It is time now for Nikita Deshpande and Stephanie Birat to celebrate as their 3D Animated short ‘Clouds’ is competing for prestigious Annecy Cristal Award 2014 in the Graduation Films Category.
The world’s largest International film festival, Annecy, takes place from 9-14 June. Short film selections have been done by Festival artistic director Marcel Jean and the team from the Films & Program Planning department, who from 88 countries, have selected a total of 212 films, having 55 short films, including12 Off-Limits, 29 TV films, 36 commissioned films 56 graduation films 36 short films in Out of competition, from the 2,293 films received for consideration.
Presently, the duo, who made sure to make ‘Clouds’ ,a gripping and interesting script, is associated with International studios. Nikita is a Texturing and Rendering artist at ‘Green Forest animation Studio’ in Shenzhen, China, and Stephanie is working for a French studio as a Lighting and Compositing artist.
“’Annecy’ is such a well known and prestigious film festival not only in Europe but all over the world. To find out that ‘Clouds’ qualifies as one of the many deserving entries makes us tremendously happy.” Shares Nikita with AnimationXpress.com
The tale of a crab,taking us through a fun filled universe, making us experience imaginative characters, objects and nature interacting with one another., has travelled a long way with official screenings and picked up their very first International award at 15th TBS Digicon6 by winning the Asian Regional Awa
rd, 24 FPS International Award for Best 2D-3D animated film, – ASIFA India Award for Best 3D Animated student film, Encouragement Award by – Chitrakatha 13’ Fest, – National Student film festival SRFTI ( Satyajeet Ray Film & Television Institute, Kolkata) for Best Film & Best Animation and Selection at NFFTY (National Film Festival for the Youth, Seattle, USA).
So what is the prime reason for the movie to get a nod at innumerable fests ? Nikita shares on this, “I think that ‘Clouds’ is a film that is exciting and fresh, not just for children or teenagers, but also for adults. I think the fact that we intensified a very simple, innocent concept to make something more mature, makes our film likable.” adds more
Before bringing any movie to the audiences, a Director considers putting oneself in the audience perspective and think about the reactions one would get for the movie, so how does Nikita find the short as a Director and a Viewer?
“As a director, I like the mix of culture and art in what we have produced by working together. Stephanie and I both come from different backgrounds. As a result we came to form a strong balance between creativity and technicality.”
International artists have also collaborated in the creation for this short, starting from the narration, which was done by, Amelie Wayne Forester and Elliot Wallace (from UK), and the music, by Robert Lee Jones (from the US).
“Without their contributions this film would not have been the same. As a viewer, I am completely drawn into the film. I really enjoy Amelie’s storytelling. She is a natural. It adds a lot of feeling in the moving images, and together with the visuals it forms a magical universe.” Adds further
Real life references of children’s drawings and paintings, a study of the common aspects in all children’s work, like bold use of colors, their simplicity, asymmetry, disproportionate yet expressive drawings, were the main aspects researched on for crafting the short.
Shares more “We also had people act out some of the scenes, which was very useful, and brought up many new ideas about how to go about the animation. We looked at a few toon style shorts, and some expressive animation like Ponyo & Pingu.”
So is the team planning to take this short to a newer level by making it into animated series or Full Length Feature “’Clouds’ can definitely work as ‘animated episodes’. This way there is a huge opportunity to explore various new and exciting stories keeping intact the universe that we have created.
“As a part of the animation industry, it would be fun to keep trying new things, and learning as much as possible from all around. I would love to keep creating exciting and new content as much as I can, and keep spreading my work to as many places as I can.” concludes Nikita