What do you do when a film director you admire a great deal phones you up and asks you to do the opening titles for his new film?

It happened to me and I said yes.

Opportunities like that aren't come around that often and I would've kicked myself for the rest of my life if I had chickened out and said no. I wasn't at all sure I was up to it but I'd give my best shot. But once I'd started I knew that failure was not an option. How could I have ever watched another Shane Meadows film knowing I had let him down?

In early 2009 an idea for an informal mini-film competition bubbled up out of forum members' discussions on the Shane Meadows forum. Shane offered to judge the entries too! To my surprise not only did Shane select my entry with five others to feature on his next DVD release as an extra but my entry also won the forum members' vote!

But that wasn't it for me. Shane Meadows showed the competition entries to his girlfriend, Jo, and she suggested that my animation style would suit Le Donk. Shane thought that was a good idea. I didn't know this but Shane had wanted animated sequences in Le Donk but the idea had fallen by the wayside. He phoned me up out-of-the-blue one evening and asked if I'd like to do an animated opening title sequence for his new film, Le Donk & Scor-Zay-Zee! And of course I said "YES!"

As soon as we finished talking I started sketching. I was due to meet Shane and his producer, Mark Herbert who's also MD of Warp Films, in a few days time. It was important I had something to show them. They were taking quite a shot in the dark and I sort of knew I had to make a gesture to reassure them that they hadn't made a rash decision.

I met Shane and Mark in Ye Olde Trip To Jerusalem pub in the heart of Nottingham. I kept my cool – battened down the hatches on any fan-boy blitherings – I didn't say or do anything stupid (I think), I showed them my sketches and we talked about what was needed.

Shane gave me a copy of the Le Donk & Scor-Zay-Zee film and emailed me the version of Scor-Zay-Zee's Rupert Brown that was to play over the opening titles.

I got to work. I had about six weeks to do 97 seconds of animation and I had to do this in my spare time around my day job.

Shane wanted Le Donk and Scor-Zay-Zee to be animated as well as certain lyrics of the Rupert Brown track to feature too. Aside from that, he told me to express myself.

That was pretty amazing for Shane to suggest I do that. I decided to have some fun. I merged the narrative of the film with the lyrics of Rupert Brown to create a little story. I also had to include the titles which I did in various, hopefully, clever ways. I wanted to mimic our dreams' ability to merge disparate memories and events from various points in our lives into new and bizarre adventures.

So I've imagined that the opening title animation is a dream that Scor-Zay-Zee has the night before the events of the film begin. His dream, in crazy dream logic, predicts what's about to happen to him and Le Donk over the next few days but mixed up with what happened the night before as well as his teenage memories that feature in the lyrics of Rupert Brown.

Shane and Mark were very happy with the animation and felt it would give the film a big lift-off. Shane didn't mind being portrayed as a bumble bee either!

Click here to find out how it all began.

Click here for a glimpse of my experiences at the premier of Le Donk & Scor-Zay-Zee at the 2009 Edinburgh International Film Festival.

If you'd like to see the animation in full, why not buy the DVD? It's a very funny film with all the heart and soul of any Meadows film you could name. You'll also be helping to support one of Britain's most talented film directors as well as contributing to the British film industry as a whole.

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