Concept and creative process
Brian Henton, a successful young driver, bought a second hand Formula One car with his savings and formed his own racing team. A BBC film crew shared his dream, his triumphs and despair, as they followed him in this unique and unsponsored attempt at the championship. The brief was to create an exciting sequence which emphasised the aspirational aspect of the content. The idea came about after seeing some of the rushes, where the speed and drama of the race was impressive. I took the live action from the programme editor and used the start of the race as it was, and then got an illustrator animator to rotoscope the remaining footage from then on. The sketchy style chosen, emphasised the speed even more and we made the most of this by adding blurry close ups as cars speeded through the frame. The drawings were done on white paper and pegged for the 16mm rostrum shoot, so the complete sequence could be dropped straight into the programme edit.
Illustrations and Animation - Ian Emes.
Concept and Art Direction - Liz Friedman.