Animation World Network | November 26, 2017 | Original Article

Sony Pictures Animation’s computer-animated feature The Star, the debut feature directed by Oscar nominee Timothy Reckart (Head Over Heels), marks the first collaboration between SPA and Cinesite Studios.

The film, produced in association with Walden Media, is a retelling of the nativity story from the point of view of some of the animals that were present at the first Christmas, including a donkey named Bo who yearns for a life beyond his daily grind at the village mill, a sheep named Ruth who has lost her flock and a smart-aleck dove named Dave, as well as three wisecracking camels, some vicious dogs and other stable animals.

VFX supervisor Chris Kazmier, whose credit list includes such films as Hotel Transylvania 1 and 2, as well as Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 and more recently, Gnome Alone, explained that the film was produced under a very tight schedule. He reported that the project began late last year, and by February, his team of artists was knee-deep in developing assets for the animation department.

“They were still fine tuning the script and finding the characters at the same time that we were working on it,” he says. “Basically, we had the main characters, but they were still in play, changing from the original paintings, but we did have a lot of characters that could get production-ready.”

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