The Kochi-based animation studio behind Lokah

The Lokah – Chapter 2 announcement is sort of the teaser, including to the drama is the animation which has a definite, graphic novel-like high quality. It is dramatic and has generated a buzz of anticipation for the following chapter. For the crew of a Kochi-based animation studio, Eunoians Studio, tucked away in a bylane in Edappally, it’s a supply of pleasure and pleasure. They are the crew behind the animation in Lokah – Chapter 1 Chandra and the Chapter 2 announcement. 

This is an enormous second for Eunoians, based in 2014 by classmates at C-DiT (Centre for Development of Imaging Technology), Thiruvananthapuram. While Lokah has catapulted them into the large league, gaining them large publicity and reward globally, in addition they just lately gained the Grand Prix in Animation on the MADDY’s (Madras Advertising Club Awards) for his or her work in Bramayugam (2024). The founders — Azeem Kattali, Seerow Unni, Imodraj Mohanamani, Rajesh Velachery, Mithun Krishna, and Jeroy Joseph — are, understandably, on cloud 9. “The response to our work is approach past our expectations. We are overwhelmed by the response, we don’t what is going on! We see it as a reward for our struggles of the previous 10 years!”

All besides Jeroy have been classmates at C-DiT the place they met once they got here collectively to check animation after commencement. “It means lovely thinkers and we like phrase play. It is one phrase in English which has all of the vowels!” Azeems explains what Eunoians means. 

Lokah, which just lately crossed the ₹300 crore mark in international field workplace collections, continues to be being analysed and one of many hotly mentioned points are the Easter eggs buried within the title playing cards. The 26 frames created by Eunoians are loaded with hints, clues and ideas, the references are cleverly embedded. Equally gorgeous are the flashback sequences. Animation within the movie enhances the motion, by no means as soon as taking away from the circulation of the narration, organically taking the story ahead.   

“Lokah was your complete package deal. Usually, we come into the image, actually, within the pre-production part. But for this movie we got here within the post-production part. The Easter eggs have come up for a lot dialogue, which suggests folks watched the movie rigorously. We needed to point out, through the title sequence, that there’s a lot extra to the world than meets the attention…that it extends approach past what we will see and understand,” says Azeem. And to that finish, the Eunoians have achieved their job; round 30 artists from the crew labored on the movie.

The total crew, Azeem says, was in a position to contribute greater than a daily animation studio as a result of “we aren’t simply animators, they’re artists, movement graphics artists and different points of what goes into this work.”  

The grandeur of the ‘Lokah’ universe

Lokah begins — courtesy the title animation — with a sure grandeur and depth which communicates the vastness of the universe it inhabits. Although generally it provides off anime-like vibes, Balaram J, an Eunoian, who was the artistic director of the Lokah animation, says, “For the title animation and flashback sequences, we got, as references, works comparable to Rembrandt’s work. We have been to provide the works a really feel of grandeur, an epic-like look.”  

The mission got here to Eunoians through the post-production supervisor of the movie, Ajmal. “We have been in fixed dialogue with the director Dominic Arun, the director of images Nimish Ravi and editor, Chaman Chakko through the pre and post-production levels of the animation. Before we began work, this crew, together with Ajmal dropped into the studio and focus on your complete story and present the visuals of the movie…that’s how the preliminary discussions came about.” 

Even as folks have been unpacking Lokah Chapter 1: Chandra, got here the announcement teaser of Chapter 2, which is much more dramatic than what we noticed in Chapter 1.

“For the announcement teaser, the transient was that it needed to be extra dramatic and the animation needed to be grander than the title sequence of the primary movie. It needed to really feel cinematic as a result of the villain was being ‘established’ and it needed to be goosebumps-inducing. The visuals needed to be such that the viewers might really feel how highly effective he’s. We weren’t informed what to do, however the last product developed over discussions with the crew,” Balaram provides. 

“We first created the fashion body, as soon as we obtained the approval we did the storyboard and the animatics” The fashion body, Balaram explains, is the appear and feel of the animation, as a way to give an thought of how it could look, the textures and its colors. “Though the references within the transient to us talked about classical painters and kinds, we tried to create our personal fashion taking inspiration from these.”   

Azeem says, “Our connections are all phrase of mouth, with our work getting observed and folks coming to us.” Bramayugam and now Lokah got here that approach. While the previous made folks sit up and take discover, their work in Lokah is of one other league. In phrases of labor, it has translated to firms approaching them with a clearer understanding of their portfolio.

This is huge for the animation studio. Apart from commissioned work, they have been into animated and static stickers, shareable content material for platforms like WeChat, Hike and Skype in addition to others. Their previous works embrace wall artwork for FIFA U-17 World Cup (2017), Crossover Stories (Kerala Tourism), and the Corona consciousness video for the Kerala Government in addition to others.

If you will have seen the signature movies of manufacturing homes comparable to Mammootty Cinema Kampany, Blessy’s Visual Romance or Soubin Shahir’s Parava Films, and most just lately Basil Joseph Entertainment…they’re all by Eunoians.  

The huge break with ‘Bramayugam’

The dialog is incomplete with out speaking about Rahul Sadasivan’s 2024 movie Bramayugam which basically obtained their work observed and the animation grew to become a speaking level on the time of its launch. Azeem calls the movie one the Eunoians’ favorite/memorable tasks. “I’m not saying this as a result of the movie went on to turn out to be an enormous hit, we’ve got felt so proper from the get-go. Rahul gave us the thumbnail sketches, like a storyboard. Like he had a transparent thought about what he needed and the way he needed to relate the story, he knew what he didn’t need. We got the liberty to discover the aesthetic a part of the job entrusted to us. The foremost problem for us, and the transient, was that when reside motion is interspersed with animation, the viewers shouldn’t disconnect. We have been in a position to efficiently do it which enhanced the mission.”  

Until Bramayugam, Azeem says, they by no means had the chance to discover an out of the field mission. “It was one in every of our first: we have been as anxious as we have been excited. But we have been in a position to pull it off through the use of a number of strategies — 2D and 3D animation, conventional animation, composting strategies — you could possibly say that we developed a mode, from scratch, for this movie. Doing it in black white whereas guaranteeing that there isn’t any dilution of high quality? We did it.” 

They have a few movies available — Rahul Sadasivan’s Pranav Mohanlal-starrer Dies Irae and the Arjun Ashokan-starrer Chatha Pacha, directed by Advaith Nayar.

Despite being a part of movies, Azeem insists that they don’t wish to place themselves as a cinema-only firm. “We wish to strike a steadiness in that we’ve got a combined portfolio, which inlcudes engaged on and with authorities tasks, NGOs, ads, fintech, edutech, healthtech and naturally, company shoppers. We don’t wish to focus solely on the leisure enterprise,” says Azeem. They have labored with WHO, UNDP, WWF other than corporates comparable to Medimix and V-Guard. 

They refuse to be boxed in. And that’s the mojo of Eunoians’ success and longevity. They pleasure themselves on their adaptability, “We will do any type of work associated to our discipline. It is barely that cinema has made us well-known!” Azeem says as he indicators off.