SA frog captivates the Japanese

As we work on every issue of Platteland, we always chuckle over the illustration Diek Grobler has produced for our regular column “That’s life” (page 144). He has been illustrating it since our first issue and his artwork always gives you something to think about.

Diek also happens to be a painter, sculptor and awardedwinning animation artist. In 2005, he and Charles Badenhorst started the company Fopspeen Moving Pictures, and, in a small back-yard room in Pretoria, they have already made four animated films together that are making waves worldwide.

Their latest one, Please Frog, Just One Sip!, a story about water-saving that brings to life illustrations by Diek’s brother, Piet Grobler, was awarded a special prize at the recent International Animation Festival held in Hiroshima, Japan. An outstanding achievement, considering that this is the most important animation festival in the East and it attracted 2 800 entries from all over the world this year.

Thanks to this award, Fopspeen now has an international distributor for the film, but you can order the DVD directly from Diek. The DVD contains both the English and Afrikaans versions (Net een slukkie, Padda! and Please Frog, Just One Sip!) as well as Het Vogeltjes ABC. What an amazing Christmas gift for young or old!

Prize R120 (postage included) Contact diek@fopspeen.co.za