The BFI will provide funding for three filmmakers or filmmaker teams up to two years to develop family friendly projects. According to the report in Screen Daily they are looking for "stories that "engage, inspire and entertain audiences, explore universal themes, work for family audiences in entertaining both adults and children, and which demonstrate the filmmaker's ambition to dramatise stories on a bigger canvas". "
From the official Development Lab site:The BFI Aardman Development Lab is designed to give professional hands-on experience to storytellers who have a passion for animated family films and wish to work in this field at the highest level. Following an initial induction, Aardman will arrange regular meetings or workshops with you, providing support and mentoring throughout the development process, help with developing early character design and visuals and exposure to and education around the animation process in order to help you better realise your project as an animated film.
Aardman Animations should need no introduction. The English animation studio behind Wallace & Gromit, The Pirates! Band of Misfits and the upcoming Shaun the Sheep the Movie is a world leader in quality family entertainment. To have them at your side as you develop your own project should be every animator's dream!
BFI Film Fund director Ben Roberts said: "The beauty of animated features lies in their ability to combine great artistry with commercial ambition. This all comes at a cost, and so the development opportunities are limited. Tapping into that Aardman brain to work in depth on a small number of carefully chosen projects from promising filmmakers, is a great opportunity for us to move some exciting and commercially appealing work closer to a reality."
So if you have a family friendly project that you would like to see develop into a feature film visit the BFI Aardman Development Lab official site for more information.