A Media City-headquartered immersive virtual reality entertainment business, which works with the likes of The 02, Blackpool Tower and the owner of Alton Towers, has signed a new deal with the maker of Wallace & Gromit and Shaun the Sheep.
Immotion Group's Uvisan division has entered into an agreement with Aardman Animations to supply it with UV-C disinfection cabinets.
Uvisan's product range "provides rapid, safe and effective" disinfection using the power of UV light.
Aardman is using Uvisan's UV-C disinfection cabinets in its production studios in Bristol to disinfect delicate puppets, props and rigging kit, including puppets for the new Shaun the Sheep movie.
Along with the sales to Aardman, the company has now sold cabinets into a number of different sectors and high-profile clients including education, healthcare and a number of other corporate sectors.
Loyd Price, head of animation and rigging at Aardman Features, said: "During the previous production, our rigging team were having to dedicate 10% of their 40-hour work weeks to disinfecting our equipment.
"This created a noticeable cost impact on our shows, as hundreds of small parts needed to be cleaned by hand, which was extremely time-consuming.
"The continual wet cleaning was also causing surface rust on some of the steel items which is not ideal for filming.
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"Prior to bringing in the UV-C cabinets we had to either clean everything by hand using alcohol and wipes or leave items on a ‘contaminated’ table where anything coming off our shooting sets is left untouched for 72 hours to allow the kit to become sterile, due to not being handled. However, due to the demand on our puppets, props and rigging kit we were frequently having to clean kit rather than have it out of action for 72 hours causing damage to delicate parts.
"Using Uvisan’s UV-C sterilising unit in both our rigging and puppet departments has been a real benefit in terms of speed as the unit only has a five-minute sterilisation cycle.
"It also means that items such as puppet costumes that couldn’t be cleaned using a wet solution are now able to be sterilised quickly without any damage to the material."
David Marks, chairman at Uvisan, added: "There had been a clear detrimental effect that the additional disinfection process has had on the studio and its filming process.
"Our UV-C cabinets not only help to reduce sterilisation times and protect equipment but also have helped many studios, schools and businesses cut down on large proportions of their sanitisation costs and the waste being sent to landfill.
"Our work with Aardman is also a fantastic opportunity to demonstrate how our equipment can be used across a wide range of sectors.
"We’re excited to play a small part in keeping the cameras rolling and bringing the much-loved shows to screens around the world."
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Uvisan has also installed its first new UV room disinfection system, "Cleanroom by Uvisan" into Chichester University.
The system uses fixed UV-C lights and a proprietary control and safety system to provide rapid disinfection of un-occupied rooms.
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It allows disinfection, typically in less than 10 minutes, of an entire room, including all surfaces and the ambient environment itself.
The university will use Uvisan's technology to cleanse its recording studio and the other equipment used in it, as well as cameras and related equipment.
Uvisan expects "Cleanroom by Uvisan" to be ready for full commercial launch by end of the month.
The news comes after the group entered into an agreement to raise £300,000 at the end of March.