For Andrew Kaggia, learning that the dinosaurs he had seen in Jurassic Park were not real was a shock.
He didn’t understand what that meant, but it sparked an interest, “and I knew that was what I wanted to do.”
Unfortunately for him, he couldn’t seem to find the right course to take to learn animation and couldn’t travel abroad. Fortunately, technology offered a portal through which he could enter the world of animation, and he taught himself.
“I just taught myself by going to cybercafes and reading books. I bought a book on the street called the 3ds max Bible, a very thick book for animation. I studied from theory,” he says.
With modern animation tools and 3D, Andrew has now written, animated and directed a computer-animated science fiction film which combines African mythology called TeraStorm. The CGI superhero film recently premiered in Cinemas in Kenya and has been submitted for the Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars.
It is purely Kenyan-produced and features the voices of Melvin Alusa, Mungai Kiroga, Arabron Nyyneque, Ali Mwangola, Peter Mudamba, Marryianne Nungo and Sara Muhoho.
“Reception has been good; people are excited,” Andrew says of how the public received the film. “Some people thought there’s no way this was Kenyan. It’s been very exciting to see people line up to buy tickets.”
Andrew’s first project was 10 years ago, an animation production called Wageuzi. The film is based on the 2012 General Election and depicts five political contenders portrayed as transformers (human-like robots) racing for the presidential seat.
“It was a cool animation. Feedback was good and people were amazed. I even got called by a couple of the politicians. They wanted me to do animation for their campaigns, but sometimes politics gets tricky so I just left that on the side. But that’s what started to get my name out there and also started getting opportunities for me,” he says.
Andrew has also worked behind the scenes on the popular satirical puppet show The XYZ Show from 2009 to 2013 doing green screen effects. But the most viewed project he has ever done to date sits on the YouTube page he created called Hero Smashers. Andrew animated several superheroes; Superman, Batman, The Hulk, Ironman, Deadpool, Spiderman, Goku and Captain America in a DC versus Marvel epic battle which has garnered 293 million views.
TeraStorm was Andrew’s directorial debut, and it’s a direction he wants to venture into more.
Watch the video below to learn more.
