Simran Koonjul

Against a Monster

I grew up loving Lego and when I was a teenager became enthralled with the "Bionicle" storyline. My favorite model has always been Krekka, a 'Dark Hunter' who pursues the heroic Toa.

This is an animation for the bad guys, and it was my way of portraying the character in a more sinister tone. The exciting fight scene leads to a frightening reveal: just how many Toa Krekka has scrapped.

'KVT' was shown at the 17th Annual Film Festival at Carnegie Mellon University in 2009.

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Full Movie

Hero in Space

Based on the first animation that I ever created back in high school, this is a project dedicated to revamping the original video. The Last Impression is a musical video piece that was featured at the Media Lab Extravaganza Film Festival at the United Nations International School in New York in 2005. The animation features one of my favorite 3d Models based on Sunrise's Gundam series.

This animation is a tribute to heroes and their efforts to do good. And while heroes may eventually fade away, the lasting impression they have on us never dies. This video has inspired me to continue animating up til the present.

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Gundam Game Animation Trailer

A Dynamic Duo?

These are original characters that I conceptually designed for a unique story setting. Mass is a former member of the 'Matter Legion,' a disbanded police force. Trying to live day by day through mercenary activities, he is accompanied by Dongle, a powerful beast who is the last of an ancient alien race. But while Mass is an experienced and veteran fighter, Dongle is an oversized toddler.

My ultimate goal for these characters is to create short episodes to show off their adventures.

Lucky Number 12

This is a collection of work that was posted as my profile pic on Facebook for a span of 12 days. Each work was produced within 30 minutes, first created in 3ds Max and then tailored in Photoshop. Every piece is based on a conceptual idea or feeling that I had that day.

This was actually quite a challenge as the time limit I set for myself was a barrier; I had to practice producing interesting work at a fairly speedy pace, and I was not allowed to think of an idea beforehand.

I Will Fight On

This is one of my current and more ambitious projects and one of the ones I am most excited about. Similar to KVT, I attempt to convey a large amount of realistic physical motion using only keyframe animation. The piece is based on the anime series Tekkaman, one of my favorite animes ever. The idea of the anti-hero has always been interesting to me, and I wanted to investigate it as a story element in a fight sequence-based animation.

I am considering using a green screen to combine live action footage with the 3d animation to produce a visually aesthetic, interesting, and realistic work of art.

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Dagger Attacks

Metal Hero

When I first heard an Iron Man movie was in the works, I immediately decided to create my own version of the Marvel character. I built my own suit before the movie came out and animated this short piece. Iron Man was one of my favorite comic book characters growing up, and I had a lot of fun making this animation.

In this piece Iron Man takes on Tinker, a robot I created specifically for this piece. Tinker has an itch to destroy things, and Iron Man has to use all his power to stop his mechanical mayhem.

Watch Sample:

Don't Mess With The Best

Invent the Future!

During my internship at Inventionland I created 3d versions of several characters from a show pitch called "The Inventsons." The story is about a family of inventors who run an environmentally friendly theme park and are constantly bothered by Balzer, an evil scientist who wants to steal their inventions.

The character designs are by Dustin Foust. I was given the layouts for each character and then built their 3d counterparts. We then printed out stereolithograph plastic molds of them in different poses. Hopefully "The Inventsons" will make their animated debut sometime soon!

Hair = Emotion

This was a project for the course 60414: Advanced ETB: Animation, Art, and Technology at Carnegie Mellon University for the Spring semester of 2009. In the course students are grouped together to develop a 2-3 minute short animation using Autodesk Maya.

Vita is an original story that I developed myself, and I worked with other students to create an animation that combines technical elements such as particle effects, fire, rain, and lightning as well as breathtaking visuals that are full of color.

Contradiction!

This was a project for the course 60415: Advanced ETB: Animation at Carnegie Mellon University for the Fall semester of 2008. In the course students are tasked in developing a 1-2 minute short animation using Autodesk Maya.

The Story of Sense is an introduction to the enigmatic character Sense from my original Mass and Dongle series. Sense is a symbol of ego and arrogance, but holds the secret to ultimate power! Will he reveal his secret, or will we only be left to wonder what rhymes with french toast?

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The Square Root of Tuesdays

Out of my Mind

This was a project for the course 60101: Concept Studio I at Carnegie Mellon University for the Fall semester of 2008. The course is a study of "The Self and the Human Being." In this project, students were tasked to create a visual "map" of their own minds. I took this opportunity to depict my attempts at becoming the prototype hero that I dream to be.

The Gundam model I used in "The Last Impression" also makes an appearance in this video!

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Mind Map

Uh Oh!

This was a project for the course 60110: Electronic Media Studio I at Carnegie Mellon University for the Fall semester of 2008. The course was an introduction to computer as a multi-purpose, art-making tool that utilizes software application programs.

I used Rock, another character from the my Mass and Dongle series, in a set of flash animations that investigated squash and stretch techniques and other forms of technical 2d animation. Rock, a hulking mechanical and sombre creature, is paired up with Mr. Bubbles, an annoying but invulnerable blue ball.

Watch and Play:

Rock and Mr. Bubbles
Play! Rock and Mr. Bubbles vs The Alien

Script Madness

This was the old design of my website. I used a flash template for the start up page that I found on the net, and modified drastically to really make it my own space. Unfortunately, the load up time was way too long, so I decided to skip the fancy flash animations and go back to stable html.

Have fun checking out all the different kinds of scripts and motions I used!

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Flash Website

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