Welcome to the whimsical world of Tim and Bash with this brand-new adventure!
This is the first episode in a BRAND NEW epic saga - featuring 15 episodes released every Friday until the end of July! This saga is going to be a roller-coaster, so enjoy the ride.
Make sure to look out for Karen the Kraken, who appears in every episode... Let me know if you found her in the comments!
The initial inspiration behind Tim and Bash came when myself and my friend Andy Bashforth were looking to develop a new animation project. After several years of working in the animation industry on films such as "Klaus," "Space Jam 2," "Sonic 2," and "Disenchanted," we really wanted to create something by ourselves and see if we could turn it into a business.
We felt like there was a space in the TikTok/YouTube Shorts realm for a high-quality CG character, and we knew it had to be something that would appeal to lots of people. Dragons have been popular in stories for centuries, and have recently come back into fashion thanks to shows like "How to Train Your Dragon" and "Game of Thrones." Dragons have always captured our imagination because they have an indefinable presence, and we feel there is still a lot of ground untrodden when it comes to dragons as they appear in films.
We felt that a baby dragon was a more unique angle that we hadn’t seen too much of, and was packed with fun story opportunities. We knew there had to be a human figure in this series that would look after Bash. We toyed with the idea of keeping everything in the fantasy realm, but the idea of bringing recognised fantasy themes into a modern-day context felt the most appropriate for engaging with people on TikTok.
Eventually, we landed on the idea of pairing Bash with a firefighter—because who else would be better to look after a fire-breathing pet? This also gave Bash a great purpose which will be our overarching storyline: Can Bash be used in the fire service?
With the characters set, I then contacted my friend Tim Northcott, who used to be a firefighter, to see if he would be interested in the project. As a lover of comics and films, Tim was extremely excited to be cast in the role and kindly let us use his name for the character. For the past couple of years, we have been developing a collection of live-action videos alongside a weekly webcomic to help introduce the world and the characters.
We wanted to create a unique design for Bash, and wanted to try something more bird-like for the head. We were inspired by Harpy Eagles, as they have an incredible set of head feathers which we felt could be arranged to resemble the familiar horns that lots of dragons have. We also wanted him to move differently to other dragons we’ve seen, so we were inspired by the twinkle-toed bodies of bear cubs, which give a clumsy but adorable look.
Balancing humour and adventure has been a natural process, as the concept is already embedded with comedy. Bash is always bound to misinterpret things, cause mischief, and have sassy remarks, whilst Tim is ever the optimist and is on a hopeless quest to make Bash something which is opposite to his nature.
I try to find stories which are relatable, and the comedy seems to come naturally from wondering how the characters might respond in different situations. The ultimate goal of the series is to be humorous, so when coming up with storylines, that is the main focus.
The most challenging part has been gleaning the hilarious ideas from merely the mildly funny ones. We've been ruthless with ourselves, trying not to fall in love with our own ideas, and reworking ideas until they have the surprise and punch that they need to work.
It has also been a mountain of artwork to achieve—over 200 panels in this saga—for which this is the first episode. We will be releasing all 15 episodes each week, so stay tuned!
Thanks so much for reading! The series continues next Friday with a dark turn of events...
