Description:

For my final year project at AUT, I had the opportunity to create a short film showcasing my visual effects and animation skills. With complete creative freedom, I delved into various ideas, genres, and themes through extensive research and experimentation. Despite exploring different avenues, I found myself continuously drawn back to the intriguing world of horror.
I've always found horror to be the most captivating genre, as it demands attention while subtly disguising controversial or sensitive concepts behind a haunting plot. Although I had previously delved into stereotypical horror subgenres like slashers and monsters, I sought to shed light on a more niche or abstract branch of horror. This led me to explore analog and uncanny terror, particularly within children’s media, where innocence often masks hidden horror.
Inspired by various media such as “Coraline,” “The Kid and The Camera,” and “Amanda the Adventurer,” I focused on bringing to life a juxtaposing concept that disguises horror elements within a welcoming facade. This sparked the conceptualization of ‘Mikey’s World!’ a horror short infused with animation and VFX aspects.
After meticulous planning, designing, sketching, animatics, and test renders, I commenced the technical design process. Utilizing Maya and Blender for modelling and texturing, I ensured that the aesthetic of an alluring and charming animated kids’ show was crafted to perfection. Despite being a novice in full 3D animated projects, this endeavour proved to be a great learning process, inspiring me to delve further into original animations.
Following a long animation and rendering process, it was time to composite the visual effects scenes in Nuke. As a VFX student, this phase felt familiar, drawing upon my experience with Nuke compositing in past assignments.
Overall, this project offered a great balance of learning and utilization of new processes and software, highlighting my strengths in storytelling and VFX. I am immensely pleased with the outcome and hope audiences will be inspired to explore analog and uncanny horror further. Reflecting on this project post-graduation, I am keen on re-exploring the concept to see how I could further improve.