Spiffy Pictures

Background

Spiffy Pictures is a Chicago-based production company founded by brothers David and Adam Rudman, both of whom (specifically the former) are known for their work on Sesame Street. The company centers around producing shows for children and are known for their puppetry work. The company was founded in 2003.

Logo (August 31, 2004-November 8, 2008, November 25, 2015-)

First prototype variant
The animal winking (prototype)
Second prototype variant
2005
The animal winking
Bunnytown variant
2015

Visuals: On a tangerine background, a white oval with the head of a cartoon animal (possibly a dog) wearing a beret in the center, "SPIFFY" (in the Witless font) at the top and "PICTURES" (in the Avant Garde font) at the bottom, jumps to the middle of the screen. The animal zooms up towards the viewer, says "Spiffy!", zooms back in place and winks with its right eye.

Variants:

There are two prototype versions of this logo.
- The first one was seen on the website. The whole logo is an orange circle, and has another blue circle in the center. The "SPIFFY" text is white with a shadow underneath it, the tagline "good stuff" is seen below, and "PICTURES" is written in a curved fashion. The animal also winks on the left eye instead of the right eye, and doesn't say anything.
- The second one was seen on the Curious Buddies episodes "Look and Listen at the Park", "Exploring at the Beach", and "Helping at Home". It's essentially the regular logo, but the lighting is darker, the letters are closer, and the lines are not filled as much.
On Bunnytown, the logo was modified. The logo is bigger and slightly positioned upwards, has a drop shadow and a thin white outline, is significantly shortened to just have the animal saying the company name, and the animation is cheaper.
Starting in 2015, the logo was remade with new animation, a different font for the logo's text (to match the website logo), and the oval zooms out to the middle of the screen.
On most broadcasts of Nature Cat on PBS Kids, there's a copyright notice at the bottom that fades in. Earlier broadcasts lack the copyright notice.

Technique: 2D computer animation; Flash animation on the Bunnytown and 2015 variants.

Audio: A two-note accordion jingle (composed by Todd Hannert) followed by the animal's dialogue (voiced by David Rudman) and a ding-dong sound as he winks. On some episodes of Jack's Big Music Show, the closing theme is heard over the regular music.

Audio Variants:

Jack's Big Music Show had three variations:
- On the episode "Spunky the Alien", the animal says "Swinky!" The last note of the end theme also plays over the accordion note.
- On the episode "Silly Show", the animal sounds like a parrot. It sounds like he's saying "SPUNKEH?!"
- On the episode ""Jack and the Beanstalk", a single drum sound plays at the beginning of the logo. This is actually a part of the end credits theme.
On Bunnytown, the accordion plays immediately after the "Spiffy!" sound effect.
On Nature Cat and Donkey Hodie, the ending theme plays over the logo.
- On seasons 4 and 5 of Nature Cat, while the animal winks, a xylophone note is heard.

Availability: The final logo can be seen on the shows Curious Buddies, Jack's Big Music Show, Bunnytown, Nature Cat, Frankie and Frank, and Donkey Hodie. The prototype version can be seen on the website here.

Legacy: Fans who grew up with Spiffy's works consider this a nostalgic logo; it's also a common subject of "logo edits (also known as "Effects")" on YouTube.