Shivam Bora.

Running through the streets of Delhi wearing a cape made from a tablecloth won’t make you a superhuman, but it surely makes you the superhero you want to be. A heart filled with heroism, and the feeling of being anything—anywhere in this universe, transcending time and space—is something I still experience whenever I tell or listen to stories. The images in storybooks never fascinated me as still visuals; they moved, spoke, and lived with me.
 

Practising physical theatre from as early as I can remember opened a gateway for me to become the characters I loved in fictional worlds. But how could I make them real? That question became the biggest quest of my fifteen-year-old self—until I found the answer. Animation became my escape route: a space where I could create my own stories, where I could be a wizard, a king, a knight, a superhero—anything I dreamed of becoming.
 

Emitting an energy ball from my bare hands was the first thing I ever animated. It took me an entire week to understand how animation worked, but by the end of it, one thing was clear: I loved animation, and it was the only medium through which I wanted to tell stories.

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Those sixty frames I animated determined the expedition of my life. They gave me a tool to carve stories without limitations. I still remember the moment the internet introduced me to my first idol—Tim Burton. His unique animation style compelled me to transform my written stories into films. I wanted to frame my imagination visually, to make it intriguing and alive.

Souls was the first animation project I completed during my first year of graduation. It also introduced me to the idea of independent filmmaking. Having trained in performing arts since early childhood, physical theatre helped me understand movement deeply, allowing me to translate emotion and motion more authentically into animation.

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Completing my first project made me realise how small I was—like an ant in a forest. After my first year, I spent the rest of my college life exploring world cinema: the works of Satyajit Ray, Hayao Miyazaki, Bimal Roy, and Tim Burton. I travelled across cultures and eras through films, absorbing the classical works of legendary filmmakers.

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For two straight years, I created nothing new. Instead, I developed something far more important—a sense of filmmaking. My world expanded through these films, shaping not just how I see cinema, but how I see life itself.