In addition to quality films, BAICFF offers children hands-on fun.
Animation Workshops[]
In addition to quality films, BAICFF offers children hands-on fun. In 2013 we will have several exciting workshops. All workshops are led by Academy Award-nominated Pixar animator Jim Capobianco, and staffed by enthusiastic and talented film students from Berkeley City College.
Sand Animation Workshop[]
Make sand come alive! Draw creatures, people, cars, trees – anything! – and make them flow together into a short film. This very simple and fun technique leads to beautiful and exciting results. After the festival, we will post the final films for download so that each child has a copy of her own. DVD copies available upon request. We plan to screen a sneak peek at footage from the workshop before the afternoon feature.
| Date: | Saturday, January 26, 2013 | |
| Start Times: | 9:30, 10:00, 10:30, 11:00, 11:30, 12:00 | |
| Duration: | 20 minutes | |
| Age Range: | 7 – 12 years old | |
| Price: | $20 | |
| Click Here to Buy Sand Animation Tickets | ||
Clay Puppet Animation Workshop[]
Our most popular workshop! Decorate and film your very own, professional stop-motion puppet and take the puppet home with you. Spend the first half of the workshop personalizing your "actor" with googly eyes, buttons, feathers, etc. Then lights, camera, action – it’s time to make your puppet come alive. Use your imagination to place your little "actor" in a series of poses that add up to action! After the festival, we will post the final films for download so that each child has a copy of her own. DVD copies available upon request. We plan to screen a sneak peek at footage from the workshop before the afternoon feature.
| Date: | Sunday, January 27, 2013 | |
| Start Times: | 9:30, 10:00, 10:30, 11:00, 11:30, 12:00 | |
| Duration: | 40 minutes | |
| Age Range: | 7 – 12 years old | |
| Price: | $35 | |
| Click Here to Buy Clay Puppet Workshop Tickets | ||
Pixilation Workshop[]
What is Pixilation? It’s an animation technique that uses the most readily available tool at your disposal - your body! In this workshop, the participants are the actors. Just change your pose slightly from one photo frame to the next and you will magically float, fly around a room, ice skate, disappear and reappear in a different location, slide along the ground, drive an invisible car, or almost anything else you can imagine! After the festival, we will post the final films for download so that each child has a copy of her own. DVD copies available upon request. We plan to screen a sneak peek at footage from the workshop before the afternoon feature.
| Date: | Saturday, January 26 & Sunday, January 27, 2013 | |
| Start Times: | 9:30, 10:00, 10:30, 11:00, 11:30, 12:00 | |
| Duration: | 20 minutes | |
| Age Range: | 6 – 14 years old | |
| Price: | $20 | |
| Click Here to Buy Pixilation Tickets | ||
Activities is Other Years[]
In 2009, twenty elementary students at The Renaissance School participated in an eight-week documentary filmmaking workshop that produced a short film about the Italian Gondolier on Lake Merritt in Oakland. The students chose the subject for the documentary, planned the shoot, directed the filming, made edit decisions, and assisted in the editing process. The students' 10-minute finished film, Il Gondolier, premiered at BAICFF 2009. Also that year, Sarah Schaffer of Sarah's Science fame came to the festival to lead children ages 7 and up in constructing picture tubes and conducting other optical experiments.
In 2010, Dutch filmmaker Jules Oosterwegel showed some of his shorts of children around the world playing street games and then played some games with children at the festival.
Also in 2010 & 2011, Pixar storyboard artists Matthew Luhn and Valerie LaPointe offered an animation workshop to children at the festival: a unique, hands-on introduction to stop motion animation. Matt helped children decorate and add personality to their own professional clay animation puppets from the Gumby Studios. Then Valerie guided children in filming their characters on an animation stage.
The claymation films created during the workshop were screened the same day, and children got to take home their claymation characters and a DVD copy of their animation.
Kids' Creations[]
Check out the video culmination of the 2010 workshops, an animated dance party created by a throng of joyous 7 to 10 years olds:
Short stop-motion animation created by children in January 23 workshop at the 2nd annual Bay Area International Children's Film Festival in 2010.
Short stop-motion animation created by children in January 24 workshop at the 2nd annual Bay Area International Children's Film Festival in 2010.
Slide show of children making a short stop-motion animation in workshops at the 2nd annual Bay Area International Children's Film Festival in January 2010.