"Ondel" is another collaborative project with Antmotion since our last project, "To Be". "Ondel" is a horror short movie about a Betawi kid named Zaki, who's also a coward. He then did something wrong that made him 'haunted' by the figure that known as Ondel-ondel. Which in the end makes him realize his mistake and try to mend it.
This is a 6 minutes 3D short animation. I mainly worked as the producer and the character designer of this animation. But since it's a collaborative work, we decided to took part in each roles. This animation is also our final project in our last year of college.
The Characters
Zaki
He is the main character of the story. He is an 11 years old Betawinese boy. The keyword for his whole design and concept are coward, and Betawi. Zaki went through a lot of developments and researches such as his basic shapes and proportion, costume, color, silhouette, accessories, and hair. Since he is the main character, and since our animation carried the Betawi culture, Zaki 's costume and feature also represent Betawi's culture and people.
Caling
Caling means Taring in Indonsian. Caling is an Ondel-ondel or now known as the icon of Jakarta. To be honest, Caling is the hardest character I ever designed. We have to go through a lot of researches and developments as I need to design Caling scarier without changing the whole concept of Ondel-ondel itself. We even went to several places such as Kampung Ondel-ondel at Pasar Senen, Jakarta, to interview the crafter about the origin of Ondel-ondel and its shape and proportions. Caling use mostly square and triangle shapes to define its asymmetrical and scary feature, but also rounded to represent that the figure of Ondel-ondel is actually harmless.
Ijal
Ijal is the supporting character from this animation. He is the one who told Zaki about the scary myth of Caling and made Zaki did something wrong which is throwing a small rock at Caling that caused one of Caling's teeth cracks. Ijal is the mischievous one on the group. He is the same age as Zaki but slightly taller which makes him feeling a bit superior than Zaki. Also there is actually one more supporting character named Kepin (which is shown on the sketch), but after some discussion we decided to take him out.
Few Stills
