As you learned from previous holiday cards, stop motion is animation that is captured one frame at a time, with physical objects that are moved between frames. When you play back the sequence of images rapidly, it creates the illusion of movement. When you think of stop motion, you might think of Wallace & Gromit, The Nightmare Before Christmas or the classic 1964 Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer movie.

What does it take to make such a time-intensive tale? A talented team that has international movie credits! Led by Christen (Chris) Waddell, a Canadian puppet builder who has credits from multiple big budget films and serves as a stop motion animator at Laika, the team included a Dutch computer specialist who specializes in video game tech and a musician whose credits include SpongeBob SquarePants and Disneyland. 

Chris undertook the massive project of creating a tiny winter window display, all in a small garage. Wondering how our movie star cookie is so expressive? The faces are all separate replacement pieces held on by miniature magnets embedded in the puppet and in the eyes and mouths. They are replaced in each frame to achieve the desired effect. The puppet itself was created using highly specialized techniques and highly specialized silicone rubber that had to accommodate the movement of the underlying armature. (We were shocked to see what’s at the core of the gingerbread cookie!) The rest of the set included materials such as candy, foam, paint, plaster, plastic, sugar, wax, wire, wood and, of course, gingerbread.

We think the process is as cool as the final product, so we wanted to give you a behind-the-scenes look at how it came together. Be sure to check out the time lapse for the full effect