MukPod

Nix is an animator at Mukpuddy and a multi-discipline artist.

Teahi Maiau is a character and effects animator at Mukpuddy, as well as comics artist behind the webcomic 'Dawn Chorus'' and in her spare time customizes dolls and creates cosplay!

We chat with Tea about growing up in Tahiti, changing studies from graphic design to animation, moving countries with her partner and the demands of producing a webcomic while working in animation.

This episode was recorded last year as you'll probably notice when Simon and Josh derail to talk about this brand new Barbenheimer phenomenon. Have you heard about this yet??

We start the new year with an interview from last year with Background artist Zoe Roberts about working regular jobs while persuing a career in the arts, their love of digital painting, their beloved pet Plum the cat, watching The Wire for the first time and Simon and Josh piece together their vague recollections of one of Zoe’s favourite franchises, Pokémon.

Follow Zoe on Instagram and Twitter @fishwitches

Follow Josh @joshuamartian_art on Instagram and @joshuamartian on Twitter

Follow Simon (Crane) @sickyfondue on Instagram and Twitter

Follow Mukpuddy Animation @Mukpuddy on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and TikTok

2023, we hardly knew ye!

Tim Evans chats with us about the projects Mukpuddy has taken on this year and the expanding crew before Josh and Simon bring this podcasting year to a close with reflections on the great guests we've spoken to and with Bryn safely hospitalised, there's almost zero chance of a painful, punchy, Christmas segment.

Follow Josh @joshuamartian_art on Instagram and @joshuamartian on Twitter

Follow Simon (Crane) @sickyfondue on Instagram and Twitter

Follow Sisko the Dog @mr.siskodog on Instagram

Follow Mukpuddy Animation @Mukpuddy on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and TikTok

Josh and Simon are finally together again to recap Josh's visit to the United Kingdom, Europe and most importantly, Disneyland.

Follow Josh @joshuamartian_art on Instagram and @joshuamartian on Twitter

Follow Simon (Crane) @sickyfondue on Instagram and Twitter

Follow Sisko the Dog @mr.siskodog on Instagram

Follow Mukpuddy Animation @Mukpuddy on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and TikTok

Josh and Bryn surprise Simon with a surprise interview about his creative journey that lead him the charmingly named Stabville, Ireland to Mukpuddy studios, New Zealand.

We dive deep into Simon's varied artistic and professional turns as a poster child for beans, radio performer, make-up effects amateur , hotel night porter, ceramics student and sooner or later; animator!

Special thanks to Bryn for their inspiration and research behind this episode.

Follow Josh @joshuamartian_art on Instagram and @joshuamartian on Twitter

Follow Simon (Crane) @sickyfondue on Instagram and Twitter

Follow Sisko the Dog @mr.siskodog on Instagram

Follow Mukpuddy Animation @Mukpuddy on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and TikTok

Stacey Has worn many hats over his extensive career in animation, from directing, animation supervising and rigging to name just a few. In this episode Stacey joins Josh and Simon to chat about how he got his start in the industry and some of the many shows he has worked on. We also talk about his traveling and working abroad leading teams in China, India, Italy and Qatar. And we find out what it was like to upskill the Mukpuddy crew in Toonboom Harmony.

Follow Josh @joshuamartian_art on Instagram and @joshuamartian on Twitter

Follow Simon (Crane) @sickyfondue on Instagram and Twitter  Follow Sisko the Dog @mr.siskodog on Instagram

Follow Mukpuddy Animation @Mukpuddy on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and TikTok

Today we welcome three new faces at Mukpuddy; Storyboard artist Del Hahn, supervising producer Polly Fryer and production coordinator Daisy L!

We chat with each of them about their new roles at the studio and what lead them here. All three have joined the crew for Mukpuddy's new series 'Badjelly'.

Kale De Wild is a rigger and prop artist at Mukpuddy, Genue was recently hired on as a character designer and they create comics and illustrations, together and independently.

It takes us 3 minutes to bring up Star Trek which segues into a game show which allow us to discuss the phenomenon of fandom and tropes both bizarre and problematic. We also discuss Kale and Gen's shared universe of OC's, independent publishing and the convention circuits. We also discuss our shared knowledge of fast-food mascot lore.

Josh Nelson is background artist at Mukpuddy, art director at Auckland Zinefest and freelance illustrator.

We chat with Josh about jumping into the background department with no experience, volunteering as a social activity, sharing a name with someone you work with and the challenges of being a fan of the sketch show 'I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson'.

Find Josh through his website joshprobably.com/ and follow him Instagram @joshprobably

Auckland Zinefest 2023 kicks off Saturday August 5th. See the full schedule of events and artists at aucklandzinefest.com

Follow Josh @joshuamartian_art on Instagram and @joshuamartian on Twitter

Follow Simon (Crane) @sickyfondue on Instagram and Twitter  Follow Sisko the Dog @mr.siskodog on Instagram

Follow Mukpuddy Animation @Mukpuddy on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and TikTok

Robert Hartley is a professional Dungeon-master, Game-master, Streamer, Actor and Mathematician.

Rob chats with Simon and Josh about Dungeons and Dragons and the world of Tabletop Roleplaying Games at large, plus comparing our respective crazy nicknames, studying mathematics on the road to becoming a professional Game-master and we talk about our friend Mike a lot.

Follow Rob @roberthartleygm on Twitch, YouTube, Instagram, Twitter and Facebook.

Simon and Josh chat with the creative leads behind Mukpuddy's new original kid-friendly horror-comedy series 'Night Eyes'

Ryan Cooper (Writer, Creator, Voice Artist) chats about the inception of the series, finding inspiration in bad ghost-documentary shows and colourful '80s horror, the fun of casting local comedians as the Night Eyes crew.

Alex Leighton (Character Designer, Art Director, Creator) chats about why he loves non-human characters, choosing specific New Zealand animals for the main cast and the thrill of designing truly terrifying creatures.

Tim Evans (Writer, Creator) chats about how everything he writes is secretly horror, starting from scratch when an episode idea isn't working and the importance of music and sound design to create a spooky atmosphere.

Matt Haworth (Background Supervisor, Art Director,) chats about creating and planning the show's organic, nocturnal, and human-free world, also how horror can help kids learn to deal with the existential.

This episode we're having a special chat about 'Project Nought', a new young-adult sci-fi graphic novel written and illustrated by Mukpuddy's own Chelsey Furedi.

We chat with Chelsey and Matt Haworth about the story origins as a web-comic, the benefits and burdens of working with a publisher and go-through

the book's design and narrative, discussing the entire story chapter by chapter.

SPOILERS BEGIN 46:15

Get your copy of Project Nought and listen along to our discussion: https://www.harpercollins.com/products/project-nought-chelsey-furedi?variant=40489128853538

Andrew Kepple is an Animator at Mukpuddy with a prolific catalogue of independent work under his handle 'TooMuchSpareTime'

Andrew joins us to chat about how not being allowed to watch cartoons spurred him to start making his own, moving back from Canada to join Mukpuddy and his short film-turned-series 'Pupper Paleolithic' which has been described as "Genndy Tartakovsky's Primal if it chilled the hell out".

We also discuss Andrew's twin passions: Paleontology and The Simpsons. We discuss how Hollywood's depiction of Dinosaurs has changed to reflect new discoveries and speculation. Plus, Andrew and Josh compete to name the most Simpsons characters off the top of their yellow heads.

It's the final instalment of this year's Star Trek special as Simon and Josh compare their ranked lists of every Star Trek television series.

We find the good aspects of our lesser favourites and the weaknesses in our beloved favourites. Josh plays contrarian on the best episode of the original series but sides with conventional wisdom on the best episode of 'The Next Generation', plus a discussion on how Star Trek continues to push the boundaries of representation and diversity in their utopian future and our ideas how they could boldly go even further.

We promise, next week we'll be getting back to animation discussion!

Series Discussion Timecodes:

00:02:01 ~ The Next Generation

00:16:42 ~ Picard

00:54:22 ~ Enterprise

01:04:54 ~ Deep Space Nine

01:27:00 ~ Strange New Worlds

01:39:31 ~ The Original Series

01:51:16 ~ Lower Decks

01:57:12 ~ Voyager

02:11:48 ~ Prodigy

02:16:55 ~ The Animated Series

02:23:50 ~ Discovery

Follow Josh @joshuamartian_art on Instagram and @joshuamartian on Twitter

Follow Simon (Crane) @sickyfondue on Instagram and Twitter  Follow Sisko the Dog @mr.siskodog on Instagram

Follow Mukpuddy Animation @Mukpuddy on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and TikTok

Still at the mercy of the Borg, Simon and Josh continue to discuss Star Trek (against their will of course), this time ranking all thirteen feature films from best to worst. Josh also pitches his rewrites for the Next Generation films as well as his theory that fan-favourite supervillain Khan is ruining the franchise. Make sure to listen through to the end because the gloves come off for the bad ones!

Movie Discussion Timecodes

00:02:35 ~ The Voyage Home

00:13:39 ~ The Undiscovered Country

00:28:15 ~ The Wrath of Khan

00:45:00 ~ First Contact

01:13:49 ~ The Search for Spock

01:26:41 ~ Star Trek (2009)

01:37:07 ~ Beyond

01:44:00 ~ The Final Frontier

01:55:20 ~ The Motion Picture

02:11:41 ~ Generations

02:43:04 ~ Into Darkness

03:10:53 ~ Insurrection

03:27:33 ~ Nemesis

Follow Josh @joshuamartian_art on Instagram and @joshuamartian on Twitter

Follow Simon (Crane) @sickyfondue on Instagram and Twitter  Follow Sisko the Dog @mr.siskodog on Instagram

Follow Mukpuddy Animation @Mukpuddy on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and TikTok

It's time again for Simon and Josh to let themselves loose to their favourite topic: Star Trek.

This year, we begin by sharing and discussing Trek-themed clips from animation history. As you can imagine, there are also plenty of parodies and Trek actors lending their voices to animated shows ranging from primetime sitcoms to saturday morning cartoons. We also find time to share William Shatner's infamous spoken-word performance of 'Rocketman'.

Join us next week for part two of this extended Star Trek Day episode. That's right, two weeks of Trek! Aren't you lucky!!

Follow Josh @joshuamartian_art on Instagram and @joshuamartian on Twitter

Follow Simon (Crane) @sickyfondue on Instagram and Twitter  Follow Sisko the Dog @mr.siskodog on Instagram

Follow Mukpuddy Animation @Mukpuddy on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and TikTok

Animator, voice actor and gamer Diego Soriano joins us to chat about heir ongoing collection of tattoos, the importance of play in acting and improv, the distinction between original characters and OC's and the extremely popular animation they've made for their TikTok. Plus a look at the state of superhero movies and video game adaptions.

We also settle an important world issue: is ice-cream or popcorn the superior movie snack? Take notes, there will be a quiz.

Róisín Kelly is storyboard artist at Mukpuddy and multi-talented visual artist.

Róisín Kelly chats with Simon and Josh about the fantasy genre and it's disreputable cousin urban-fantasy, the challenges of growing up with aspergers, the astrophysics of tidally-locked planets and Terry Pratchett's long-running Discworld series and the various attempts to bring his satirical fantasy world to the screen.

We also recommend a number of novels, so here are a few titles for your convenience:

'The Dresden Files' series by Jim Butcher

'War for the Oaks' by Emma Bull

'Snapshot' by Brandon Sanderson

'Guards, Guards' by Terry Pratchett

Dane Jacobs is a compositor at Mukpuddy and wears many hats as an independent creator but paramount amonst all his achievements, is hift to the world: and most importantly, the genius behind the MukPod theme song!

Simon and Josh chat to Dane about his new video-game-inspired concept album Super Golyhedronland, the difficulties of studying and teaching animation and starting the award winning 48-hour film competition team I LOVE LOOPS.

We also talk about sticking with bad online handles from when we were young, swap stories about our time studying and you'll never guess what Space Faring franchise Dane happens to have gotten into over the past few years....

It's our last episode for 2022! Ryan and Alex join us to reflect on the incredible number of projects Mukpuddy has worked on this year including service work for overseas productions Dead Sea Squirrels and Juju Brain, music videos for Drink Bleach and Chris Lam Sam, ad campaigns for Electric Kiwi ads and Google, original Mukpuddy series Night Eyes and securing development funding for the long-awaited Bad Jelly the Witch series!

Josh and Simon then catch up to discuss Simon's Irish holiday and Josh's Halloween escapades. We also find time for movie recommendations, Trek talk and a few plugs for books, music and art that would make for ideal stocking stuffers.

And we know many of you have been SENDing us mail asking for a HELPing of Christmas-themed Mukpod but we're only human BEINGs and don't want to be HELD PRISONER BY deadlines at CHRISTMAS time, so we'll see you FANATICs in 2023 for more Mukpod!

Matt is a London born, kiwi raised, visual development artist, illustrator and drawing tutor currently based in Auckland, NZ.

Matt chats with us about finding a consistent paycheck as a recent animation graduate, working as a lead background artist at Mukpuddy, teaching and learning from students as a drawing tutor and teases their new pitch for a mindfulness-based pre-school show 'Be with Zeze' PLUSthe secret origin of the satay egg!

Rick Sweden is a production design and concept artist for such diverse projects as Bro Town, Monster Beach and even Shortland Street. Yeah, THAT Shortland Street.

Do you dare listen to our ghoulish guests spin terrifying tales of All Hallow's Eve in the Land of the Long White Cloud?

In case you hadn't noticed, Mukpuddy loves Halloween! Which explains why this episode clocks in at nearly four hours. If you make it through this podcast alive - you're already dead!!

EPISODE SEGMENTS

00:01:08 ~ Josh and Simon welcome listeners with a celebration of Vincent Price, kid-friendly horror recommendations and Halloween memories submitted from around the studio.

00:44:08 ~ Mike Glasswell shares how he brought Halloween to his neighbourhood by turning his home into a zombie survival experience for local trick-or-treaters.

01:13:42 ~ Ryan Cooper and Alex Leighton discuss being inspired by E.T's depiction of Halloween as kids, defying New Zealand's 'Grow Up' attitude and how Halloween brings out the best in people.

01:33:00 ~ Doug Macfarlane, Horror Superfan, geeks out over his favourite genre, shares new and old favourites and how many different films can fit under that seemingly small label.

01:53:30 ~ Matt Haworth discusses a bizarre small-town English tradition called 'Penny for the Guy' and the utter dread of staying up late to watch banned Video Nasties.

02:11:56 ~ Alan Parr returns from seeing his favourite film 'An American Werewolf in London' on the big screen and how his parents introducing him to blood and guts over milk and cereal.

02:31:00 ~ Diego Soriano discusses learning how to make a costume from scratch and the benefit of communal crafting.

02:48:50 ~ Bryn Kettle and Josh compare their favourite Halloween specials to help answer the question 'what makes a truly great Halloween special?'

03:29:49 ~ Josh and Simon put this podcast down for it's dirt nap but not before sharing a few final Halloween treats.

Bryn Kettle is an animator turned storyboarder at Mukpuddy, as well as a multi-talented character designer and writer.
We chat with Bryn about their unique animation philosophy, developing concepts just for the fun of it, the right and wrong ways to break-the-fourth-wall and dragging Josh for constantly mentioning his holiday.
But that's not all folks! Stay tooned til the end of the episode to hear everyone pitching ideas for Looney Tunes shorts pairing characters who've never interacted before.

Chris Maguren is a self described 'animation generalist' who like his family, works hard and plays hard.

As a team leader at Mukpuddy, he manages a team of animators, on top of his regular animation duties.

He also does regular freelance work and still makes time to play sports and enjoy his other hobbies.

We chat with Chris about the first nationally celebrated Matariki public holiday, great strides for Te Reo and the amazing animation depicting New Zealand's early history for The Aotearoa History show.

We also discuss a memorable job working on Underworld: Rise of the Lycans, the importance of spreadsheets and a whole bunch of movies.

See Chris artwork @kiwi_in_a_hat on Instagram