Directors Paulo Garcia and Natalia Gouvea at Zombie Studio merge stop-motion with 2D and 3D animation plus real-time projection to craft an emotional six-minute film celebrating adoptive families for US nonprofit Second Nurture.

Produced in collaboration with agency Klick Health and powered by a heartfelt score from Christina Perri and Jamute Music, the film asserts “there is no wrong way to build a family” as it recreates the true story of an abandoned baby found in the New York subway 25 years ago and a gay couple’s fight to adopt him.

Paulo Garcia: “One of the biggest challenges in making ’18 Months’ was finding ways to tell such an emotionally layered story while working within the intense limitations of stop-motion.
 

“This was a demanding film to make, but one that came straight from the heart, and from a deep respect for the story we were telling.”

 
“We knew we wanted to keep the focus on our two main characters — not just for narrative clarity, but because building and animating a large cast would’ve been impossible given the time and resources we had. That led us to a more poetic approach to secondary characters, using shadow projections instead of fully built puppets.

“Another major challenge was the number of sets we needed to build. The story moves through so many emotional spaces, and each one required a different environment. To make that possible, we split the production between different teams working in parallel — each one crafting sets by hand, with a high level of detail and care to maintain consistency across the world.

“One of the things I’m most proud of is the art direction using torn-up pages from real maternity books. These books — full of rules, expectations, and often narrow definitions of family — became the building blocks of the film. We weren’t sure if this would be noticeable on screen, but it blended so naturally into the textures of the world and it gave everything a deeper, more symbolic weight.

“This was a demanding film to make, but one that came straight from the heart, and from a deep respect for the story we were telling.”

Watch the making of film:
 

 
 

 
Client: Second Nurture

Agency: Klick Health
CCO: Rich Levy
ECD: Bernardo Romero, Amy Fortunato, Andrea Bistany
EVP Executive Creative Producer/Head of Production: Laura Denham
SVP, Executive Creative Producer: Jen Martin
Senior Director, Creative Producer: Anna Lopez
VP, Production Operations: Serena Stanley

Production: Zombie Studio
Director: Paulo Garcia, Natalia Gouvea
Managing Director: Natalia Gouvea
Lead Director: Isaac Buzzola
EP: Stephanie Wang, Alex Unick
ECD: Paulo Garcia
Art Director: Cat Rao
Character Designer: Rayner Alencar, Cat Rao, Bruno Mazzili, Dante
Concept Artist: Cat Rao, Beatriz Mayumi, Ana Maria Sena, Guilherme Lascasas, Bruno Mazzili, Dante
Production Director: Natalia Gouvea / Isaac Buzzola / André Carvalho
Producer: Stephanie Saito, Alessandra Cena, Everson Martins, Carol Abreu, Andre Carvalho
Agenda Coordinator: Kira Nayana
StoryBoard and Animatic: Gabriel Sao Marcos (Gaz), Bruno Mazzilli
Head of CG: Isaac Buzzola
Assembler: Gabba Dias, Danilo Silva
VFX: Lucas Amaral
Rig Supervision & Rigging: Raul Sales
Scenes Modeling & Layout: Lélio Alves, Enrique Pedretti, Rafael Vargas
Lighting: Gustavo Rangel, Gean Carlos,Thiago Peyon
Lookdev: Thiago Peyon
Character Modeling: Douglas Silva, Vitor Semeghini
Rotoscoping: Ivan Jovchevski
Set Design Director: Natalia Gouvea
Lead Set Design: João Cunha, William Pereira, Teresa Sbardellati,
Set Design Coordination: João Cunha, William Pereira, Teresa Sbardellati, Aline Hiane, Carolina Gonçalves Sabino, Marina Lima
Set Design: Bruno Paes, Lucas Pereira, Lua Nucci, Marina Lima, Ani Valentim, Simone Pinheiro, Thays do Valle Oliveira, Glória Amaral, Mirela Thais Macedo Santos, Nicole Horiye Bavaresco, Nico Myaki, Cecília Silva Martinez.

Stop Motion Animation
Director: Matias Liebrecht
Animator: Matias Liebrecht, Thiago Calçado, Rosana van der Meer, Pedro Peluso, Érica Valle
Animation Assistant: Alexandre Gonca
Animator Rigger: Mateus de Jesus
Puppet Maker: Mateus de Jesus, Marcus Telles
Puppet Painter: Ana Barroso
Puppet Costume Designer: Andressa Klava, Adriana Cigogni
Motion Control: André Kim, Samuel Mariani, André de Souza

3D Animation
Animation Supervisor: Alex Ferreira Simões
Animator: Airi Umezawa, Jeffry Syahputra Wy, Jesiel Almeida, Christian Weckl, Michiel Band, Fabio Pugliese, Felipe Simões, Lucas Barbosa, Marcio Bukoviski, Daniil Pereluka
Layout: Jander Filho

2D Animation
Animation Supervisor: Bruno Mazzilli
Animator: Bruno Mazzilli
Clean Up: Cassiel Costa, Beatriz Dutra
Animation Projection: Bruno Mazzilli, André Kim

Puppet Animation
Artist: Dante
Assistant: Margareth Moura
Animation: Brenda Villatoro, Ale Scaldini, Dante

Photography Director: Erick Ricco, Paulo César Elias (PC)
Photography Assistant: Diego Saito, Larissa Nakashima
Camera Operator Assistant: Fábio Moraes
Gaffer: Paulo César Elias (PC), Henrique Toledo
Machinist: Anderson Puru
Gaffer Assistant: Charles Pedro da Silva
Machinist Assistant: João Vitor, Carlos Alberto Teles Lopes, Mary Alves
Production Assistant: Tallita Ramos, Rodrigo Cena, Márcia Martins, Lucilene Martins
Film Studio: 358, Dark Lab (Jey77)

Making of: Meimei, Nidin Sanches, Mateus de Jesus

Edit Artist: Yohann
Editing & Conform Assistant: Igor Costa
Motion Graphics: Vini Kahan

Art Design: Kaike Gouvea

Operations/Financial: Alessandra Cena

TI: Gabriel Paixão

Music/Sound Production: Jamute
Music: Christina Perri
Music Direction: Jerames Feel
Music Production: James Feeler and Leck Gomes
Singers: Day Limns. Charly Coombes
Music EP: Gabriela Alberti
Sound Engineer: Otavio Bertolo
Music Production Coordinator: Julianna Zuppo, Juliana Pompeu and Letícia Nunes

Post Production: PICMA
VFX Supervisor: Rodrigo Elias
VFX Producer: Aline Barros Elias
Data Wrangler: Bruno Bulgarelli
VFX Coordination: Eduarda Castro, Lívia Baptista Hiakuna
Conform: Rafaela Cândido, Mateus B Elias
Lead Compositor : Bruno Elias
Compositor: Rodrigo Elias, Carlos Bumbiers Junior, Cassiano Falabella, Ricardo H. R. da Silva, Anderson Noise, Anderson Sampaio, Vinicius Brandão, Pedro Roloff, André Gallego, Miguel Sacomano
Matchmove/Compositor: Lucas Coutinho
HDR/Setup: Ricky Costabile Monti, Fernando Azulini

Color Grading: PSYCHO N’ LOOK
Image Supervision: Marcio Pasqualino, ABC
Colorist: Marcio Pasqualino, ABC
Head of Operations: Guilherme Castelli
Head of Finishing: Matheus Ricardo
Assistant: Letícia Nelly
Executive Planning: Luana Daminelli
EP: Maísa La Cava