The VeggieTales TV Show

The VeggieTales TV Show (often marketed as simply VeggieTales) is a live-action/computer-animated children's television series and a spin-off of the American Christian computer-animated children's franchise, VeggieTales. The television series is produced through the partnerships of Modern Cartoons and Big Idea Productions. It aired in syndication from September 10, 1996 to August 9, 1999 and later on Nickelodeon as part of the Nick Jr. block from October 20, 1996 to September 19, 1999.

Premise
The show focuses on the VeggieTales characters putting on a big show in the chamber of silliness that include videos and shorts. Phil Vischer says the show will start with a question in the form of letters from the ten kids, and then Bob and Larry will respond to that question by putting on a big show. Bob the Tomato attempts to use the big show to accomplish his dream of becoming the next Mister Rogers. According to Vischer, "the thing that drives Bob crazy is when James Murray does The Adventures of Timmy the Tooth, everything goes perfectly. Nothing ever goes wrong on ‘The Adventures of Timmy the Tooth.’ And Bob wants that for his big show, but he can never achieve it. ”Each show would never go the way that Bob had initially planned, resulting in complete progress.

Phil Vischer says "It's really all about Bob and Larry wanting to put on a show for all the kids. They want to teach things to all the kids. Bob wants to help all the kids, Larry wants to help Bob."

Characters
All the characters are the same from the early VeggieTales videos. The show brings new characters, as the owners of the chamber of silliness in which the show takes place. It also featured ten kids of the VeggieTales dance party. Junior's red-headed 7-year-old sister Julie is featured in the television series. Buzzsaw Louie from The Toy That Saved Christmas also appears as a television reporter. Goliath from Dave and the Giant Pickle has been teased in storyboards from the teaser trailer with the Fib from Larry-Boy and the Fib from Outer Space, with possibilities that they will be included in the television series as well in Season 2.

Production
The television series was produced by Modern Cartoons and Big Idea Productions. Unlike the video series, this television series used a variety of animation techniques:


 * The backgrounds were miniature sets (usually built on two 4 by 8 feet (1,200 mm × 2,400 mm) sheets of plywood).


 * The humans, including ten kids, are live action children and shot in front of a greenscreen.


 * The VeggieTales characters were the same computer models created in Softimage 3D and Alias Wavefront PowerAnimator.


 * The movement of the VeggieTales characters was recorded by playing out the scene with squash and stretch models equipped with cartoony rejects. The VeggieTales characters had a switch to fix the bouncing, jumping, dancing, and facial expressions, due to some minor mistakes in the cartoony rejecting data.


 * The VeggieTales characters' facial expressions and lip synching were done by face controlling, an animation technique where reflective spots are put on a voice actor's facial expression. The voice track is digitally recorded along with the spot data. Then the textures were rendered using Pixar's RenderMan.


 * Body movement and other effects were done by joysticks.

The animation complex and CGI issues were solved by Sillicon Graphics and Alias Wavefront.

A number of proprietary software systems were used:


 * Data/audio recording and smoothing were done on a Microsoft Windows machine.


 * Daily cuts were done on "SGI" computers running a 64-bit version of Microsoft Windows NT 4.0.

Episodes
Season 1 (1996) Season 2 (1997) Season 3 (1998-1999)
 * 1) Where's God When I'm S-Scared?
 * 2) God Wants Me to Forgive Them?!?
 * 3) Are You My Neighbor?
 * 4) Rack, Shack and Benny
 * 1) Dave and the Giant Pickle
 * 2) The Toy That Saved Christmas
 * 3) Larry-Boy! And the Fib from Outer Space!
 * 4) Josh and the Big Wall!
 * 1) Madame Blueberry
 * 2) The Value Bargain Sale
 * 3) The Road Trip
 * 4) The Chamber of Commerce
 * 5) The Invisible Cream at the Beach
 * 6) The Run for President
 * 7) LarryBoy Returns
 * 8) I Like Your Funny Face
 * 9) Dough-Nutty
 * 10) The Veggie Zone
 * 11) The Country Fair
 * 12) Larry-Boy and the Rumor Weed