Wind & Tree

This is an animated short produced by Kinstantin Steshenko which I found on youtube whilst searching for ideas for my Animation Process and Production brief. It is the winner of Ottawa International Festival's Best Canadian Student Film 2013 and it is completely deserving.

This short is a love story between a tree and a lonely wind character. Whilst the wind is computer generated, everything else is stop motion, and I think this combination really works well, especially for this storyline. It only emphasises the fact that the wind and three are different entities, which makes the film even more sad.

The animation communicates themes of companionship, loss and solidarity all through making the audience feel a connection to the characters. Both, despite their aesthetic difference and difference in form, are willing to be together and this makes the audience align with them. Therefore when there is a storm, the audience has allegience with the 'couple' and therefore from conveying loss and grief, the audience also feels their sadness.

I think there could have been more detail in the sound to portray even further the themes, especially the one of loss, because the strings in the background is a little distracting, but other than that I think adding real life wind noises make the short just as effective. There are some points in the film where I find the computer animation looks slightly odd on top of the stop motion, but that is only because it look more obvious in close ups, rather than when there are two shots. 

Just by looking at the short I would not be able to tell what audience it is aimed at, even more so because there is no dialogue, but since it was entered in an academic festival, then I assume it's audience is primarily critical. However because I found it on Youtube, it's audience has been improved to everyone, since anyone of any age can view it for free. 

Overall I think it is a really nice combination of stop motion and computer generated animation, and it is the first time I have seen the two together so obviously. I am glad it won the award and I must have a look at what else they have made.