Film premiere for Bohermeen NS

Sixth class pupils from Bohermeen NS are hosting the premiere of an animation film they worked on in collaboration with a Californian high school in the local parish centre today.

The unique project brought the two schools together to produce 'Split', an Irish Fairytale with a twist.

Cottonwood Creek High School students and teacher Ben Keeline came up with the idea for the animated movie. They wanted Irish voices for their characters, and particularly children's voices and this is where the Bohermeen children came in.

The US students wrote the draft script and the Bohermeen children, along with teacher James Brennan, gave their input on what changes should be made to improve it.

Recording equipment was sent over and the children recorded their lines for the various characters, as the classroom was tranformed into a recording studio.

 'Split' -  the animation created by Cottonwood Creek students in collaboration with Bohermeen NS

Mr Brennan described it as the most unique project every undertaken by a primary school in Ireland. 

He explained how it came about: 'Through one of the parents in our school, I came into contact with Ben Keeline, a teacher at Cottonwood Creek High School in California.
'What began as an exploratory email grew over months of script writing, voice recordings and skyping across the Atlantic Ocean to the short film we will premiere today. 
'We worked together with Ben and his students on the script. While the animation was done in America, all the voices on the film were recorded in our classroom in Bohermeen.'

The film itself is just under 17 minutes long and there is also a short documentary about how the film was made (4 minutes long).

 

The short documentary about the making of 'Split'