Dunna Chuck Bruck film in competition final

Aith pupils’ “Dunna Chuck Bruck” stop-motion film has made it to the final stages of the Marlisco marine litter competition.

The pupils, from P3 and P4, have been invited to the awards ceremony on 2nd April at the National Aquarium in Plymouth.

From there the winners and runners up will go on to an international festival at Bremen in Germany in May, an area which incidentally has historical associations with Shetland through fishing.

The whole thing started when Amelie Atia, one of the girls in P3, came into school one day with a DVD of a stop-motion animation she had made with her family, teacher Ingrid Smith explained.

The class was so impressed that they were inspired to have a go at stop-motion animation at school.

Amelie’s mother Elizabeth kindly agreed to help with the project in her role as press officer for the Aith lifeboat. She had come across the Marlisco competition which brought to the children’s attention the huge problem of marine litter and the threat it posed to the environment.

Sita Hughson from Shetland Amenity Trust’s “Dunna Chuck Bruck” campaign lent her support and is keen to highlight the schools achievement. The school is well-known for its green ethos from nursery to S4.

Mrs Smith said the pupils already participate in initiatives on waste prevention, recycling and litter control. They even had “task force” teams, which not only look to the immediate school area but the surrounding one as well.

She said the bairns loved making the film, “brainstorming” with a story board, and were involved in the whole process from the script to narration.

They were amazed and had to be very patient with the hundreds of single shots needed, this meant the tiniest of alterations. They even starred in the video at the end which caused a lot of hilarity as they are seen speeded up.

To finish the whole thing off Amelie’s father Leith did the soundtrack which matched the film very well.

Mrs Smith said it had been a very good exercise, encompassing creative pursuits and environmental studies. The video can be seen on YouTube where people can vote and this closes on 20th March.