Background Information[]
Emily is a fictional standard gauge tender locomotive created by Phil Fehrle and Jan Page. She is the No. 12 engine on the North Western Railway.
Emily first appeared in the seventh series episode Emily's New Coaches, which first aired in 2003. Her last appearance was in the twenty-fourth series episode Gordon and Rebecca, Coming Through!, which was released in 2021.
Steam Team[]
When production of the eighth series began, the "Steam Team" was created. The first seven engines were included in the new Steam Team. Duck was considered to be the eighth member for a while, but was dropped in favour of Emily in order to give a female character a prominent role, thus making Emily appear as one of the main characters ever since, essentially making her one of the most significant female characters of the television series.
Emily's Conceptualisation[]
During production of the sixth series, one of the crew members built a model of a GNR Stirling Single in his spare time. The rest of the crew were impressed with this model, with some even saying that the smokebox design and cylinder casing bared a resemblance to women's hair. This gave the crew the impression that this specific class of engine would make the perfect basis for a female character in the show, which led to Emily's creation and introduction in the seventh series.
Gauge 1 model[]
Two models for Emily were scratch-built from brass to run on gauge 1 track. For unknown reasons, one of Emily's models did not have brake-pipe outlets. Interestingly, this model had a tendency to oscillate left-and-right when at speed, a quality that Emily's basis was affected by.
Model Orthos[]
Close-up model[]
A larger scale model of Emily was built in the seventh series. It was required for scenes where she had to interact with the close-up scale figures. It was also used for close-up whistle shots; smoke would emit when required.
Most of the engine was built, excluding the wheels, and a visible face. It also had a snowplough, most likely made for the episode, Thomas, Emily and the Snowplough, but it ultimately was never used on-screen.
It appeared in the seventh, eighth, tenth and twelfth series.
CGI model[]
In 2009, the series introduced Computer-Generated Imagery (CGI) as a replacement for the show's long-standing live-action models. Emily was recreated from scratch in CGI by Nitrogen Studios. Her model was "hand-sculpted" in Maya, a 3D animation and modelling software.
Photographs of Emily's Gauge 1 model were used for referencing. According to Greg Tiernan, every detail of the original television series models for each character is carefully reproduced in the CGI model. The models are subjected to many rounds of review before they are submitted to HiT Entertainment for final input and approval.