Jim Henson's Creature Shop is an American animation and special/visual effects company founded in 1979 by Jim Henson, creator of The Muppets. The company is based in Hollywood, California, United States.
Jim Henson's Creature Shop was originally created as a partnership with British illustrator Brian Froud to facilitate the production of The Dark Crystal.[1] Originally located in Hampstead, London, it received its name in order to differentiate it from Jim Henson's original puppet workshop in New York City.[1] It was then used for future productions such as Labyrinth and The StoryTeller.[1]
It was relocated to Camden Town following Henson's death in 1990 and his son, Brian Henson, takes it over.[1] A third location in Burbank, California opened to serve Hollywood, and one of its first projects was the Dinosaurs television series.[2] Its main animatronic supervisor is London native David Barrington-Holt.[3]
Since The Jim Henson Company sold off the rights to The Muppets brand to Disney in 2004; the Muppet Workshop in New York is now credited as Jim Henson's Creature Shop. In the modern day, the New York shop specializes in hand puppets, including building The Muppets and most of the puppets in Sesame Street.[2] The Los Angeles branch creates more realistic animatronic creatures and creature suits.[2]
The location at Camden Town, London closed in Spring 2005, and was converted into a luxury apartment known as The Henson.[4]
In addition to practical effects, the shop also specializes in "digital puppetry", a form of computer animation that controls a digital avatar using manual puppet controls to animate them more quickly and easily than if it was entirely digital.[2] This is known as the "Henson Digital Puppetry Studio" and is used extensively in television, including the entirety of the series Sid the Science Kid.[2]
Besides films, the Creature Shop has created costumes for live events and theme park appearances. They created a realistic Smilodon "full-suit puppet" for a show at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, which cost more than $100,000.[5] Some of their other costumes include the Polar Bear for Coca-Cola, Tony the Tiger, Shrek, Tommy and Chuckie from Rugrats, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles,[6] and the animatronics from Five Nights at Freddy’s.
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