Lotus
Sabrina Zhang
(1:35)
Watch Trailer

Synopsis
A girl helps a little monster escape being hunted by soldiers, and finds that the forest holds a magical secret.

The main inspiration for the setting of my story came from a trip I took to Zhangjiajie, China. The scenery there is stunningly beautiful, and I have loved the forest ever since. At the same time, I enjoy monster culture, so I linked the two together in my short animated film, Lotus (2021). Through the little monster in my film, I want to express that harmless creatures are being killed, just because they look scary. With the creature’s character design, I want to develop a cute and loveable creature under a scary skull. The visual design uses a realism-based aesthetic. The location of the scene is in a forest, using a rich and saturated color palette. Most of the backgrounds are digital 2D, painted in Photoshop and Clip Studio Paint.

Sabrina Zhang is a Vancouver based 2D animator. Born in China, she is influenced by Chinese and Japanese animation and manga, as well as Disney. She fell in love with drawing and painting, and a seed was planted to pursue a career in animation. She studied 2D + Experimental Animation at Emily Carr University of Art + Design in Canada, receiving her Bachelors of Media Arts in 2021. While learning 2D animation, she developed a strong interest in 3D computer animation, and is self-taught using a variety of software.