Ramayana: The costliest animation film

Touted as India’s most expensive and ambitious animation film already had a story, animating Ramayana - The Epic required a team of 400, two-and-a-half years and Rs 24 crore

Even though what is being touted as India’s most expensive and ambitious animation film already had a story, animating

HT Image

Ramayana - The Epic

was not an easy job.

After nine months of working on the character sketches from the epic, based on audiences’ perceptions of Rama, Sita and Raavana, a team of 400 people toiled for two and a half years to bring the Indian epic tale to life.

Talking about the process of the creation of the faces, director Chetan Desai says, “When you start sketching, you have to start locking on each stage and be sure of what you’re making, keeping in mind what the end result will look like. Only then can you start modelling it, otherwise if one step goes wrong, it’ll have to be recreated from scratch.”

Since the main characters of the book are critical to Indian sentiments, a team of creators specifically worked on crafting the imagery based on what people would find acceptable.

“Everyone has seen Rama in comic books, temples and so on; so our design had to similar to all that,” says Desai. The movie that costs over Rs 24 crore is hoping to recover its expenses from international markets.

“Animation is essentially a global market and

Ramayana

is the most popular Indian story ever told. We’re hoping to take this story to the world this Dussera,” says Ketan Mehta, the producer.

Ramayana - The Epic

is due to release in theatres on October 15, this year.