Photo: qdnd.vn

PANO – The Korean Cultural Centre in Vietnam (KCCV) opened the Vietnam-Republic of Korea (RoK) animation festival (VKAF), on August 13th with the support of the Vietnam Department of Cinematography and the Vietnam Animation Film Studio.

Following the success of the first festival in Vietnam last year, as KCCV’s Director Park Nark Jong said, this festival will be a chance to connect animation lovers and film makers of the two countries, and to assist Vietnam animators to develop the animation industry.

A number of activities will be organized during the festival, such as a cartoon characters exhibition (from August 7th-22nd) at Lotte center, the opening and award ceremonies for short animation contest (on August 13th), short animation film making instruction (August 13th-14th), a seminar on animation development (August 14th-15th) at Daewoo hotel, and free Vietnam-Korea animation screening at Au Co Art Center on August 15th-16th.

This year, professional experts in Korean animation from Gangwon Information and Culture Development Institute and FUNNYFLUX, SAMG, TUBA companies are invited to share their experience on introducing Korean cartoons to the world and also discuss further animation cooperation between the two countries.

Especially, since the launch of a short animation making competition on June 5th, the KCCV has received 22 entries from eight groups of four animation companies and 14 others. All the entries are rich in contents and expressions.

At the opening ceremony of the festival, the organizers presented prizes to the best entries of the animation making competition. The first prize winner is “Father of chicks” (Bo cua ga con) by Pham Ngoc Tuan from the Vietnam animation film studio. The second prize belonged to “Lu and Robo” by Co Lo Ry company in Ho Chi Minh City and the third prize went to “Cake of friendship” (Chiec banh tinh ban) by Phan Ngoc Thuy Duong, a student from Ho Chi Minh City University of Architecture. All the producers of the three awarded movies will receive advices from Korean experts to improve their products before joining the International Animation Festival in Chuncheon, the Republic of Korea this September. Air tickets and accommodation will be supported by the organizers.

Addressing the award ceremony, Mr. Park Nark Jong stressed that this competition aimed to discover the potential of the Vietnam animation and introduce Korean culture to the Vietnamese people and to assure them that the RoK is famous for not only Kpop but also for its developed animation industry, and  popularize Korean animation characters.

Invitation tickets for above activities during the festival are distributed freely to Vietnamese animators and some Hanoi students. Other audiences can get free tickets at KCCV at No.49 Nguyen Du Street, Hanoi.

Translated by Duong Thanh