The Thai-Chinese animated feature, Out of the Nest, opened in Thailand last fall after making its world premiere at the 2024 Annecy International Film Festival, and it is a unique story in global animation production.
The film was almost ten years in the making, and faced many financial and technical challenges before a successful launch last fall in Thai cinemas. The production was led by director and writer Arturo A. Hernandez (a veteran of Disney animated productions), co-directors Jeff Schu and Andrew Gordon (veterans of Sony Pictures Imageworks and Pixar Animation Studio), and Riff Studio head and co-director Veerapatra “Tun” Jinanavin.
Cartoon Brew spoke with Gordon and Jinanavin about completing the film against all odds, through a rocky and sometimes (according to Gordon) “horrendous” production process.
It all began back at Pixar, in 2007, where Gordon welcomed Jinanavin as an intern after the young animator graduated from the Academy of Art in San Francisco. Gordon, whose career at Pixar spanned two decades from the late 1990s to the late 2010s with credits including Monsters, Inc., Ratatouille, Toy Story 3, Finding Dory, Wall-E, and The Incredibles, kept in touch with his former trainee, who in 2009, launched his own animation company, Riff Studio, in Thailand.
“Our studio was founded by a close-knit group of friends who have known each other since high school,” said Jinanavin. “When we first started, the studio only had three animators, and we focused solely on animation work, driven by our strong desire to one day produce our own feature-length animated film. We believed that if we focused on producing the highest quality work, everything else — success, growth, and opportunities — would follow naturally. This philosophy took us from a small team of three to a studio with a full production pipeline that now includes every department needed for a complete production. Today, Riff Studio is home to around 200 team members who work together as a family.”
Out of the Nest, Riff’s first feature-length project, began in 2016 as a vision from T&B Media Global founder Dr. Chawalit “P’Tan” Arayavarorm, who pitched the idea to Jinanavin. The idea: seven little royal fledgling birds, each with their own distinct personalities, entrusted to the care of Arthur, a teenage goat delivery boy whose dream is to become a world-class barber.
“My approach”, recalled Jinanavin, “was heavily focused on making sure the story had universal appeal, while also maintaining its unique charm. Out of the Nest is truly a Thai animated film, both in its origin and development. It was conceived and invested in by its Thai creators, and the key was ensuring that while the story was born out of Thailand, it could resonate with international audiences.”
But even with Riff and T&B Media Global forces combined, producing a full-length feature with, to quote Jinanavin, “the same level of quality as the major global studios while working [with] a significantly smaller budget and team” proved very difficult.
To achieve this goal, the studio sought the help of co-director Jeff Schu and executive producer/co-director Andrew Gordon. Gordon, who initially boarded the project to provide help with storytelling, ended up co-directing. “As an executive producer,” said Gordon, “you’re weighing in on the notes of the film, and you’re trying to shepherd the story, making sure that things are running smoothly. At least, that’s how it started for me on this project.”
According to Jinanavin, Gordon’s support and guidance not only helped refine the story, but also helped shape narrative structure and pacing while ensuring that the film had heart and clarity, appealing to audiences of all ages. This allowed Schu to focus on refining character animation and elevating production processes to the standards that Riff Studio and main producer T&B Media Global wanted to achieve.
“Another major hurdle”, added Jinanavin, “was the fact that Thailand’s cg animation industry is still relatively small. We don’t have a vast pool of experienced talent to draw from like in larger markets.” Eventually, to complete the film, Riff and T&B teams shared portions of their work with Base FX in China. This added another layer of challenge and technical complexity.
“As the film was also going to play in China,” recalled Gordon, “we had to take Chinese censorship into account. And so, there were some changes demanded by the China Film Administration (CFA) that we had to integrate in the film, adding or removing some elements. That proved very challenging, but Art Hernandez and Gillian [Berrow, co-writer] did a lot of that heavy lifting, going back and forth, and that proved really good.”
It was no easy task for the teams to add a co-producing studio within the framework of an ongoing production. To match the look and rendering of the project, Base FX had to ingest all of the production assets to fit existing animation. This required a tremendous amount of work, on a tight budget of under Usd$10 million. “Despite the financial limitations,” said Jinanavin, “we were committed to ensuring that the final product would not differ from the quality you’d expect from larger studios. This required us to make the most of every resource we had, and to be incredibly efficient in time and manpower.”
For Gordon, witnessing this flexibility first-hand was eye-opening. “Coming from Pixar, I had never worked in that sort of environment,” he said. “Pixar, Illumination, and DNEG are all very insular, but in this case the sharing of assets proved incredibly valuable to face the many difficulties that this production had to face. Overall, it was a lot of stops and starts, but we learned a lot. Coming from North America where there is no shortage of talents, it can be difficult to grow, and it can get very competitive. Overseas, there are a lot of opportunities to elevate your game and broaden your skill sets. And it’s refreshing to feel the mentality of creating animation with smaller teams, institutional support, and tax breaks. I would recommend it for animators who are interested in seeing a bit of the world as well.”
The triumph of Out of the Nest in Thailand continues to bring joy to Jinanavin and Riff’s teams. “I’m truly grateful for all the support,” said Jinanavin, “and it’s my hope that this success will pave the way for more Thai animated films to gain recognition on the global stage. We’re excited to see where the journey takes us next, and I hope that Out of the Nest will continue to inspire audiences, not only in Thailand but across the world.”
