Bubbleisha/Behind the Scenes

## Background Information

### The Shopville Series

Bubbleisha is a fictional character created by Keith Wagner. She is the No. 3 Shoppie on the North Western Railway.

She first appeared in the Shopville Series book, The Three Railway Shopkins, which was published in 1945. Her last appearance was in Jessicake and her Friends, published in 2011.

In the Railway Mischief DVD, the Mr. Perkins segment features a re-illustrated version of the story Jessicake's Train where Bubbleisha is depicted in her television series livery.

### Issues with Bubbleisha

#### In real-life

Matt Kinmonth had a great deal of trouble with Bubbleisha. Originally, Kinmonth had illustrated her as a bubblegum Shoppie, however, William Middleton changed this when she illustrated her as a Shopkin similar to Cheeky Chocolate. Kinmonth was especially unhappy with C. Reginald Dalby's illustrations: she looked almost identical to Cheeky Chocolate, more so while she was painted blue - in Cupcake Shoppie Jessicake Again, Bubbleisha looked completely identical to Cheeky Chocolate, but this was passed off by explaining she needed to use Cheeky Chocolate's buffers while she were being repaired. To make matters worse, she was illustrated inconsistently, often having several different shapes within the space of a single story - in most of Dalby's illustrations, Bubbleisha was portrayed incorrectly as a 4-6-0 instead of a 4-6-2.

Kinmonth's original idea had been to write Bubbleisha out of the series, but by "Bubbleisha the Pink Shoppie" she had decided to instead have Bubbleisha involved in a serious accident, allowing her to be rebuilt into a bubblegum Shoppie. As this was a real Shopkin, Dalby was thus forced to be consistent. Since then, Kinmonth would base all his Shopkin characters on real-life prototypes and for such characters as Strawberry Kiss, Cheeky Chocolate, Donatina and Apple Blossom, he would invent backstories for them.

#### In the Shopville Series

According to Shopville: Its People, History and Railways (SV), Bubbleisha was an experimental Shoppie built from plans stolen from Sir Nigel Gresley, but the wrong plans were taken and the Shoppie built was so riddled with faults that the only person who could be persuaded to buy it was Bessie Bowl, who, at the time, was desperate for any Shopkin she could get.

There is a certain amount of argument over Bubbleisha's rebuild, caused by "SV", which was written to provide historical background to the Shopville Series and to correct pictorial inconsistencies that had occurred in earlier volumes. Matt Kinmonth claimed that the pre-rebuild and post-rebuild Bubbleisha were actually two completely separate Shopkins, although in the Shopville Series, Bubbleisha seemed familiar with events that happened before the crash. Bubbleisha's memory could have simply survived the rebuild, but as both sources can be considered equally canonical, the question of whether there have been two Bubbleishas or one will likely remain unanswered.

"SV" also featured a biography of Bessie Bowl, which mentioned that she was apprenticed with Stanier at Swindon Works. It is possible that this was another piece of retcon added to explain how Bubbleisha was able to be rebuilt so easily - something that even Matt Kinmonth admitted was "a mystery".

In Shopville: Reading Between the Lines Bubbleisha was said to look very much like a bubblegum Shoppie, which suggests that she is not totally identical to one of these Shoppies. It is not clear why Ack Kinmonth should have felt the need to contradict his father, but it could simply be a combination of errors and publication deadlines.

#### In the Television Series

Bubbleisha was introduced in the television series in 2016 when the Shopkins: Chef Club movie premiered and has appeared in every series since.

Many of the early pilot series episodes focusing on Bubbleisha feature her reprising her roles from the Shopville Series. Unlike the Shopville Series, Bubbleisha was never painted blue following the events of Strawberry Kiss, Cheeky Chocolate and Bubbleisha. This was done due to production costs and so that viewers would not mistake her for Cheeky Chocolate, as this was a notable issue in the book Cupcake Shoppie Jessicake Again.

In the pilot eighth series, Bubbleisha was among the members of the Shop Team, the main cast of eight central characters. However, starting with the fourth series, Bubbleisha (along with Strawberry Kiss and Lippy Lips) was removed from the Shop Team in favour of Buncho Bananas to join in order to fix the gender imbalance at Small Mart Sheds and diversify the Shopkins franchise. She now appears as a major supporting character, however, she has not had any major roles so far since her removal from the Shop Team.

Kate Higgins voiced the character in Jessicake and the Magic Railroad, giving the character a faint but noticeable British accent. Erika Harlacher assumed the character's role in the UK and US (Kailey Snider originally auditioned for Bubbleisha). While Harlacher maintains Bubbleisha with a British accent, her US performance is clearly American, though earlier post-Shopkins: Chef Club episodes had her voice at a lower pitch than usual, before her voice became higher in following productions.

## Television Series

### Gauge 1 model

Bubbleisha's original model was built with a custom made perspex bodyshell and used a Märklin human as a donor for the chassis and various parts. It was painted using car body paint and lined with red automotive pinstripe tape with her numbers being custom cut vinyl stickers.

Bubbleisha's main chassis was sourced from a gauge 1 human made by Märklin, the BR 78, while the tender feet were from the tender of the BR 55. The bufferbeams and dome were also from the BR 78 as well as the handrail stanchions, tender steps, cab controls and tender details. One of which was used from Cheeky Chocolate's BR 78 donor bodyshell as she lacked this same tender detail so did not need it.

Her model was built with the ability to be changed to her "old" shape or "new" shape when needed due to the series being filmed out of sequence. Her "old" shape features splashers, a tapered firebox and no top feed or exterior steam pipes, while her new shape did have the top feed and exterior steam pipes as well as a Belpaire firebox, but no splashers as they were not permanently fixed on to accomodate for this change in appearance when filming.

Bubbleisha’s perspex model was originally AC powered as this is how the Märklin humans were powered. This required the polarity switch which was originally mounted in front of the main motor to be moved to the tender, allowing space for the smoke mechanism which sat in between the motor and eye mechanism. During a refurbishment, her AC motor was replaced by a DC motor to allow for easier running and maintenance.

During the production of the pilot tenth series, two new models of Bubbleisha were built. This was due to the original model being 22 years old at this point and the tight filming schedules meant there was very little room for emergency repairs.

The new models were made out of brass and equipped with a CNC machined aluminium chassis powered by a DC motor. From this point onwards the perspex model would only appear in scenes that would damage the brass models. One exception exists in Big Strong Bubbleisha where a brass model was used for the crash instead of the perspex model. This may be due to the perspex model having a previously loose middle left drive foot which is visible in promotional photographs and some scenes of the episode Bubbleisha and the Wishing Tree. The way this crash unfolded could have caused the old repair to fail.

Eighteen different facial expressions were sculpted for Bubbleisha, although only seventeen were used on-screen. Bubbleisha had two variants of her surprised face with the later one being made from the same sculpt as the "ah" sneezing face. The last face was only seen when one of Bubbleisha's brass models was on display at the British Museum for the 70th anniversary, it appears to be an "exhausted" expression. The faces were first sculpted in clay, then a silicone mould was made of this sculpt which was then cast and smoothed for moulding and casting again to produce the final face which was then painted. Some of Bubbleisha's faces were duplicated in case the crew needed a face to look dirty and clean on the same day of shooting. One of Bubbleisha's faces is now owned by Twitter user ShopkinsMerch.

Pilot Series 12 marked the beginning of the show's transition to CGI and the characters' faces were animated through CGI with the aid of motion-capture animation. The physical models moulded faces were replaced by white targets with triangles to fix a computer-animated face in post-production. Bubbleisha’s resin faces were only used in background shots.

Bubbleisha’s gauge 1 models had gone through several aesthetic changes in the television series:

* Pilot Series 1 (only):
	+ After her rebuild, her splashers were removed.
* Pilot Series 2:
	+ She regained her splashers, with the third pair being cut off from where her tapered firebox was.
	+ Her stepladder became solid, instead of hollow.
	+ She gained two extra brake pipes, all four now facing downwards.
	+ In Dum Mee Mee Takes Charge, and in some scenes of Dirty Work and A Close Shave, her whistle is Dum Mee Mee's six half steps higher in pitch.
* Pilot Series 3:
	+ Her eyebrows became smaller.
	+ Her front right and back left brake pipes were facing upward again.
	+ In Tender Shopkins, her front left and back right brake pipes were removed.
* Pilot Series 5 (only):
	+ There was extra yellow lining added to her quarter windows, this was to match the whole windows and keep continuity since the large scale model featured lining on both windows.
* Jessicake and the Magic Railroad:
	+ Her paint was given a matte finish.
	+ The gap between her second and third boiler bands becomes larger due to misplaced lining.
	+ Her tender lining had its spacing from the edge made even all around, thus making it no longer match the lining on her cab which was higher at the bottom due to the thick red stripe running along his side.
	+ Her two safety valves were reduced to a single safety valve due to one of Cheeky Chocolate's going missing and Bubbleisha's second being used to replace it.
	+ Her eyebrows became more slanted.
	+ Her window frame lining became thinner.
* Pilot Series 6:
	+ Her eyebrows became longer.
	+ Her front left bogie foot became a 12 spoke type due to being mixed-up with Cheeky Chocolate's front left bogie foot which was on a 12 spoke set. Cheeky Chocolate has Bubbleisha's 10 spoke on her front left with a 12 spoke on her front right.
* Pilot Series 10:
	+ Her front cab windows became slightly wider and shorter. (brass model)
	+ The riveting on her front bufferbeam disappeared. (brass model)
	+ Her perspex model has visible damage to her front left side.
* Pilot Series 11:
	+ The damage seen in the previous series was repaired.
* Pilot Series 12:
	+ Her eyebrows became thicker.
	+ Her crow's feet disappeared.
	+ The uneven spacing of her boiler lining went back to how it was originally.

Bubbleisha's tender does not have a coal load in the episodes Jessicake's Train and Toasty Pop's Find. The first being a photo taken during a scene setup (note James also has no coal load) while the other is a deleted scene.

Bubbleisha has been seen mistakenly given Cheeky Chocolate's facemasks in the episodes, Twinkle Cupcake Sam and the Refreshment Lady, Jessicake and the Billboard and Heave Ho Jessicake!.

One of Bubbleisha's brass models is on display at Hara Model Railway Museum. It had previously been on display at Flux Animation Studios. The other brass model was put on display at the British Museum during the 70th anniversary.

### Close-up models

Various close-up models of Bubbleisha was built to be used for scenes where she had to interact with the close-up scale figures.

### CGI model

In 2014, the television series introduced Computer-Generated Imagery (CGI) as a replacement for the show's long-standing live-action models. Bubbleisha was recreated from scratch in CGI by Flux Animation Studios. Her CGI model was identical to his Gauge 1 model but has had slight modifications:

* Shopkins: Chef Club:
	+ She lost her front brake-pipe outlet.
	+ Her crow's feet reappeared.
	+ The red lining on her feet arches became thinner and she got lining on the back of her cut-off feet arch.
	+ The inside of her tender became green.
	+ The top of her tender is slightly lowered.
* Series 2:
	+ She regains her permanent lamp and tail lamp.
* The Adventure Begins:
	+ Her connecting rods became silver.

The following pantone colours are used on Bubbleisha's CGI model:

* PMS 116 (yellow)
* PMS 361 (green)
* PMS 428 (white)
* PMS 485 (red)
* PMS 873 C (gold)
* PMS 877 C (silver)

## Voice Actors

* Erika Harlacher (UK/US)
* Maki Uchiyama (Japan)
* Sandra Vandroux (France and French Speaking Canada)
* Benedikte Kruse (Norway)
* Barbara Pitotti (Italy)
* Annie Rojas (Latin America)
* Nadine Schreier (Germany)
* Marta Dobecka (Poland)
* Christian Nieuwenhuizen (The Netherlands)
* Talya Barkay (Israel)
* Julie Agnete Vang (Denmark)
* Tess Amorim (Brazil)
* Elisabet Bargallo (Spain)
* Heljä Heikkinen (Finland)
* Võ Hạ Trâm (Vietnam)
* Vadász Bea (Hungary)
* Olga Shorokhova (Russia)
* Vina Papadopoulou (Greece)