The Lokah – Chapter 2 announcement is quite the teaser, adding to the drama is the animation which has a distinct, graphic novel-like quality. It is dramatic and has generated a buzz of anticipation for the next chapter. For the team of a Kochi-based animation studio, Eunoians Studio, tucked away in a bylane in Edappally, it is a source of pride and joy. They are the team behind the animation in Lokah – Chapter 1 Chandra and the Chapter 2 announcement.
The team with Nimish Ravi (in blue) and Dominic Arun (second from right) at Eunoians Studio at Edappally
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This is a big moment for Eunoians, founded in 2014 by classmates at C-DiT (Centre for Development of Imaging Technology), Thiruvananthapuram. While Lokah has catapulted them into the big league, gaining them massive exposure and praise globally, they also recently won the Grand Prix in Animation at the MADDY’s (Madras Advertising Club Awards) for their work in Bramayugam (2024). The founders — Azeem Kattali, Seerow Unni, Imodraj Mohanamani, Rajesh Velachery, Mithun Krishna, and Jeroy Joseph — are, understandably, on cloud nine. “The response to our work is way beyond our expectations. We are overwhelmed by the response, we don’t what is happening! We see it as a reward for our struggles of the past 10 years!”
All except Jeroy were classmates at C-DiT where they met when they came together to study animation after graduation. “It means beautiful thinkers and we like word play. It is one word in English which has all the vowels!” Azeems explains what Eunoians means.
One of the animations for Lokah
Lokah, which recently crossed the ₹300 crore mark in global box office collections, is still being analysed and one of the hotly discussed aspects are the Easter eggs buried in the title cards. The 26 frames created by Eunoians are loaded with hints, clues and suggestions, the references are cleverly embedded. Equally stunning are the flashback sequences. Animation in the film complements the action, never once taking away from the flow of the narration, organically taking the story forward.
“Lokah was the entire package. Usually, we come into the picture, literally, in the pre-production phase. But for this film we came in the post-production phase. The Easter eggs have come up for much discussion, which means people watched the film carefully. We wanted to show, via the title sequence, that there is so much more to the world than meets the eye…that it extends way beyond what we can see and perceive,” says Azeem. And to that end, the Eunoians have done their job; around 30 artists from the team worked on the film.
From Lokah
The entire team, Azeem says, was able to contribute more than a regular animation studio because “we are not just animators, they are artists, motion graphics artists and other aspects of what goes into this work.”
The grandeur of the ‘Lokah’ universe
Lokah starts — courtesy the title animation — with a certain grandeur and depth which communicates the vastness of the universe it inhabits. Although sometimes it gives off anime-like vibes, Balaram J, an Eunoian, who was the creative director of the Lokah animation, says, “For the title animation and flashback sequences, we were given, as references, works such as Rembrandt’s paintings. We were to give the works a feel of grandeur, an epic-like look.”
The project came to Eunoians via the post-production supervisor of the film, Ajmal. “We were in constant discussion with the director Dominic Arun, the director of photography Nimish Ravi and editor, Chaman Chakko during the pre and post-production stages of the animation. Before we started work, this team, including Ajmal dropped into the studio and discuss the entire story and show the visuals of the film…that is how the initial discussions took place.”
The Eunoians team with the MADDY for their work in Bramayugam
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Jinson Abrabam
Even as people were unpacking Lokah Chapter 1: Chandra, came the announcement teaser of Chapter 2, which is even more dramatic than what we saw in Chapter 1.
“For the announcement teaser, the brief was that it had to be more dramatic and the animation had to be grander than the title sequence of the first film. It had to feel cinematic because the villain was being ‘established’ and it had to be goosebumps-inducing. The visuals had to be such that the audience could feel how powerful he is. We weren’t told what to do, but the final product evolved over discussions with the team,” Balaram adds.
“We first created the style frame, once we got the approval we did the storyboard and the animatics” The style frame, Balaram explains, is the look and feel of the animation, in order to give an idea of how it would look, the textures and its colours. “Though the references in the brief to us mentioned classical painters and styles, we tried to create our own style taking inspiration from these.”
The Eunoians work in Bramayugam
Azeem says, “Our connections are all word of mouth, with our work getting noticed and people coming to us.” Bramayugam and now Lokah came that way. While the former made people sit up and take notice, their work in Lokah is of another league. In terms of work, it has translated to companies approaching them with a clearer understanding of their portfolio.
This is big for the animation studio. Apart from commissioned work, they were into animated and static stickers, shareable content for platforms like WeChat, Hike and Skype besides others. Their past works include wall art for FIFA U-17 World Cup (2017), Crossover Stories (Kerala Tourism), and the Corona awareness video for the Kerala Government besides others.
From Bramayugam
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If you have seen the signature films of production houses such as Mammootty Cinema Kampany, Blessy’s Visual Romance or Soubin Shahir’s Parava Films, and most recently Basil Joseph Entertainment…they are all by Eunoians.
The big break with ‘Bramayugam’
The conversation is incomplete without talking about Rahul Sadasivan’s 2024 film Bramayugam which essentially got their work noticed and the animation became a talking point at the time of its release. Azeem calls the film one the Eunoians’ favourite/memorable projects. “I’m not saying this because the film went on to become a huge hit, we have felt so right from the get-go. Rahul gave us the thumbnail sketches, like a storyboard. Like he had a clear idea about what he wanted and how he wanted to narrate the story, he knew what he did not want. We were given the freedom to explore the aesthetic part of the job entrusted to us. The main challenge for us, and the brief, was that when live action is interspersed with animation, the audience shouldn’t disconnect. We were able to successfully do it which enhanced the project.”
Until Bramayugam, Azeem says, they never had the opportunity to explore an out of the box project. “It was one of our first: we were as anxious as we were excited. But we were able to pull it off by using multiple techniques — 2D and 3D animation, traditional animation, composting techniques — you could say that we developed a style, from scratch, for this film. Doing it in black white while ensuring that there is no dilution of quality? We did it.”
They have a couple of films on hand — Rahul Sadasivan’s Pranav Mohanlal-starrer Dies Irae and the Arjun Ashokan-starrer Chatha Pacha, directed by Advaith Nayar.
Despite being part of films, Azeem insists that they don’t want to position themselves as a cinema-only company. “We want to strike a balance in that we have a mixed portfolio, which inlcudes working on and with government projects, NGOs, advertisements, fintech, edutech, healthtech and of course, corporate clients. We don’t want to focus solely on the entertainment business,” says Azeem. They have worked with WHO, UNDP, WWF apart from corporates such as Medimix and V-Guard.
They refuse to be boxed in. And that is the mojo of Eunoians’ success and longevity. They pride themselves on their adaptability, “We will do any kind of work related to our field. It is only that cinema has made us famous!” Azeem says as he signs off.
