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Combining figurative abstraction with magic realism, this animated short depicts a world in which whales fall out of the sky and fish turn into balloons. It is a black and white evocation of the real world, transformed by the director's special sense of whimsy. With bold lines reminiscent of the stark simplicity of Inuit art, this cautionary tale is a reminder of the interconnectedness of all things. We are all affected by the fate of the Arctic, which each year is disappearing a little farther into the ocean.

In the year 2080, the Earth and the moon were at peace. Tired of the same old daily routine, the ordinary robots 'Bolts' and 'Blip' coincidentally are chosen as battle robots. They join the perennially bad 'Thunderbolts' team to fight in the Moon League. However, as the competition begins, 'Blip' realizes he has specials powers and soon becomes the hero of the planet. Just then, 'Dr. Blood' threatens to take over the Earth and 'Bolts', who was jealous of popular 'Blip', teams up with Dr. Blood. Now it is left to 'Blip' to face the challenge of saving the planet and regaining his friend 'Bolts'.

TV: transformational vibrations.

In this captivating dark comedy by Fantastic Fest alum Sol Friedman four bizarrely relatable characters cope with the ferocious attacks of a creature lurking in the woods.

In a white space where children are naively having fun, a large black spot extends. Quietly, it swallowed up the toys scattered on the ground and little by little, held the children in its abyss. Only a young boy refuses to go down there, knowing very well that no one escapes their destiny.

This animated short for children tells the story of Christopher, a little boy who didn't want to be called Christopher anymore. Such a common name! When Aunty Gail from Trinidad tells him a story about a Tiger, Christopher changes his name to Tiger. But then he finds a better name. When he has trouble cashing a birthday cheque, he realizes maybe he should stick with his original name... or maybe not?

A short animation directed by Don Filipchuk

Sara has to miss school because she has a fever.

The OIAF’s contribution to Nuit Blanche Ottawa is Hello Amiga by the Toronto Animated Image Society (TAIS). TAIS commissioned six Canadian artists – Alex McLeod, Amy Lockhart, Barry Doupé, Daniel Barrow, Lorna Mills & Mark Pellegrino – to create animations by exploring Amiga computers. These machines were popularized for graphics and image generation in the 1980s and early 1990s. The artists have created captivating works that promote necessary critical discourse around animation, ponder the history of recent technologies and embrace new manipulations of old processes.

A meditative journey through colour, form and sound. This film was created for Toronto chamber music composer Frank Horvat. The composition is performed by Canadian percussionist Beverley Johnston. The animation is created by painting ink directly onto 16mm film.

Wendy Tilby's Tables of Content was her graduation film from the Emily Carr College of Art and Design, Vancouver in 1986. The movie transports one into another era, an earlier age of gentility and reticence, set in a rather stuffy restaurant during the day.

A girl thinks she can get a glimpse of the afterlife and ropes her friend into it.

The story of the exquisite torture suffered by high school students on a daily basis. Our hero is both sullen and gay. He feels isolated and alienated but he is not alone - they're all caught up in a big daisy chain of unrequited love and teen trauma.

Mr. Piper short released in 1963 where three sisters venture off in the world but get captured by a giant. Molly has to figure out how to save them.

Our story begins a long time ago on the Nootka Island where the people Nuu-Chah-Nulth lives. Kanda, a young playful and reckless girl, is rejected by the villagers. She decides to get her revenge and begins an impossible quest.

This collection assembles the first animated films to be made by Inuit artists at the NFB. Featured is work by Solomonie Pootoogook, Timmun Alariaq, Mathew Joanasie, and Itee Pootoogook Pilaloosie—all participants in the Cape Dorset (Baffin Island) Film Animation Workshop, established to teach animation skills to local artists. The soundtrack features performances by Aggeok and Peter Pitseolok. Commentary is provided in a blend of Inuktitut and English.

Machine for Living is a project elaborated in the context of a 9 month residency at Château Ephémère (Carrière-sous-Poissy, France). The video series investigates the architecture of the new towns (Villes nouvelles) and brutalist habitation buildings in the surroundings of Paris. Cities such as Noisy-le-Grand, Montigny-le-Bretonneux, Créteil, Grigny, Cergy-Pontoise, Nanterre and Ivry-sur-Seine were at the center of this research. Created using photographs, 3D animation and video synthesizer, Machine for living combines documentation and abstraction and straddles the line between utopia and dystopia.

When a kid starts spending time in the real world, it's up to his smartphone to bring his attention back to where it belongs.

A vignette using animation and live action to depict mussel farmers digging in the mud through the ice on bays and estuaries in Prince Edward Island.

Festive experimental animation

A flame is looking for friendship, but he might be too hot to handle.

Experience the world with the sensitivity of a person with autism.

Combining colour, animation and sound to clarify principles of radio-wave transmission, this film illustrates how antennas propagate radio waves and how they may be adapted to increase the directivity of transmissions. The theoretical concepts are emphasized.

Three ghosts, representing three different generations, keep a portrait of themselves as the unique sign left of their own identity after death. Two of the ghosts have an analog portrait (a black and white photography and a painting), while the third one has a digital portrait contained within a computer. Soon they will experience the obsolescence of technology, which will challenge the preservation of memories and data through time.

Gaze into a wondrous abyss. What happens when you look at something hard for too long?

Skin for Skin is a dark allegory of greed and spiritual reckoning set during the early days of the fur trade. In 1823, the Governor of the largest fur-trading company in the world travels across his Dominion, extracting ever-greater riches from the winter bounty of animal furs. In his brutal world of profit and loss, animals are slaughtered to the brink of extinction until the balance of power shifts, and the forces of nature exact their own terrible price. With nods to Melville and Coleridge, directors Carol Beecher & Kevin Kurytnik have created a visually stunning contemporary myth about the cost of arrogance and greed.

Over a plate of mangos, a Filipino mother shares her experience working as a nurse.

The time: New Year's Eve, late 1800s. The place: Gatineau Valley, Quebec. A group of loggers, working in an isolated winter camp, yearn to celebrate New Year's Eve with their loved ones. But the river is frozen, the sky is dark, and swirling snow makes travelling treacherous. If the men want to see their families, their only choice is to make a pact with the devil to ride in a flying canoe. While pacts with the devil are the stuff of legends from another time, the cautionary tale of The Flying Canoe has a resonance for modern life. Original music and bold animation preserve the spirit of this well-known Quebec legend derived from La Chasse-galerie, first published in 1891 by Honoré Beaugrand. Hand-drawn animation scanned and coloured on computer.

Animated short film by Francois Aubry

Charles lives with his obese mother, and takes care of everything in the house. Constantly laughed at by his classmates, he takes refuge in a dream world populated by frogs. They help him through hard times that are about to get worse.

Go Dyke! Go! is a humorous commentary on lesbian relationships in the context of children’s literature. Taking off from the popular children’s book Go Dog! Go! (by P.D. Eastman), this animation paints a sarcastic, pointed and comic picture of queer life in the 90s. Familiar pop imagery and everyday signifiers are a point of entry for a discussion of the patterns of serial monogamy and lesbian representation. Go Dyke! Go! plays with the genre of animation and poses a game of semiotics to deconstruct the tropes of children's books and heterosexism.

A man in the throes of a mid-life crisis reconnects with his childhood sweetheart, and unwittingly finds himself ambushed by the reveal of a dark secret.

3D animation by Sabrina Ratté

Two college girls throw a party to make new friends but end up bargaining with a demon they accidentally summoned with a glittery pentagon decoration in this quirky animation.

Grace Fall is about the struggles and joys of trying to perform impossibly well in a circus whose troupe members aren’t really visible, but can certainly be perceived regardless. This film was made as part of the 9th edition of the NFB's Hothouse apprenticeship.

After being transported into a 19th century Edo painting, a university student discovers everyday sustainable practices from history to bring home to modern Japan.

Training film for the Canadian Department of National Defence.

Filmmaker Fred Casia, inspired by the iconic '50s-vintage View-Master stereo viewer and '60s-era TV nature shows, takes us on a weird and wacky 3-D safari through the jungle that is the human digestive system. With 2-D digital animation set into a diorama-esque stereoscopic space, Casia creates a small, bizarre gem. This film was made as part of the 6th edition of the NFB's Hothouse apprenticeship.

A man brings a small plant into his home and cares for it.

A perceptive young boy attending his uncle's birthday party notices the unfortunate results of the man’s smoking habit.

An animated film showing a woolly mammoth and its offspring. These animals lived on the Canadian tundra over ten thousand years ago.

A child's first discovery of wind--the silent, invisible something that tickles his fancy, ruffles his hair, ripples the grass around him--portrayed here in winsome animated drawings. But the artist also shows the elemental force that carries all before it. Without words but with sound effects, this is a film of universal appeal.

Celebration of film as an artform for the Liaison Independent Filmmakers of Toronto: 25 Film Manifesto’s. Both sound and picture drawn onto 35mm film.

Michel Gagné's Sheridan college film presents us with some cute animation of a rabbit and a butterfly. All is not as it seems. The film gives us an early look at this brilliant animators visual efx style.

A project based on a spoken word poem written by Shane Koyczan to further explore the profound and lasting impact that bullying can have on an individual.

When life gives you lemon...

A pair of Two-Spirit Métis Chinese youth soften a deer hide together.

This film is animated in the rough collage style that James MacSwain has made his own. Utilizing a series of vignettes, the film traces the story of the child born to Marilyn Monroe and President Kennedy. As the satire unfolds, the story becomes a metaphor for the collapse of the American Empire due to mysticism and drugs.

A visually fascinating and mildly ironic look at the Canadian people, this three-minute film is an animated version of a poem by Lionel Kearns. It is experimental in nature and well-stocked with brilliant graphics and an unusual sound track.

The fictitious space-rock duo DEATH VAN tours through a miniature world inhabited by surreal creatures that are haunted and terrorized by a menacing and mischievous entity.

The famous Canadian astronaut Kao-Kuk is just coming back from a dangerous deep space mission in a transdimensional rift. But back home at the astro station, a deeper, even more deadly mystery awaits, threatening his impending doom.

The maple leaf on the Canadian flag turns into two profiles that illustrate the many relationships between people.

An hand drawn animation merged of Colors.

Snake Eyes need to protect the ship that have little micro robot that eat metal of whole planet whit out be take by the bounty hunter and is old good friend.

A day in the life of a duck that may end up being eaten.

A compilation of satirical anti-smoking clips.

It's a short story between a little boy and a bottle with a message inside.

Ariane's grandmother often visits her in her dreams. Together, they wander through unknown nocturnal landscapes. In this dreamlike short film, where the border between memories and imagination is blurry, Ariane raises the possibility that the seal between life and death is more porous than we think.

A play on the theme of hearts. Two hearts cavort, change shape, shoot arrows at one another, give birth, and finally become one heart bearing the message "Will you be our Valentine?"