of our interactive work for Coca-Cola was chosen to be showcased.

IDI Ireland website

Inferno has just completed a branding and graphics package for a new food programme for RTE - 'Fresh from the farmers' market' with Clodagh McKenna.
Once again, we used a variety of media - bespoke watercolour painted backgrounds seasoned with tasty typography and yummy motion graphics...

View the work here

This is one of those strange situations where you create a nice piece of work but can't really show it.
We produced a very tasty commercial for a very large client as per their brief - but between production and delivery, the world was blessed with Jade Goody's educated views of culture and race on 'Celebrity' Big Brother. This concerned the client and they pulled the commercial - it was created for the Six Nations rugby featuring an Italian guy coming to visit his girlfriend's Irish parents - and after much shmoosing from the Italian Stallion, Dad's blood boiled and rugby tackled him to the ground delivering an amazing speech on rugby.
The client has actually posted it on YouTube...

We really can't say who just yet, but we're currently working on the early stages of a major project for an international brand. It's for one of the world's biggest companies, and naturally, we're very excited - and will show and tell as soon as we can!

We were absolutely delighted to be commissioned to recreate, model and animate the Honey Monster for Sugar Puffs.
We're not going to say how good it looks, take a look for yourself. Client absolutely delighted.

View the work here

'Sorry for your trouble' - as local people here in Northern Ireland say to someone who has been bereaved.

We were commissioned to work on a major documentary for BBC - branding, graphics and animation. The client's brief was great - 'Create some very nice titles for me' - so we did. We decided against an animated approach and wanted to show the revealing of the title through a stonemason carving letterforms in stone. We wanted to show craftsmanship - we bought a big granite headstone, and filmed the mason working in a workshop - lit only by a bare filament lightbulb. We filmed long track shots through stacked up headstones, keeping the whole thing very dark, cutting to close chisel shots, and the reveal when the mason blew away the excess gold leaf. We had planned to film the final scene with the stone in a graveyard, but changed our plans when we tried to lift the thing - it took four of us to shift it - and just about at that!

The client also wanted to create an animated sequence that showed the decomposition of a body over time - so, that's what we did. Bit of an eye-opener, and not the most glamorous project we've ever produced - but great fun. Lots of 'Uuugggghs' and 'Ooooooohhh's - research was partly courtesy of rotten.com - not a place for the faint hearted.

Great project, great fun.

View the work here

We're really pleased to have been chosen from 18 tenderers to write and produce a major DVD to tackle Hate Crime in Craigavon. We're creating three sections and treating them as short films with really high production values and shooting on HD.

View the films here

Wow. Where did 2006 go to? We're now officially closed for the Christmas and New Year holidays and will re-open on 02 January 2007.
We would like to echo our gratitude to each of our clients that have made 2006 a great year for us and look forward to some fantastic opportunities in 2007 which we will reveal in January.

A Very Merry Christmas and a Blessed New Year from all of us.

So many of you have asked to see some of the work Nilesh did before coming to Inferno. We've put together a showreel of some of his best bits - including the pieces that he won the two PROMAX awards for.

View the showreel here.

Bit tricky this - we're not trying to big ourselves up here, but this year instead of sending our clients lovely things like Alessi accessories or fine wines, we sent Beehives and Fruit tree saplings in their names to poor farmers in Africa.

The real reason we're mentioning this is because we would encourage you to consider this amazing gift instead of more needless excess which we can all do without. Visit their great work at: www.sendacow.org

We are delighted to announce that we have won a major tender to create and install three permanent historical films at Dunluce Castle, Carrickfergus Castle and Scrabo Tower. They focus on theatrical reinactments and 3D reconstruction of how the properties would've looked in their day.

Lots of you have been asking: 'Where did you all go to for two days last week...?'
Because we feel that we work hard, and of course, Colin is such a generous boss , we all went off to Lusty Beg for two days of watersports, 4x4 driving, eating, drinking and chilling out.

Had a great time - photos are in the album, here

We are absolutely delighted to be commissioned to recreate, model and animate the big fella himself, the Honey Monster for Sugar Puffs. This is another major UK contract that is underway at Inferno.
Sugar Puffs are relaunching the product with a heavy focus on the Honey Monster and chose Inferno to create him from scratch - there are barely any visual references to him - nothing more than old commercials on YouTube - and no original artwork from Quaker, the original brand behind Sugar Puffs. We are using Hollywood techniques to apply his fur - which is long and floppy on top, and a bit 'shaven' elsewhere. We're also bringing his friend, the Honey Bee to life too. Watch this space in January.

Inferno have been commissioned by Straight Forward Productions to create the programme branding, titles, stings, contestant profiles and other diagrammatic animation for their new cool science show for BBCNI - Bright Sparks!

View the work here

We're delighted to deliver the opening titles, stings and edit masks for Waddell Media's new entertainment series, Looking for Love. Our approach was a comical journey of the 'love bus' as it travels throughout Northern Ireland. The bus was created in MAX, Christine and May were filmed on greenscreen and composited into the bus. Nilesh gave the bus it's huge springs, to emphesise the american style track. All of the backgrounds are hand drawn and hand painted with watercolours. We specialise in creating unique pieces of work for our clients - each piece is different and we love trying new techniques - and this one really worked well.

View the work here

Inferno has been commissioned to create another high quality cinema trailer for a major UK cinema chain. It's work in progress, being created at full 2K resolution as normal, and mastered in Dolby 5:1 audio. More details to follow.

A big welcome to Anjali Sharma who has joined us at Inferno. Anjali is a graduate with a BSc in Design Management and is coming to Inferno to help us build our export marketing. Anjali is a professional dancer and is already keeping us on our toes!

We've just completed the full graphics package for BBCNI's new quiz programme, Class Distinction hosted by John Daly. We created the programme's graphical concept which we then rolled out through the opening titles, on-screen question graphics and elements of the set to include an animated gameboard. The show was recorded live, so we supplied the kit and graphic technicians to make sure that it all ran smoothly. We built our own graphics engine to power the on-screen questions - there were 1000 possible questions. We built a vector based graphic application that animates the question bar on and off the screen and allows the user to move through questions. Our application outputs SDI signals for fill and key allowing perfect keying on the scanner side. Broadcast starts Thursday 19 October on BBC1NI

View the work here

We've just completed a commercial for the Northern Ireland Horse Show for Navigator Blue. The brief was to animate horses in the style of the supplied logo on the end frame. We filmed reference footage to see how horses run and jump. From this, we created the hand-drawn cel animation - which means 25 individual drawings per second. The client wanted the horses to turn into fireworks, so we created a series of horse leaps that worked. The objective, of course, is to make sure it doesn't look as if the horses were exploding. That would be messy. Very happy client.

View the work here

We have just invested a substantial amount of money into purchasing new state-of-the-art animation suites to add to our studio. They're specially built by BOXX, in the USA for high-end animation packages, 3D Studio Max and Maya - which we have also bought licences for. The new kit boasts Dual processor, Dual core chipsets (4 processors in each machine). We've also added kit to make life easier - including tools for cel animation including graphics tablets, software and traditional lightboxes. Animation is much much more than shiny chrome logos...

A full page profile of Colin in today's Irish News, talking about what inspired him to work for himself and set up Inferno.

A big welcome to Nilesh Panse, our new head of Animation at Inferno. Nilesh, a native of India is an extremely talented animator with over 10 years experience in working with worldwide companies including MTV. He's a lovely guy and we know that we're going to really enjoy getting to know him.

Introducing our new site....
We're delighted to find the time to gather together our bits and pieces and find an online home for it all here. It's taken us almost four years, but we've designed our site in a way that's very easy to update - and that's what we plan to do.
Thanks to all the wellwishers and admirers. We love you too!