Quote of the Day by LAIKA’s Nelson Lowry: "When the challenges are that raw, you just make mistakes, and you learn from them"
(Image credit: LAIKA) Copy link Email Share this article 0 Join the conversation Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Subscribe to our newsletter Nelson Lowry has designed sets for LAIKA for years, and Wildwood still gave him problems he couldn’t solve on the first try. The…
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(Image credit: LAIKA) Copy link Email Share this article 0 Join the conversation Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Subscribe to our newsletter Nelson Lowry has designed sets for LAIKA for years, and Wildwood still gave him problems he couldn’t solve on the first try. The new stop-motion animation from the studio behind Kubo and the Two Strings and Coraline has been a labour of love, taking seven years, with Lowry's team building four years of one battle scene and a massive 132 physical sets. So you'd expect to accept that, on a massive film project like this, you have to get things wrong to get them right.Speaking to journalists, including The Nerds of Colour, he explained that the film’s storyboards and constantly moving camera meant the sets couldn’t always make physical sense. One example was a battlefield shot where a character on one side sees someone on the other, who in real life would be smaller than a pixel. His team mocked up options, tested them in camera, and got many of them wrong because the problems were so unconventional. They kept going until it worked. He’s done this a long time, he said, but with challenges that raw, “you just make mistakes, and you learn from them.”What can we learn from Lowry? Most of us only see the finished version of a painting or project: the polished portfolio, the behind-the-scenes reel where everything looks smooth. Lowry’s story is the part those leave out. If your current illustration, animation, or design isn’t working, it may be at the stage where the first attempt failed and the second hasn’t happened yet.If LAIKA's artists can spend seven years making characters move millimetres at a time, making mistakes, learning, moving on and improving, then maybe the rest of us can cut ourselves a bit of slack, too. You can see every inch of that work at the Design Museum exhibition, too.Source: Mike Manalo, The Nerds of Color, 21 September 2026. Visit LAIKA for behind the scenes insights for Wildwood and more. Image 1 of 6 (Image credit: LAIKA) (Image credit: LAIKA) (Image credit: LAIKA) (Image credit: LAIKA) (Image credit: LAIKA) (Image credit: LAIKA) Image 1 of 6 View Original Image 2 of 6 View Original Image 3 of 6 View Original Image 4 of 6 View Original Image 5 of 6 View Original Image 6 of 6 View Original Best LAIKA art books: Penguin Random House Laika: the Magic Behind a Stop-Motion Dream Factory: Two Decades of Groundbreaking Animation From Coraline to Wildwood Rizzoli Electa The Art of Wildwood Want to explore the world of digital art?Our digital art newsletter is your go-to source for the latest news, trends, and inspiration from the worlds of art, illustration, 3D modelling, game design, animation, and beyond. TOPICS Ian Dean Editor, Digital Arts & 3D Ian Dean is Editor, Digital Arts & 3D at Creative Bloq, and the former editor of many leading magazines. These titles included ImagineFX, 3D World and video game titles Play and Official PlayStation Magazine. Ian launched Xbox magazine X360 and edited PlayStation World. For Creative Bloq, Ian combines his experiences to bring the latest news on digital art, VFX and video games and tech, and in his spare time he doodles in Procreate, ArtRage, and Rebelle while finding time to play Xbox and PS5. View More You must confirm your public display name before commenting Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name. Logout LATEST ARTICLES 1 The Narnia: The Magician's Nephew trailer has a tiny Easter egg that's sparked big controversy 2 With $150 off, this 27in 4K monitor just became a great buy for creative work at home 3 The new GTA VI trailer looks too good to be real, but graphics aren't even its biggest achievement 4 Cinema 4D finally gets one of the most-requested features in new 2027 release 5 How Unreal Engine 5's Chaos physics was modified for this indie game about tearing down your hometown with a sledgehammer
