Richard the Stork
Richard the Stork (Released in North America as A Stork's Journey, German: Überflieger – Kleine Vögel, großes Geklapper and also known as Little Bird's Big Adventure) is a 2017 computer-animated adventure film. It was directed by and Reza Memari. "Richard the Stork" premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival in Germany on February 12, 2017. Animated movie was released for a limited time on Google Play on June 1, 2017. It premiered in theaters in the United States on June 30, 2017. Plot. Richard, an orphaned sparrow, is adopted and raised by a group of  storks. But when they leave on their annual migration south for the winter, Richard, a little non-migrating bird, endeavors to embark on the long arduous journey to stay with his stork family that must reveal his true identity and leave him behind in the forest, since he would not survive the journey to Africa. Determined to prove he is a stork after all, Richard ventures south on his own, joined by an eccentric pygmy owl named Olga with an imaginary friend named Oleg and a narcissistic, disco-singing parakeet named Kiki. Along their epic journey, they run into many  obstacles, like deadly bats, internet-addicted pigeons, mafia crows and a thundering jumbo jet. When they finally find their way to Africa, it's up to Richard to rescue his stork brother Max from the clutches of a monstrous honey badger. The tiniest stork must learn to see himself as the greatest sparrow to unleash his true potential and be reunited with his family. Production. "Studio Rakete" in Hamburg, Germany and "Studio 352" in Luxembourg created the storyboard. "Studio Rakete" was also responsible for the design of the main characters; Studio "352" designed the supporting characters. Most of the character  animation was done by these companies and Bug AS in Norway. Lighting/shading, FX simulations and compositing of the final pictures was done by "Walking the Dog" from Belgium and Rise FX in Berlin. The movie was animated & rendered using Houdini with over 500 shots to be finished.