PNCA Animated Arts Students’ Short Film Premieres on World Fish Migration Day
October 26, 2020
Continuing a lineage of arts and science collaboration between PNCA and NOAA Fisheries, a group of PNCA Animated Arts students premiered a short animated film depicting the life cycle of Pacific Salmon on October 24, 2020.
The opportunity for students to design and animate the film stemmed from PNCA Animated Arts Department Head Rose Bond’s continuing relationship with NOAA, having collaborated with the organization on two prior projects.
This time around, NOAA notified Bond of a call for proposals from the National Marine Sanctuary Foundation (NMSF) to create an animated salmon cycle video specifically for Pacific Salmon. Working together with the NOAA team and her students, Bond wrote the grant and was thrilled to learn that the proposal was accepted, granting her team $25,000 to create the film.
Throughout the project students had access to support from Alicia Keefe, the project’s West Coast regional lead at NOAA Fisheries, who was able to provide scientific research and confirm the accuracy of their animations. The student team also organized a research field trip to the Hood Canal Salmon Center in Belfair, Washington, where they took a tour of the estuary and volunteered planting trees to help restore the salmon’s habitat.
The student team was led by PNCA Animated Arts Assistant Professor Lori Damiano, and consisted of Project Director Emmi Stonier ’20, Lead Storyboarder Mei Mei Leonard ’20, Lead Colorist Emily Portinga ’20, Lead Background Artist Naveen Alkhatib ’20, and Lead Compositor Hsin-Tze Wang ’20.
The team received additional support from Faye Jaime (narration), Jeff Cravath ’19 (sound design), and Lizzie Hull ’19 (additional colorist). Special thanks to Rose Bond, Maxwell Brown, Ruth Howell, Lucas Marin, and Laura Stone for their assistance.
View the team’s incredible work for yourself below!