Ainslie Henderson is a writer, director, and animator based between Edinburgh and Newcastle, known for stop-motion puppetry. Working under the name Ainslie, Henderson also releases on-chain artworks, including the animated-band project Beautiful Rowdy Prisoners and Recycled rObots. In 2012 Henderson won a BAFTA for co-writing The Making of Longbird with Will Anderson, and the directorial debut I Am Tom Moody was BAFTA-nominated and won more than 30 festival awards.
Stems, made with the musician Poppy Ackroyd, grew from stems of her music tracks that Henderson built puppets and characters around, and won the McLaren Award at the Edinburgh International Film Festival. “They should have a kind of 'aliveness' even before they move, that way you don't have to do terribly much in the animating to bring them to life”, Henderson has said of his puppets. Shackle, about three felted creatures whose jealousy corrupts their creativity, was a BAFTA nominee and won Best British Film at the London International Animation Festival in 2022.
