Isabela Littger, filmmaker, art director and concept artist

Graduated from the Master in Character Animation and Animated Filmmaking in 2019, Isabela Littger is a Brazilian filmmaker, art director and concept artist.

She has been working in animation for the last 8 years in diverse roles such as storyboarder, concept artist, director... She is currently developing her original film project "Sybil and her Past Lives".

Since graduating, I've actually had the chance to explore many sides of the animation industry. I have worked as a storyboarder, concept artist, art director, and creative director.

I spent two years as a full-time Creative Director at Lobo Studio, working in advertising, before deciding to leave and focus more on story-driven and game projects.

Both as a freelancer and full-time, I've collaborated with clients like Disney, Cartoon Network, Garena, Envar Games, the UN and many others.

After GOBELINS, I spent a few years in Brazil, because of family circumstances. I have recently moved back to France and I'm really happy about my next adventure as an episodic director for Titmouse Paris' new series project.

During these years, I also continued developing my personal project "Sybil and Her Past Lives", which has been growing in parallel to my professional journey.

"The Tiny Tailoress" : Isabela Littger

"Sybil" started back in 2015 with just one illustration: an Indigenous girl surrounded by the spirits of her past lives. A few nights later, I literally dreamt about her and the other characters, and I could really feel their personalities.

So that dream really stayed with me. I loved the idea of someone who could talk to their past lives in a straightforward way. Like what if we could talk to ourselves, but in another lifetime? Who would we be? Would we judge ourselves by our current lenses?

I could feel the characters and envision the interactions to be funny, mystical, and very human at the same time. But I didn't really have a narrative yet... So I kept it in my heart, and went to France for my studies.

During my time at GOBELINS, the concept kept coming to my mind, and I started doodling the characters and thanks to the school I started to see how to structure it in an actual animation project.

"Tuane and them Seals - Isabela Littger

After graduating, I shared the concept with my childhood friend Lara Manesco, who is an amazing writer and an expert in literature. She fell in love with the concept, so we started shaping the project together.

We used to escape to the countryside, surrounded by nature, no internet - just us, notebooks, nature and a ton of home-made snacks! Those moments were what made "Sybil" blossom into an actual series idea.

We eventually built a first pitch bible and applied to Annecy MIFA as our first strategy goal, and amazingly enough, the project was selected! That experience brought us amazing feedback and opened a lot of doors.

Today our team includes Loïc François, Marie Dubois (our awesome executive producer), Bruna Brasil (our lovely project manager and cultural consultant from Manaus), and we also had the consultancy of two Indigenous leaders who gave us great insight about our story.

We had a true journey since the initial spark of "Sybil", and I can't describe how much we have learned through this process. Thanks to all these experiences and feedbacks, "Sybil" is now evolving from a series into a feature film, so we are back to writing!

"Cats' Tent - Isabela Littger

Annecy was so important in Sybil's progress so far.

Even though in 2021 the event was online because of the pandemic, we got really helpful feedback and made some great connections.

When we finally attended in person in 2022, it was magical! We met so many inspiring people who gave us a lot of insight, and many are still part of our journey today.

Annecy gave us both visibility and confidence to keep going.

In terms of animation, the works that inspire us are the manga "Shaman King" and the tv series "Avatar - The Legend of Ang" .

For the visuals (especially backgrounds) I draw a lot of inspiration from the Brazilian children's show "Castelo Rá-Tim-Bum".

But beyond that, the story is inspired by shamanic traditions, our own experiences with dreams, and our relationship with nature and ancestral memory.

"Into the Unknown - Isabela Littger

We're currently re-structuring the story into a film and developing new visuals before we go back into pitching.

For our early teaser and animation tests, we were lucky to collaborate with my amazing GOBELINS friends like Rohit Kelkar, Diego Porral, Rohan Deschougule, Bruno Cohen, Germaine Colajanni, and composer Mathieu Alvado, who also collaborated with us on "Blind Eye", our graduation movie.

"Blind Eye

Back when I entered the world of animation every single film I saw coming out from GOBELINS made my body particles shake!

They were poetic, emotional, and brave enough to tell stories differently from the mainstream media and whatever was considered "comercial".

So when the international master's program opened, I jumped in like a llama.

"Skull Hands - Isabela Littger

In all honest, my time at GOBELINS was one of the loveliest in my life. I met friends I still consider family, learned to collaborate with incredible artists, and rediscovered how fun animation can be.

I loved my group and they are still some of my closest friends today!
And, of course, those morning walks through Paris to school... I have soo many delicious memories from those days.

I'd say that creating art is much more than just a career, it's the start of a much bigger journey. So have fun, pay attention to your intuition, get inspired by others but try not to compare yourself, and focus on creating what excites and expands you. And when work doesn't provide that, try and create what matters to you whenever you find space.

For example, I don't know if "Sybil" will turn out exactly as I dream it, but just following this idea has already brought me so many adventures, lessons, and friendships along the way.

We never really know where a creative project will take us, so the more we let go of expectations and remain open and curious the wilder the journey becomes!