Project Breakdown
Stories of Survival
The Project
American Canoe Association
Fredericksburg, VA
Nonprofit Organization
Character Animation
3D
2D
Characters
Open Pixel Studios worked with the education team at the ACA to produce Stories of Survival, an animated video in which real paddlers recount near-death experiences on the water. The project combined live interviews with 3D Animation and motion-graphics animation to bring their raw stories to life in an engaging and educational format. The resulting series served as a powerful tool for water safety training, awareness campaigns, and experiential learning for outdoor education programs.
The Creative Challenges
Needed to capture authentic first-person narratives and then translate them into visual motion design.
Required seamless integration of interview audio and animated reconstructions while maintaining emotional impact.
Had to create educationally-effective animation that retained the substance of each story and met training narratives.
Needed a visual style that balanced seriousness, clarity, and engagement across diverse learning platforms.
Our Solutions
Produced a hybrid interview-animation format that combined real audio with 3D animated characters to illustrate three survival stories.
Developed a design language and animation toolkit that elevated the narrative while keeping it accessible for educational audiences.
Delivered video assets optimized for use in safety awareness, outdoor education, and water-paddling curriculum.
Enabled scalable, multi-platform distribution so the series could be integrated into online training modules, classroom viewing, and community outreach.
