Hilda & The Mountain King

Main Titles
2021

As big Hilda fans, it was a dream to work with Mercury, Silvergate and Luke Pearson on the main title for The Mountain King. We were given a delicious amount of freedom to sculpt the story of title, and opted for a 3 act structure that abstractly laid out the tensions of the film — inner conflict, interpersonal conflict and inter-community conflict — while introducing the key players and their roles in their respective conflicts. Go watch it on Netflix!

 
 
 

 

Story development.

Before putting pen to pixel, we spent a good chunk of time breaking the film’s themes down into a :60 second microcosm — giving the audience a taste of what’s to come without any big spoilers to those who hadn’t read the graphic novels.

 
 
 
 
 

Illustration development.

Then it was on to sketching scenes to bring our metaphors to life, creating 3D turnarounds of Hilda to make posing quicker (and because we’re nerds).

 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Making the sausage.

We knew that we wanted the piece to feel fresh and weird, and it took a lot of experimentation to get there. After trying some traditional 3D approaches and discovering that it felt too “correct”, we opted for a looser, more physics-defying approach to depth and perspective via 2.5D and cel methods. Ultimately, we aimed to create something that felt software-agnostic, and was more representative of the quirky surreality of Hilda’s world.

 
 
 

Credits -

Client: Mercury Filmworks & Silvergate Media
Directed by Giant Ant

Hilda & The Mountain King
Produced by Silvergate Media & Mercury Filmworks
Directed by Andy Coyle
Animation Company: Mercury Filmworks
Based on the graphic novels by Luke Pearson

Main Title
Executive Producer: Teresa Toews
Executive Creative Director: Jay Grandin
Producer: Melissa Buisán
Creative Direction: Jay Grandin, Eric Pautz
Concept Development: Jay Grandin, Eric Pautz, Conor Whelan
Written Treatment: Jay Grandin

Art Direction: Eric Pautz
Storyboard: Eric Pautz, Conor Whelan
Illustration: Eric Pautz, Hugo Baurens
Animation Direction: Conor Whelan
Cel Animation: Sitji Chou, Esther Cheung, Diego Maclean, Johannes Fast, Conor Whelan
Additional Cleanup: Hugo Baurens, Fabio Valesini, Diego Maclean, Michelle Cheng
2D Animation & Compositing: Conor Whelan, Eric Pautz, Diego Maclean

Music: Ryan Carlson