Design
All the visuals for the show are produced using CGI computer graphics and that largely explains the high cost of the production (USD$7 million/£4 million) . The first series was produced using LightWave 3D software.
Some critics have pointed out the similarities between Underground Ernie and Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends, in that both series feature anthropomorphised talking trains. Whilst acknowledging a similarity, the producers make it clear that this is very different from Thomas and is very much based in the 21st century. Despite being underground trains, they often travel overground around open countryside to various stations including seaside resort.
The overall design is inspired by the real London Underground, and Transport for London has allowed the series to use design elements directly taken from their brand, in particular the use of their distinctive Underground logo, or 'roundel' as it's known.
Read more about this topic: Underground Ernie
Famous quotes containing the word design:
“To nourish children and raise them against odds is in any time, any place, more valuable than to fix bolts in cars or design nuclear weapons.”
—Marilyn French (20th century)
“A good scientist is a person with original ideas. A good engineer is a person who makes a design that works with as few original ideas as possible. There are no prima donnas in engineering.”
—Freeman Dyson (b. 1923)
“With wonderful art he grinds into paint for his picture all his moods and experiences, so that all his forces may be brought to the encounter. Apparently writing without a particular design or responsibility, setting down his soliloquies from time to time, taking advantage of all his humors, when at length the hour comes to declare himself, he puts down in plain English, without quotation marks, what he, Thomas Carlyle, is ready to defend in the face of the world.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)