The effects of global warming are well documented in images of barren landscapes, typhoons, and flooding. What’s less widely known is its impact on environments under the sea, including rising ocean temperatures and heatwaves, which are wreaking havoc on marine ecosystems.

WWF is drawing attention to the issue with a new stop motion film that makes clever use of technology. Created by London-based animation studio Nomint, the ad has been shot entirely with thermal imaging cameras. This choice is both relevant to the cause and effective for stylistic reasons, lending the film a fiery, high contrast palette suggestive of the planet’s rising temperatures.

While thermal cameras would ordinarily be used in real life scenarios, the film obviously isn’t live action. Instead, the scenes of the child were animated in 3D, then 3D printed and heated precisely to produce certain colour levels through the thermal camera. These were then brought together into a stop motion animation.

“This striking film evokes the intrinsic connection people feel with the ocean, and uses art and technology to powerfully illustrate a devastating effect of climate change that we cannot see with the naked eye, but which is being felt across the globe,” says Pepe Clarke, Oceans Practice leader at WWF.

In Hot Water has launched to coincide with Cop29 in Baku, Azerbaijan, and is the fourth instalment in the organisation’s series of striking films coinciding with the event each year, including last year’s powerfully cloying film on fossil fuels.

Credits:
Agency and Production Company: Nomint
Creative Direction: Yannis Konstantinidis, Christos Lefakis
Director: Yannis Konstantinidis
Music and Sound Supervision: Daniel Payne, Matt Lee (Twelve Decibels)
Colour Grading:  Black Kite Studios