Snake in the Grass: Statement of Intention

The work that I want to create involves trying to tell a simple, yet engaging, story using the means of no dialogue, all sound effects done by myself with unusual origins and having a couple of different animation styles featured. It is about a young child (animated using 2D animation) who decides to spend their time in solitude on the grass on a warm day. However, their plans are cut short when they discover that a snake (animated using Claymation) has been unknowingly following them, causing a chase between the child and the snake. However, the child eventually perks up the courage to stand up to the snake, give him a good spin and throw him into the sun so that he explodes, which leaves the child to resume chilling under the sun. For the simple story with no dialogue, I was inspired by the short film The Adventures of André and Wally B (1984, directed by Alvy Ray Smith), seeing as the plot of my short feels reminiscent. It was also a short film made by Pixar personnel before Pixar was set up, and as it was made at a time when CGI was not commonplace, I would say it is experimental. I decided to go for the “animation on top of live footage” approach after watching the film Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988, directed by Robert Zemeckis) and falling in love with how much it felt believable, even when it is obviously fiction. As for the unusual usage of sound effects in the short film, I felt inspired to do that after watching some episodes of the British stop-motion cartoon Clangers (1969-1974, created by Oliver Postgate) and how the characters speak in a whistle language, which were clearly original sounds and certainly very strange.