There was once a time when your 3D student project would just be seen by your professors and fellow students. In recent years, sites like YouTube and Vimeo have meant the best student shorts can go viral and get you worldwide recognition for your work. But for the head of Florida's Dave School, even that wasn't enough.
Jeff Scheetz is so convinced of his students' talents, that he asked them to create an entire animated feature film, based on this 2008 short, also created by Dave School students:
Scheetz has turned to Kickstarter to get the movie funded. But they don't need hundreds of millions to finish it, Sheetz stresses.
"We intend to tell the entire 94 page screenplay in a highly creative yet minimally technical way," he explains. "Every element (character, set, prop, vehicle, or creature) will be constructed as a 'simple but cool' approximation of what would be needed for a finished film. An element that might take a studio like DreamWorks or Pixar 30 people and a month to prepare, we will do in a day.
"Will it look as good? No way!" he admits. "But it will pull you into the story and it will take you on our amazing adventure!" Sounds intriguing, and we're pretty sure this will be the first of its kind in the world. You can find out more, and back the Kickstarter here.