Amautalab founders Carlos Battilana and Martin Jalfen.

• Name: Amautalab
• Created on: 2005-Mar-25, Los Angeles, California
• Record last updated on: 2008-Mar-4
• Homepage: www.amautalab.com
• Domain: Filmmaking, Design, Animation, Interactive
• Location: Buenos Aires, Lima, Los Angeles

Amautalab is a multidisciplinary creative studio co-founded by Martin Jalfen and Carlos Battilana in 2005. Amautalab’s tri-office locale in Peru, Argentina and Los Angeles could be the reason for the unique variety of whimsical stop-motion animation the studio is known for, or perhaps it’s the extra bit of imagination required to conduct creative meetings through iChat with a six-hour time difference. We caught up with the two chief operators for an insightful chat about what makes Amautalab tick.

What does Amauta mean?
Amauta is a QUECHUA word (language of the Incas) which is very popular in the Andean region of South America and means MASTER.

Still from animated open of W+KTokyoLab’s NHK TV show Tokyo Now. WATCH IT

Why do you have locations in three countries – what is the significance of having a presence in both South and North America and does each city have a specific focus or expertise?
Yes and no. We try to see Amautalab’s three studios as one, only separated by distance but very close thanks to the airplanes, telephone and Internet. Within time, each studio has developed more in a specific area, based mainly on what that city provides to us. Los Angeles is a great place to do new business, great projects and budgets come out of here and Carlos leads this office. Our creative, design and animation team is in Buenos Aires and this studio is overseen by Martin and Javier. Buenos Aires is also a great place for film production. Lima is the result of many years of Carlos’ experience in the local market in web prior to Amautalab, so we were able to put together an amazing interactive team there.

Amautalab’s Buenos Aires team with “Blindness of the Woods” cast. Clockwise from far left: Martina, Flor, Javi, Ale, Rudy, Martin, Pauline, bear, Facu and Toma

Amautalab’s work is mainly rooted in stop motion animation, how do you see your work evolving and would you like to transition into feature films or stay with shorts and commercials? What are your goals for the future?
Our work uses many different animation and film techniques. Depending on the project we will choose the most appropriate one that communicates the story better. Some times stop motion has been the approach but we have many projects animated in 3D, 2D and a mix of live action with CG. Lately we are doing more live action but with a more artistic approach on the visual style.

As any director we hope to have the opportunity to do more independent film work that can coexist with our commercial work. We think both serve the same purpose, which is to entertain our audience.

One of Amautalab’s acclaimed spots for the liqueur Fernet 1882 WATCH IT

What was your inspiration for The Blindness of the Woods?
Everything started watching porn at the studio. It’s not that we do that very often but let’s say that we were doing that. And while we were watching it we started talking about the different types of porno, which we divided into two: HARD PORN and SOFT PORN. From there we came up with the term CUTE PORN. And right away we liked the idea of creating two worlds that apparently couldn’t match, the cute and the porn world. Actually that was our challenge. We tried to confront those two extremes along the process, through opposite temperatures: cold and hot. The short is about the encounter of these two.

A still from Amautalab’s short film, Blindness of the Woods (2008)

Can you take us through the production of the short? (Describe various phases of animation, etc.
The short was shot in 16mm. The trees, forest, cabin and snow are fake. They are part of a set we designed in a big studio in Buenos Aires, in the neighborhood of Munro where you can find jackets at a great price. We always liked the idea of not having anything real in the set, to reinforce the concept of a fairy tale.

For the wide shots we built a big scale model of the cabin and forest with the mountains painted in the background. The idea was to locate the cabin in an isolated and cold environment.

For the porn scenes we found inspiration in the erotic films of the 70s, specifically from Armando Bo, a cult Argentinean filmmaker from the 60s and 70s who invented Argentinean erotic cinema. There we found the bad cuts in the editing, the beautiful overacting from his wife and main character in all his movies, Coca Sarli, and the very strange camera movements with abrupt zooms ins and outs, and shots intended to symbolize “love” by pointing at a snowy window or flowers in the middle of an erotic scene

The character design had to be super cute to have a big contrast with the world of porn. The costumes are made of wool to reinforce the coldness of the Nordic environment. That’s why we recorded the voice-overs with Swedish actors.

There is a moment in the short that we love, when the lumberjack and the woman meet for the first time. She is in her cabin, feeling cold and alone when the lumberjack knocks at the door bringing wood. She touches his face, then the woods and then we make a fast cut into them naked having sex. We like it not only because it’s a straight reference to porn movies but also because it shows the easiness Nordics have to engage in sexual relationships.

All animals: birds, owl and butterflies are CG.

Even though the actors had a hard time dealing with heat and lighting during the sex scenes, the production was lots of fun. We think some people of the crew still think they worked on a porn movie.

You’ve hosted a number of events at your Los Angeles office space – why is this? Do you think an office should be more than just a place to work?
An office should be a place where you have fun and enjoy your time and not be so rigid and structured all the time. The more free and open the better; it changes according to our mood or needs.

What is your ultimate dream project, given that you have no budget, time or talent restrictions?
1.Reshoot the landing in the moon in HD.
2.Direct a Venezuelan soap opera in stop motion
3.Direct Evita but with Cindy Lauper.