ARK

Storyline

After ARK's mysterious cease of operations, Ash, a young survivor, is set to investigate the issue. While tracking a signal, Ash finds the once Human Research Centre. Clueless that NOAH is lurking in the dark, Ash decides to delve deep into the facility. During her search, Ash falls into NOAH's trap, where she loses the one thing that keeps the human race from evolving. What began as a standard quest rapidly became Ash's last search, where she'll learn the dreadful cost of human preservation.

Film ScreenCaps

Making Of

ARK is a 3D animation student film, directed by Braulio Martínez and produced by Olivia López.

The project was developed at Escena: Escuela de Animación y Artes Creativas, located in Mexico City. Most of the production of the film was made from home, due to the COVID-19 Pandemic.

During the dark times of the pandemic, we grew as a community and expanded our communication skills to keep each other’s enthusiasm going. When we wrote the script about a worldwide catastrophe –an idea from pure imagination– we didn’t know what was coming in 2020. 

Undoubtedly, this project changed a lot from the original idea and expectations. There was a lot of feedback to be considered, many re-evaluations, failures, and even flunked semesters. In the end, we made it; we graduated. We are very satisfied with our achievement.

"ARK was born after having all these thoughts about what the next step in human evolution would look like, how will it happen or even what if we were forced to evolve. Nowadays it is easy to think about the end of our race and what can we do to stop it. In ARK we'll see what would happen if the next step in evolution we were forced to design goes biblical on us. So after a lot of hard work and team effort, I'm so excited to finally share ARK with the world"

Braulio Martínez     Director

"We are very proud of this project. The creative idea of Ark was born among friends chatting on a terrace and grew to become the graduation project of our studies. As a producer, I had to push myself to be more organized, and more importantly, to avoid losing the human touch within my team, something I understood from the point of view of an artist. ARK reaffirmed our love for animation, the medium we work in, and I discovered my passion for being a producer in this industry." 

Olivia López     Producer

Concept Art

Storyboard

Color Script

Character Design

Ash

From the ashes of society Ash is born

Curious, lonesome, and with a high comprehension of technology, Ash is a young survivor that had to look after herself in this dystopic world

N.O.A.H.

The new step in human evolution

On the verge of human extinction, NOAH was created by ARK Tech, the world's biggest tech company, to save the human race from its inevitable fate

Character LookDev & Groom

World Design

Render & Comp

To avoid extremely high rendering times during our Render process, we had to optimize each frame into many Render Passes and AOVs to achieve the desired look. 

Our Team

What started with a group of only 15 people who believed in this short film, gradually evolved into a stronger and larger team. , with the help of around 60 artists. We also had the support of industry professionals, and our teachers’ feedback and advice guided us through the process.

Our vision strives to deliver the best possible results, and we learned how to manage a production along the way, and the importance of being trustworthy with collaborators.

Thanks to everyone involved in this project, for all the support and the hard work. Proud to have worked with so many talented artists, you did an amazing work and made this possible.

Thank you ARK team!