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Jellyfish Pictures co-founder Phil Dobree has broken his silence on the sudden closure of his U.K.-headquartered studio which had been in operation for 24 years.
The studio recently produced the animation for Dreamworks Animation’s Dog Man and Netflix’s series Wolf King, which premiered last week.
Dobree shared his thoughts in a Linkedin post, saying that “unstoppable market forces have resulted in a race to the bottom” and calling for more industry support and regulation. He cited a variety of factors that led to the sudden downfall of one of England’s major animation studios, including “covid, global economic turmoil, industrial action and content wars.”
After listing some of Jellyfish’s accomplishments, he concluded the note by saying, “It is difficult to reconcile this success not leading to more – I believe in this industry and I am still very much committed to it. I have gained huge insights that I hope can contribute to building a sustainable future and a way forward for this amazing sector.”
His full unedited message can be read below:
#JellyfishPictures – a fond and sad farewell.
When I founded Jellyfish Pictures in 2001 all we wanted to do was to work on projects we loved with people we loved working with, in the still nascent but exciting world of VFX or “computer animation” as we called it back then. Innocent and naive to the huge challenges of succeeding as a creative business in the UK, let alone in such a tough sector, we had to make huge personal sacrifices – as every business owner and entrepreneur must. My mantra was always to grow slowly and within our means.
The primary motivation for growth was never about money or working on great projects, it was for the thrill and privilege of bringing talented, like-minded people together to create amazing images and stories. My ambition was to help grow our industry in the UK. Jellyfish became a large complex living organism, delicate and special, a family and community of colleagues and friends, a home and haven to thousands of brilliant creative people.
Perhaps we became the victim of our own success – rapid growth while keeping the essential DNA that brought this success is a difficult challenge to sustain in a creative business like Jellyfish. The recent struggles in our sector are well documented. Without Industry support and regulation, unstoppable market forces have resulted in a race to the bottom – compounded by the unprecedented challenges of covid, global economic turmoil, industrial action and content wars. Without the support and vision from the industry we are reliant on, our sector, which has done so much to contribute to its success, has inevitably struggled.
Jellyfish Pictures, a fragile and beautiful business, a home to a community of talented people, the accolades and milestones we won are a testament to our achievements – you will always be my family. We so nearly found a way through. Up until the very end our reputation and brand shone brightly. The messages, love and support received over the last few weeks is a huge testament to what we achieved together, we all deeply feel the loss – you truly deserve the very best. Thank you to all you many Jellyfish heroes who have achieved so much. Against the odds we did it our way, quite incredible: Baftas, Emmies, Annies; Star Wars, Kingsman, Stranger Things, How to Train Your Dragon, Kungfu Panda, Boss Baby, Bad Guys, The Creator etc; 300+ episodes of animated episodes; recently – Dogman (number 1 in US and UK box office), Wolf King top 3 on Netflix, Roald Dahl’s TWITS feature imminently out on Netflix; Stan & Gran – our first IP due for TX later in 2025; B Corp certified with the highest rating in our industry (105 points).
It is difficult to reconcile this success not leading to more – I believe in this industry and I am still very much committed to it. I have gained huge insights that I hope can contribute to building a sustainable future and a way forward for this amazing sector.
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