Shaving and styling product company Braun has teamed up with Aardman Animations to create a magical and intriguing stop-motion short Beardimation.

The animated film uses over fifty male beards to show the brand new Braun Styling Range. Aardman created the film by combining together the sequence of still images to create the “illusion of life.” The creative hair designs were aligned in a way that allowed the pattern to move effortlessly from one frame to the next, and projection guides for the animators were lined up well in advance of filming. Thus, creating perhaps one of the most precise showcases of stop-motion animation you will see. Check out the video below:

This type of ‘lineup’ animation was a definite challenge for the Aardman team because the canvas was a human face. Humans naturally move between shots unlike Aardman’s usual stop-motion tools, puppets, and clay models. Will Studd, director of the video, explained that, “Because of this, the rigging has been really original; we have never had to rig in the way we have for this project so there’s been a lot of experimentation. There is a lot of planning when it comes to creating a stop motion animation video. Stop motion doesn’t have an ‘undo’ button like CGI or 2D animation so it needs to be done right the first time.”

Andreas Leibundgut, Assistant Brand Manager for Braun, stated, “We are very excited to partner with Aardman on this unique piece of work. Braun has never undertaken a partnership like this one before and we are really pleased with the final result…our hope for this campaign is that it will inspire men to be creative and experiment with their looks, and we think it will do just that.” You can explore the behind-the-scenes video below:

Other involvements included musical talent Gramatick, who provided the music to the video with an exclusive upbeat electronic track. Male models Andrea Hamman, Chris John Millington, and Luke Ditella lent their facial hair for the project and to the artistic stylists.