As Art and Animation Director for the 21st edition of Animest, I took charge of the overall creative vision to mark the Bucharest International Animation Film Festival's milestone year.

The project required bridging offline event design with frame-by-frame animation. I developed a flexible visual identity that scaled cleanly across physical media, including environmental signage, car decals, posters, tickets, and badges, while keeping the look bold and cohesive across digital channels. To top off the identity, I handled the trailer entirely end-to-end: writing the concept, animating the sequence, and crafting the sound design to establish the audio-visual tone for the entire festival.

Building a VISUAL IDENTITY

Each year the festival centers around a specific theme. For the 21st milestone edition, the theme was nature. Working with an open brief, I wanted to explore the feeling of living in a city, craving green spaces, and overfilling an apartment with houseplants to compensate.

After exploring several directions, we landed on the final hero visual: a person at home surrounded by lush plants, gently holding a caterpillar on their finger. From there, I adapted and expanded this core concept to brand the festival’s specialized sub-events, including Creepy Animation Night, Animusic, Erotica, and Trippy Animation Night. I reused the foundational layout while shifting elements, altering color palettes, and hiding subtle easter eggs across the designs for attendees to discover as they encountered them throughout the city.

Beyond traditional portrait posters, I designed and adapted the assets to scale cleanly across a wide range of formats, from web banners and social campaigns to outdoor banners, tickets, and print materials.

FROM SCREEN TO CITY

Scaling the modular nature theme into a living, breathing part of the 10-day event. From the official festival catalogue and venue screen displays to volunteer T-shirts, tote bags, and posters, the identity was built to be worn, carried, and encountered around every corner.

Scaling the modular nature theme into a living, breathing part of the 10-day event. From the official festival catalogue and venue screen displays to volunteer T-shirts, tote bags, and posters, the identity was built to be worn, carried, and encountered around every corner.

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CREATING A FESTIVAL TRAILER

For the official festival trailer, I wanted everything to tie directly back to the main visual identity, starting with our hero character - the caterpillar. Because the caterpillar is constructed from six simple circles, I realized it could be entirely modular. Breaking it apart into different shapes and positions let me have fun with the motion and animate it however I wanted.

I first roughed out the sequence in 2D using Adobe Animate. Once the animatic was locked, I used it as a guide to trace the animation frame-by-frame in Blender, which sped up the production process massively. To finish the piece, I created the sound design that brought the tactile, playful movement to life and set the audio tone for the festival.

For the official festival trailer, I wanted everything to tie directly back to the main visual identity, starting with our hero character - the caterpillar. Because the caterpillar is constructed from six simple circles, I realized it could be entirely modular. Breaking it apart into different shapes and positions let me have fun with the motion and animate it however I wanted.

I first roughed out the sequence in 2D using Adobe Animate. Once the animatic was locked, I used it as a guide to trace the animation frame-by-frame in Blender, which sped up the production process massively. To finish the piece, I created the sound design that brought the tactile, playful movement to life and set the audio tone for the festival.

EVOLUTION & STORYBOARDING

The design went through a few conceptual shifts before landing on the final look. The earliest sketches featured an older woman in a headscarf, which we soon shifted to a younger protagonist to better reflect the festival’s audience. Initially, we spent quite a bit of time developing the character with a direct stylistic nod to Romanian animation pioneer Ion Popescu-Gopo's classic character (Omulețul lui Gopo), complete with a vase of flowers. We eventually moved away from that direction to lean entirely into my own character style, and swapped out the flower vase for a caterpillar - a small addition that ended up driving the entire modular system and becoming the central visual motif for the festival identity.

The design went through a few conceptual shifts before landing on the final look. The earliest sketches featured an older woman in a headscarf, which we soon shifted to a younger protagonist to better reflect the festival’s audience. Initially, we spent quite a bit of time developing the character with a direct stylistic nod to Romanian animation pioneer Ion Popescu-Gopo's classic character (Omulețul lui Gopo), complete with a vase of flowers. We eventually moved away from that direction to lean entirely into my own character style, and swapped out the flower vase for a caterpillar - a small addition that ended up driving the entire modular system and becoming the central visual motif for the festival identity.

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let's make something

© 2026 Luiz Stockler. All rights reserved.

let's make something

© 2026 Luiz Stockler. All rights reserved.

let's make something

© 2026 Luiz Stockler. All rights reserved.