03/26/2006

Northern People

Young filmmaker takes awards at competition

By MARTA HEPLER DRAHOS

mdrahos@record-eagle.com

Record-Eagle/Douglas Tesner
Eighth-grader Zoe Allen-Wicklerrecently took first place in the middle school category at the 2006 youth competition of the East Lansing Childrenís Film Festival for her animated film “Top Tips from the Fluffiest Chicken.”

SUTTONS BAY — It may not surpass "Chicken Little" at the box office, but "Top Tips for the Fluffiest Chicken" was at the top of the pecking order at this year's East Lansing Children's Film Festival.

And so was its director, 13-year-old Zoe Allen-Wickler. The Suttons Bay Middle School eighth-grader has been winning awards for her animated films since she started making them as a member of the local after-school Animation Club. Her latest effort, a three-and-a-half-minute fantasy about a day in the life of a chicken, took first place in the middle school division of ELCFF's 2006 Youth Film Competition.

The film was inspired by Zoe and sister Olivia's seven Buff Orpington chickens, an old English breed characterized by soft golden color and the ability to lay 160 eggs a year.

"They've been begging us to get chickens since we moved to Michigan," said mom Chris Allen-Wickler, who gave in shortly after the family moved to northern Lower Michigan from St. Paul, Minn. in 2001. "We were all smitten with how great chickens are as pets."

The movie took about two weeks to make, using a video camera linked to a computer and video editing software called iMovie. To create the characters, Zoe sculpted dozens of chicken parts — combs, beaks, eyebrows, wings, tail feathers and toes — from Sculpey, a soft, pliable clay that bakes to hardness.

"That's a really fun part because you can imagine a lot of different ways for it to look and then come up with ways to make it," she said.

Filmmaking is a family affair. Chris Allen-Wickler is a self-taught animator and co-director of the non-profit Suttons Bay art center, The Art Place, where the Animation Club for middle school students meets once a week. Ten-year-old Olivia won second place at this year's East Lansing Children's Film Festival for her elementary school division film, "Marshmellow Land."

The family even plans an annual vacation around the festival, which took place Feb. 24-March 2 this year.

"It sort of marries all your interests: drawing, art, music and words," said Chris Allen-Wickler, a bead artist who also produces a line of handmade resist-dyed wearables with her husband, Roger.

Besides placing four years in a row in the elementary and middle school divisions at ELCFF, Zoe is a two-time winner of the festival's "Girls in Film" award, which recognizes outstanding work in filmmaking by young women. Her films, including "The Skeleton," "Animals in Space" and "The Green Worm," also have been recognized at the Kalamazoo Animation Festival International and The Windsong Student Festival in Ft. Wayne, Ind.

While making movies through drawing, clay, paper cutouts, collage and object animation appeals to her creative side, Zoe said filmmaking is as challenging to the left side of the brain as it is to the right.

"You can do any story and you can imagine different ways of making it and find ways to do that," she said. "It's a lot of problem-solving."