Gromit was the name of a cat. When I started modeling the cat I just didn't feel it was quite right, so I made it into a dog because he could have a bigger nose and bigger, longer legs.

After studying in Sheffield, I went down to London to do my post-graduate degree at the National Film and Television School, embarking on the movie that would eventually become 'A Grand Day Out.

I always considered Ray Harryhausen's work so fine that it was way out of my league: in terms of realism and naturalism, in terms of animal movement.

If you respect the audience enough, they can take onboard many things.

We can do things that we never could before. Stop-motion lets you build tiny little worlds, and computers make that world even more believable.

With some CGI, I think the brain slightly perceives that things aren't real. There's no gravity, the light's not quite real, the shadows aren't quite real.

Gromit was the name of a cat. When I started modeling the cat I just didn't feel it was quite right, so I made it into a dog because he could have a bigger nose and bigger, longer legs.