Tim Burton’s new animated feature is being shot in black and white, before being rendered in 3D. Old/New skool or what?

Stop motion animation is by far one of the most painstaking pursuits a film maker can employ to tell a story. Yet the industry maintains many big fans, none more famous than Tim Burton, who’s currently directing a stop motion remake of his second short film; a half-hour live action about a boy and his dog titled Frankenweenie. Best for Film got to chat to Steven Warne, one of the budding animators of Burton’s project, about his love of animation.

This week’s short film The Calligrapher by the Brothers Quay is one of their early stop-motion pieces. Terry Gilliam adores them and rated their venture The Crocodile as one of the top ten animated films of all time…

A robot and a chicken go together like… two opposite things stuck painfully together with superglue. The chicken’s all like “cluck” and “I’m eating and stuff, no seriously I am, check me out” and the robot’s all like “I want to make ner-ner-ner robot sounds and take over the world but I can’t because half of me is a chicken”. And then we have Robot Chicken Star Wars. Which is something completely different. Are you ready? Robot… Chicken… Star… Wars. Superglue it to your brain.

You know the Cravendale adverts? You know, the stop-motion animation where a cow, a pirate and a cyclist all live together, living off milk and competing in musical statue for the last glass? Well, picture a feature length film in that style, in French and with more imagination then you could use to power the whole of Whoville and you’ve got the gloriously absurd and playful A Town Called Panic.

How much would you pay for 22-inch furless and motionless King Kong model? If your answer is “less than £120,000” we’re afraid you would have walked away empty handed at auction.  ..