In recent years, Pakistan has witnessed an unprecedented growth in animation startups and with the release of animation movies like Burka Avenger and 3 Bahadur, the talent has only begun to unleash itself. But while Burka Avenger was a short video series, 3 Bahadur is Pakistan’s first full-length animation officially releasing in Pakistani cinemas on 22nd May.
And again Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy has come to the spotlight with the potential for win another Oscar for Pakistan. While animation may be an unchartered territory for her, she has certainly shown the Pakistanis may be the worst in other things, but they are certainly one of the best in the technology sphere.
She has founded the animation company Waadi Animations in collaboration with ARY Films. The company produces animated content including feature films, short films, TV series and commercials. And with Karachi’s Pi Labs and Lahore’s Mindstorm Studios leading the way for the animation industry, we should be expecting greater things to come in the future. Recently, a gaming startup in Pakistan, GameDotPlay, produced the first ever Kinect Cricket Game in the world. Yeah, we got a lot to be proud of.
The technology powerhouse TkXel also has a gaming arm in its company named ‘Nutty Apps’ which produces fun mobile games and Creativesip is doing some amazing work in 3D and animation for European and Dubai-based clients. Yes, the Pakistani creative industry has a high demand internationally.
Did you know that the main title animation sequence that plays before every episode of Game of Thrones, has been produced by Hameed Shaukat,who is a US-born Pakistani.
But the demand for such animation solutions is growing locally too. Because of the deregulation of media services in Pakistan, TV channels have grown at an unprecedented rate and all of them require the services of the animation industry in the form content for advertising, and entertainment.
The first Pakistani movie to cross the million-dollar mark, ‘Waar’, used a lot of visual effects and animations in its sequences. Safeguard and Dettol uses a lot of animated characters in its television commercials too. More and more consumer goods companies are now jumping onto the bandwagon and require animation ads for marketing their products. This means that there is a lot of unexplored opportunity in the market. So especially for those seeking a college major, next time someone tells you to be a doctor or an engineer to earn a stable income, throw this in their face. Well not literally, of course.
