Lily Ward at NYICFF 2025 - a report on an impromptu meeting

I met animator Lily Ward today at NYICFF. Her film SPLISH, SPLASH, SPLOSH! was playing in Shorts for Tots and afterward she was in the lobby getting mobbed by the kids who wanted to know how it was done. (The film is a lovely tale of two friends out in the rain a review soon)

The interaction and need to engage with her was exactly the same as I saw Nick Park do a meet and greet for the latest Wallace and Gromit film. She handled the mob of kids like a pro- explaining everything to the kids in such away that they were informed and desired to try it for themselves. Seriously Ward made every kid feel special and leave wide eyed.

I asked Ms Ward about the Aardman Academy and the next thing that happened was I was doing an impromptu and unrecorded interview. She answered all my questions no matter how mundane (how big were her sets? About the size of one of the folding tables) or run of the mill (What made you want to do animation-certain children's shows I did not write down. After animating as a kid, she went to film school where her passion for animation was re-ignited.)

The answer to the Aardman Academy question is that it's program that Aardman runs to help animators make better films. The animators are given mentors and access to tools and are turned loose on their project. Lily said she worked on SPLISH SPLASH SPLOSH for eight months and did all the animation. It was largely just her doing the actual animation. The puppets bend. The faces were animated by changing the facial features with features held in place by pins. 

The characters are Jeremy and Wobbbly Woo. She is currently working on trying to get the characters to carry over to a series. 

Talking to Ward was special. She is a passionate filmmaker who knows what she wants to do. She has the fire in her belly the way that some of great young filmmakers I've spoken with have had.  She reminded me of Dommee Shi when I spoke with her at Tribeca, right before she won an Oscar for BAO and went on to direct TURNING RED.  Two minutes into speaking with her you know she's the real deal and you know she's going to do wondrous things.

You need to keep an eye out for Ward's work  both now (SPLISH SPLASH SPLOSH is playing in the TOTS collection which plays the next two weekends at the festival) and in the future.