Rapsittie Street Kids: Believe in Santa (found CGI animated TV film; 2002)

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Bislogo.jpg

Logo featuring the Rapsittie Street Kids.

Status: Found

Date found: 13 Sept 2015

Found by: Dycaite

Rapsittie Street Kids: Believe in Santa is a musical 2002 CGI Christmas special from Wolf Tracer Studios Inc. and J Rose Productions that aired on The WB on December 25th, 2002.[1][2]

Premise

Believe in Santa was to be the start of a franchise introducing a group of kids known as the "Rapsittie Street Kids". During the special, Nicole, a spoiled and cynical girl, receives a teddy bear as a gift from her classmate Ricky. Nicole sees no value in the bear and trashes it until she learns the sentiments behind the gift and the "true meaning of Christmas". Nicole and her friends attempt to hunt down the trashed stuffed animal before it's too late.

Reception

The special was met with overwhelmingly negative criticism regarding its storyline and poor graphics and animation. Many viewers took to the internet to express their disbelief that the special had aired with that quality of computer graphics.[3] Believe in Santa featured several high-profile voice actors including Mark Hamill, Nancy Cartwright, and Paige O'Hara.

Rarity

The film is increasingly obscure because it was aired sporadically at the discretion of local affiliates across the US. The special never aired again after its 2002 airdates and has never been released on any form of home media. A soundtrack featuring Whitney Houston that was advertised during the special was not released either.

The special ended with a teaser for an Easter-themed follow up called A Bunny's Tale, which was produced and aired but remains lost.

Before resurfacing, the only footage that had been recovered of Believe in Santa was from a Wolf Tracer demo reel that also includes footage of their other CGI animated film Dinosaur Island (which was also lost but then found).

On September 13th, 2015, Lost Media Wiki founder Dycaite found a copy of the film and released it during Found Media Week.

Production

The daughter of one of the creators has stated that Wolf Tracer, the company that animated the film, provided concept art of significantly better quality than the final product. Her father trusted the animators and in fact, never checked in on their work. His first time seeing the animation was on the night the movie premiered. He had spent around $500,000 USD on production.[4]

The film was animated on a software called 3D choreographer which was an incredibly limited software. It was only used in schools and for beginner animators. the way the software worked was you select a 3D model out of 100. You can modify the model. Select or create a background which would just be flat backgrounds, select a prop or animal then start animating. The models would not of rigs, you'd have to select the the model, create a path for it then choose a walking/running cycle for it then BOOM, ya got a walk cycle in less then 5 minutes. or you'd select the face and choose a face shell expression like happy or sad.

The project was known as The Bash Street Kids, and the name may have been changed to Rapsittie to avoid confusion with The Beano's "Bash Street Kids" comic strip.

Gallery

Rapsittie Street Kids: Believe in Santa

Wolf Tracer's demo reel.

External Link

References