FUNN, the Sharjah-based foundation dedicated to promoting media arts for children and youth in the UAE, has concluded a workshop on animation aimed at developing the artistic skills of young people in all forms of media arts.

The workshop titled "Animation and Character Design" was conducted by students of the animation department at Sharjah Women's College from May 21st to 23rd  and  from 28th to 30th at the Sharjah Discovery Centre.

The four-day workshop was conducted in line with FUNN’s ambitious strategy to discover young artistic talents, develop their abilities and understanding of art and multimedia techniques, foster young talent, and nurture a promising future generation of creative artists in the media and film industry.

Commenting on the workshop, Sheikha Jawaher bint Abdullah Al Qasimi, Director of FUNN, said, "This workshop is one in a series of training programmes and activities organised by the FUNN foundation in its ambitious strive to promote new media work and films made by children and youth in Sharjah and the UAE."

The participating students in the animation workshop were actively engaged in drawing on ready-printed templates of outlines of cartoon characters, before scanning the characters and animating them on the computer using Adobe Photoshop.

The trainees were encouraged to find an inspirational quote or an idea to be the core of their animations and serve a certain purpose. The workshop aimed to teach students how animation can be a powerful means of communication.  

The animated works created by trainees in the workshop will be exhibited in the Annual Media Arts Exhibition (FAME 2015) during the upcoming edition of the Sharjah International Children’s Film Festival (SICFF), scheduled to take place in October 2015.

The exhibition will showcase all animations and artwork made by children and youth during the workshops conducted by FUNN throughout the current year.