Chicken Run was Aardman's first full-length feature

Each of the internet films will be free-to-view and downloadable. All will feature one of Wallace's characteristically strange inventions, made most famous in the 30-minute TV film The Wrong Trousers.

A spokesman for Aardman, based in Bristol, said: "As fans already appreciate, Wallace is one of the most prolific inventors of our time - remember a certain pair of mechanical trousers?

"Well Wallace's inventions have moved on, they are definitely 21st Century."

Wallace's workshop will include a Bowl-O-Matic machine, a Vac-O-Matic machine, and a Breakfast TV Toaster.

Cinema

Fans of Wallace and Gromit have been languishing since the duo's last 30-minute TV outing in A Close Shave in 1995.

The Wrong Trousers appeared earlier in 1993 and followed A Grand Day Out in 1992.

Wallace and Gromit have been absent six years

Chicken Run, from 2000, was Aardman's first full-length feature, which Park made with his friend and colleague Peter Lord.

The second movie will be an adaptation of the Tortoise and the Hare fable and is due out before the start of 2003.

Park is now also working on the script for The Great Vegetable Plot. It will be released in two years.

Aardman was the first studio to release a free animated series online when it launched Angry Kid in May 2000.

The company says more than seven million people have logged on to access the character.