Mary Nnah
To address concerns about the dangers of young people getting involved in political thuggery, a 3D animated short film titled Ami has been released.
Produced and co-directed by Tunde Oluwa, the 16-minutes film was inspired by the October 2020 Endsars crisis in Nigeria.
According to Oluwa, who doubles as creative director of Blackice animation studios, this is reiterating the implication of getting involved in political thuggery especially as we are in the electioneering season.
“I decided to use 3D animation as a medium of passing this message because the target audience is young adults who mostly spend part of their leisure time playing video games.
“The style and details in the film are about 85 percent close to the graphics one will get in a new generation game console. I believe young people will appreciate this and find it easy to relate with. Also, my background in architecture made animation a part of me, effortlessly.”
The animation film, which featured the voices of actors, Segun Dada, Olalekan Fehintola, Omowunmi Dada, and Oriyomi Joseph, is Nigeria’s first most detailed, most relatable 3D animation short film.
For artistic and co-director of the short film, Joseph Duke, said, “accountability is key in any democratic system; as such, we hope that the youth and necessary government monitoring agencies will focus on holding political office holders accountable for their promises and responsibilities.
We hope to use this film to start discussions and design workable programmes and implementation plans for transparent accountability in our country.
“Also, we hope to educate the youths and make them realise that they must stand their ground to protect their lives, the lives of their loved ones, and our collective peace and unity as a nation, by saying No to Violence.”
Duke, who also runs Elects Network and Synergy Limited, said it partnered with Blackice Animation studios to design strategic programmes that will scale up its audio-visual artwork into a measurable impact-based social campaign through its #100tags4change Initiative.
“We need to work with the youths, in an inclusive system where we can change things for the better. Just as I and Tunde have decided to start advocating for what is right in a nonviolent way by making this film, we need to encourage other youths to think introspectively and find ways of demanding accountability from political office holders, in a non-violent way, because it’s our right as citizens of this country.
“We have plans to train 50 -100 youths in animation so they too can create social and economic impact-based advocacy film, by this we can all together gradually become ambassadors for a new and better Nigeria and influence policy and procedure in the country.”
