Glasgow animation studio teams up with E4 and Netflix

Axis sister studio Flaunt worked on Lost in Oz for Amazon Studios

Axis, led by managing director Richard Scott, is collaborating with co-producers Balloon Entertainment and Kindle Entertainment to work on a six-part animated series for E4 and Netflix.

Based on the novel by Lottie Moggach, Kiss Me First tells the story of Leila, a lonely 17-year-old girl who is addicted to a fictional online gaming site called Agora. Adapted by Bryan Elsley, the Scottish co-creator of E4 teen drama Skins, the thriller will combine live action and animated virtual world sequences created by Axis.

The show will premier in the UK on E4, with Netflix streaming the series around the world from July 2017.

Scott said: “It is fantastic to work for household names such as E4 and Netflix bringing animation to an older-skewing worldwide audience. People’s perception of animation is changing – animated content is not just for kids and Kiss Me First is a natural extension to the Axis teams’ work on some of the world’s biggest game franchises.”

Sheku Bayoh death: Family vow to find out truth

Axis has created visuals for top-selling games including Assassin’s Creed, Call of Duty and Halo – as well as the Shaun the Sheep movie – and its sister studio Flaunt has just announced the creation of a “long-format” division after working on a pilot called Lost in Oz, which was recently given the green light for a series on Amazon Prime. Flaunt has also produced two Monster High animated features for Mattel, which will be coming to DVD and Blu-Ray in 2016 and 2017.

Scott said: “We’ve gone into these longer-format productions full of enthusiasm and packed with creative talent.

“We’ve extended our teams, created new departments, adapted our processes and added to our technical infrastructure. We believe that Flaunt has the capacity to compete with major studios in the longer-format animation production space.”