Animation Ch 3 : Light animation

Where darkness becomes canvas, flashlights become brushes, and accidents become art

The Luminous Discovery

Sometimes the most profound creative journeys begin in a classroom setting but continue long after the lesson ends. When Vaibhav Kumaresh—the renowned animator, director, and founder of Vaibhav Studios—visited NID as a guest faculty, he introduced our entire class to light animation techniques. While for many classmates it was simply another interesting workshop, for me it became a turning point. Coming from someone whose work includes iconic animations like "Simpoo" for Channel V and numerous award-winning short films, this introduction to light animation resonated differently with me. What was a standard lesson for the class opened a door I didn't even know existed—a portal to a world where darkness wasn't the absence of medium but the canvas itself, one I would continue exploring long after others had moved on.

I'm eternally grateful to Vaibhav for this introduction. Light animation represented something fundamentally different from my previous animation experiences—instead of creating the illusion of movement through sequential images, we were capturing actual movement of light through time and space. The light itself became both subject and medium, drawing ephemeral patterns that existed only in that moment and in the resulting footage.

Our first experiment became "Worms in my book"—a playful exploration of light trails that seemed alive, crawling across pages like luminous creatures. The simplicity of the technique belied the complexity of what it captured: light itself writing its autobiography in the dark.

The Accidental Studio

Animation often thrives on serendipity and improvisation. When Wrik and I planned a light animation shoot with an actor who never showed up, I found myself with a room full of equipment and no project. Rather than letting the gear sit idle, I decided to experiment.

With no real plan or concept, I simply began playing with light sources against different surfaces, exploring what happened when light moved through time rather than remaining static. The resulting piece was completely unplanned—a pure document of experimentation that captured not just light trails but the joy of creative discovery.

What I learned from this impromptu session: Sometimes the best animations emerge when plans fall apart, leaving space for pure play and discovery.

The Broken Leg Chronicles

Despite a broken leg that limited my mobility, Wrik and I managed to create a light animation promo for Monsoon Fiesta using a broken tripod—imperfection building upon imperfection to create something unexpectedly beautiful.

We pushed the technique in new directions: flashing lights while drawing to create staccato effects, capturing water reflections to add texture, shooting from unusual distances to play with scale, and tracing existing objects to give them luminous outlines.

The shoot stretched across 3-4 days, grabbing just a shot or two each day as our schedules and my broken leg allowed. Many planned shots never materialized as we became caught up in other festival events, but what emerged was a piece defined by its constraints rather than diminished by them.

This experience taught me another animation truth: Physical limitations often spark creative solutions that wouldn't emerge in perfect conditions.

The GARAM Promo: Heat Through Light

The "GARAM" (Hot) promo pushed our light animation into narrative territory. Vikrant proved an exceptionally patient subject as we experimented with different light techniques around and on him.

We borrowed Shreyasi's idea of mismatching voice with image, adding an unexpected layer of humor to the piece. The contrast between the serious light painting and the incongruous audio created a tension that made me laugh every time I reviewed footage during editing.

This collaborative piece showed me how light animation could move beyond pure abstraction to support storytelling and emotion—in this case, humor through juxtaposition.

Family Illuminations

Perhaps the true test of any creative obsession is whether it infects those around you. On a Diwali night, I couldn't resist involving my sister Pranita in light experiments. While I drove, she took her first shots with a DSLR, capturing the streaking trails of fireworks against the night sky.

 

Later, I watched as she attempted to write her name with light—each exposure documenting her determined efforts to master this ephemeral handwriting. The resulting images show not just light trails but the learning process itself—some attempts more recognizable than others, but each one a document of creative courage.

Seeing her excitement as the invisible became visible in these long exposures reminded me why animation in all its forms remains magical: it reveals what the naked eye cannot see, making the impossible momentarily possible.

The Inevitable Animation Impulse

When you're an animator, you simply can't resist animating everything around you. The world becomes a collection of potential movements waiting to be captured and transformed.

This was certainly true when Wrik and I created "Apla more," a silhouette light animation featuring More drinking chai. The simple, everyday action became something mythic and mysterious when rendered in pure light against darkness.

That same year, driven by what I can only describe as "excess libido" (creative energy has to go somewhere, after all), we created another light animation with sound recorded in the hostel bathroom. The echo-chamber acoustics added another dimension to the visual experiment, creating a complete sensory experience.

Passing the Luminous Torch

Years later, life completed a satisfying creative circle when I found myself helping juniors create their own RGB light animation promo. Assisting Nilomee, Ketki, Venky, Neer, and Dinesh as they discovered the magic of painting with light brought me back to that first moment of discovery with Vaibhav.

assisted Nilomee, ketki, venky, neer and Dinesh in making the RGB light animation.  

Their fresh ideas and approaches showed me how techniques evolve across generations of artists. What began as my own experimental play had become something I could pass on, each new animator adding their own vision and innovation to the practice.

This experience embodied another animation truth I've come to value: The techniques we discover don't belong to us—they're simply waiting for us to pass them along, improved by each hand that wields them.

The Light Between Frames

Looking back at these light animation experiments—from collaborative promos to family creative play, from accidental discoveries to intentional creations—I'm struck by how this technique bridges traditional animation and pure photography.

Light animation exists in that liminal space where single-frame capture meets time-based art. Each exposure is both complete in itself and part of a larger temporal experience. The light writes its brief autobiography in the dark, creating glowing calligraphy that exists only in that moment and in the resulting image.

What makes light animation particularly special is its perfect marriage of precision and accident. You can plan the general movement, but the exact pattern of light—how it blooms against darkness, how it reflects and refracts—remains gloriously unpredictable. Each capture becomes a collaboration between intention and chance.

These experiments taught me to value that unpredictability—to see animation not just as the perfect execution of a planned sequence but as a dialogue with materials and techniques that have their own voices and tendencies.

Whether working with sophisticated digital tools or simply waving flashlights in a darkened room, the fundamental joy remains the same: bringing movement to stillness, revealing the invisible, and finding beauty in ephemeral moments.