Animation Wild Card

07/02/2025

💖 It’s been an honor to organize and share the contributions of the Animation Wild Card community over the last 5 years. We moved our in-person finale event online due to the fires in Los Angeles earlier this month (January 2025), and we’re now sharing the complete celebration and retrospective showcase screening event on our YouTube channel. (Link in Bio)

Additionally a full program of the films can be found linked in the description of our YouTube video - Please be sure to - ❤️ Like 💌 Share and ✅ Follow all of our contributors featured in our finale event (names and titles found through our YouTube program link).

While the Animation Wild Card episode series has come to an end, we’re incredibly grateful for what this community has become over the years. Thank you so much for sharing your joy and creativity with us. Please continue to stay in touch, our online presence and communication channels will remain open :)

Your Animation Wild Card Team,
Lex & Casey
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31/12/2024

To honor the contributions of the AWC community, we are finishing the series with an in-person retrospective event co-hosted by our friends at Hot 30 Microshorts at El Cid in Los Angeles on Wednesday, January 8, 2025. We hope you can join us for the final installment of the Animation Wild Card journey. RSVP via Eventbrite: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-animation-wild-card-retrospective-finale-screening-tickets-1122330824709?aff=oddtdtcreator

26/11/2024

With gratitude and some sadness, we have made the difficult decision to end our Animation Wild Card episode series. To honor the contributions of the Animation Wild Card community over the last 5 years, we are hosting an in-person celebration and retrospective showcase event on January 8th, 2025, at El Cid in Los Angeles (in collaboration with ). Please swipe through our post for a farewell letter from our longtime project organizers, Lex and Casey 💕

19/12/2023

Director / Animator, , shared a bit about the process of making "Help! (my elf is in a funk)" :⁠
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"Here are some process pics of the making of the Andy Puppet! ⁠
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He is a foam build up puppet made with 1/8 inch armature wire lashed together with extra strong thread and spray adhesive, built up body mass with upholstery foam, and his head was sculpted with chavant clay which was then used to make a mold to cast a light weight resin head. ⁠
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He was also made with lots of love and a dash of Christmas magic!"⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠
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19/12/2023

presents, Jeremy Mowery aka :⁠
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"Jeremy Mowery is a freelance stop motion animator and teacher hailing from Los Angeles. He founded his garage studio, Sock Dolly Productions in 2017, with his friend and colleague, Adam Thebault. Since then, he has worked on several indie short films, music videos, commercials, and features. The Christmas Elf, Andy the Agitated Elf, is a character from the upcoming indie feature film, An LA Christmas Story, coming in 2024."⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

20/11/2023

presents, Nicolette Groome aka :⁠
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"Hi! I'm a freelance animator and writer. I love to tell stories. I take a lot of inspiration from my own life. My current passion project is a pilot called Apopalypse. I am a quarterfinalist in Screencraft's Animation Competition this year. I'm hoping I will be able to share it with everyone in the near future!"⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

18/11/2023

presents, Gina Bernardini aka .bernardini :⁠
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"Gina Bernardini is an animator and artist currently located in Tampa, FL. She works as a muralist while creating stop-motion and 2D animations in her free time. With hopes to someday work in the film industry, she continues learning how to implement her traditional art skills to build puppets and sets for her animations."⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

12/11/2023

presents, Shawn Nelson aka :⁠
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"Arrrrr This be me.⁠
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I’m not sure how I first found Tiki Culture. I certainly tried to go in other directions before I settled my hut on Tiki Island. I guess the siren’s call finally reeled me in. Looking back I was most likely possessed as a youngster while my Grandparents would duck into the Enchanted Tiki Room to escape the LA heat at the Big D. As they were sleeping through the show I was inhaling tiny tiki particles shed by the drumming wall decorations. Eventually these nano-tikis took over my brain, and much like Marc Davis, and Gauguin, I was a lost soul doomed to drink from Scorpion Bowls and wear bright comfortable clothes forever."⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠
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10/11/2023

Animator / Creator, , shared a bit about the process of making "Neck Romancer: Book" from his web series :⁠
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"Originally, I was going to start this short already inside the library. However, the exterior building and the steep steps leading up to the actual real life library, were too interesting not to recreate in miniature form. Here are a few photos of the process."⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠
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10/11/2023

presents, Joseph Orr aka :⁠
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"My name is Joseph Orr and I am from Dublin, Ireland. I studied film in college but found later that animation was my true passion. Stop motion was the perfect gateway into this world because of how accessible it was compared to other forms of animation. Plus I had always been a huge Wallace & Gromit fan. I started my stop motion journey with just a phone, an app and some LEGO. I had no formal animation training but instead relied heavily on the tutorials and behind-the-scenes videos of others.⁠
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All of my early work was made using a combination of LEGO characters and sets made of arts and crafts materials. I really enjoyed creating original comedy sketches with popular characters from Star Wars, Marvel, Harry Potter and more. These brick films gave me the opportunity to develop as an animator and tap into a hugely supportive community of other like minded artists. ⁠
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However soon I began to take notice of film festivals. I became obsessed with the idea of entering one but I would need to move away from LEGO to do so. This is what led me to produce my first original short "Dracuvan". It took roughly 9 months and it is almost entirely made out of card and wood. The main character of Dracuvan was Thaddeus Dracula, a vampire living in Dublin. I had so much fun with this character that I decided to create a web series around him and that is how the idea for my web series Neck Romancer ( ) came into being."⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

03/07/2023

presents, Isabella Potenziani aka :⁠
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"Isabella Potenziani is a stop-motion animator and fabricator who grew up in Tinton Falls, New Jersey. Later moving to Baltimore Maryland to get a degree in Animation at Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA). While there, she focused on stop-motion animation and had an internship at NASA in Greenbelt, MD. After graduation she returned back to New Jersey where she resides now, making animated shorts and crochet commissions."⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

23/06/2023

https://youtu.be/j3JZUwffsLA
NEW AWC EPISODE ALERT! As we get into the summer months (and soon our mid-season break), we chose "Close" as the optional theme for episode 23.⁠⁠⁠ This episode features some great short-short animations from new & old contributors!

Check out our Instagram () for features on all the contributing artists, and view full credits below:

0:12 The Warmest Hug
Director, Animator & Sound Designer: Pattama Homrod
YouTube & Instagram:
Film Colorist & Sound Design Advisor: Kamolwit Thomyabat
Instagram: .art

0:58 Magical Cat
By: Threadwood
Instagram:
TikTok:
Threadwood.com

1:47 Light Up
Director: Miguel Duarte
Instagram:

2:22 Subway B***r
Story, Art, Animation & Music By: Warren Muzak
Instagram:
YouTube:
Music Performed By: Warren Muzak and Mary Ancheta

2:42 Too Close
Direction/Animation By: Kira Awdry
YouTube & Instagram:
Sound Effects By: Kira Awdry & Freesound.org

3:26 Eyeball Experiments
Design/Animation By: Elliot Lobell
Instagram:

4:24 Lil' Space Bellies
Created By: Mikael Trench
TikToK & Instagram:
YouTube: TriClops Animations

5:11 Connection
Created/Directed By: Megan Matelonek
Instagram & Twitter:

5:42 We Are Not Alone
Direction/Animation/Fabrication By: Jeremy Mowery
Instagram:
Music By: Pulsar Radio
Instagram:

6:27 Too Close
Animator, Director, Editor: Isabella Potenziani
Instagram:

7:08 Aubrey Grump
Music: Robert Dietz
Direction, Animation and all the other things: Mike Dietz
Instagram:
www.mikedietz.com

Animation Wild Card Bumper
By: Cami Kwan & Apartment D Films
Instagram:
Instagram:
Music By: Ellen C***s & Lee Young
Instagram:
Instagram:

Thank You!

As we get into the summer months (and soon our mid-season break), we chose "Close" as the optional theme for episode 23.⁠⁠⁠ This episode features some great ...