VFXWorld have a lengthy article on the UK computer graphics industry. The animation supervisor for Framestore CFC, who are providing character work for The Golden Compass – including all the polar bears, among them Iorek – said of the movie, “We discussed internally what we’d really like to work on before being awarded the project and agreed it was the bears because we saw them as the most challenging.” The characters will be “hyper realistic” and feature dialog sequences. “We have to create totally convincing interactions,” he added. Read more.

We can also clarify the involvement various companies have in His Dark Materials. Framestore-CFC have all of the bears. Cinesite have the secondary daemons, whilst Rythm and Hues have the main daemons. Cinesite are also doing a fair bit of set extension and miniature work.