Shalini Kanthan

Animation and Illustration

Book cover for Tales of the Wind

Hello, my name is Shalini Kanthan and I was born and raised in East London with my Srilankan Family. I am a student of Illustration & Animation, studying in Cambridge School of Art. I have a lot of experience working creating animations along with a few illustrations that I have created along the way. It has been truly one big journey to get to this point and it is overwhelming, mostly my advantages are writing stories, like screenwriting.

I have always dreamed of creating my own stories and making them come to a big screen. Studying in this course, I was able to learn software that is well known in the Industry such as TV Paint and Maya for 3D. I mostly enjoy designing characters and writing scripts for my story, it motivates me so much since it gives me so much pace and is easier to follow.

Being in this course for three years has been a long journey and I have learned a lot of things and I would be looking forward to it after all of these years.  Studying in Cambridge has made me independent and things haven't been easy but I was able to overcome the odds.

My final project work is a comic and it is called “Tales of the Wind” and it is about two people who meet by chance and it is set around 1920s in England. It is a love story which brings two main characters together and their name is Sara Jane Jones and Mateo Reyes. Both of them come from very different backgrounds but that’s what brings them closer and which ends for them an unfortunate ending.

We are to explore as the story just began and we are here to see more of them together till the end of their lives. I really want to create a story based on a time period which is the 1920s, Roaring 20s. Art Deco is the style I am mainly going for since I have so much interest in it since I have watched films that are based on 1920s and during 1920s, Art Deco has been their main style. I created the story to have a sad ending since I like to bring out emotional feelings and I was so inspired by the artstyle of Art Deco, I wanted to give my own style of a story that based 1920s time period.

Spread from a comic book featuring a man and woman meeting
Comic Page 5 & 6 in comic “Tales of the Wind”
Spread from a comic book featuring a man and woman walking round London
Illustration of a woman in make-up and evening wear
Illustration of a grandfather clock between silhouettes of a woman and a man
A postcard of Westminster from Mateo to Sara
Illustration of woman and man in market
Illustration of woman in green dress with patches
The trailer for “Tales of the Wind” Comic
Showreel