What Time Is It?

1. What was one of the most challenging moments you faced while making What Time Is It? Did this ‘setback’ change the direction of the final story?

There were many challenges—both story-wise and technically.

Technical: This was our first film using a new pipeline: creating the entire short in the VR painting/animation app Quill and then rendering it in Maya to achieve a stop-motion look. We had no idea if it would even be possible, so we had to figure it out as we went. It was also our first time adding lip-sync to characters and directing professional U.S. voice actors. All of that stretched us technically—and personally.

Story: Cracking the ending was the toughest part. Our producer, Goro Fujita, felt the original ending was unsatisfying. We first assumed we needed to “go bigger” —a time-travel paradox twist or a neat romantic ending—but none of those options felt true to the film. In the end, the solution was simpler than we expected: we tightened the edit and leaned into snappier comedic timing, and suddenly it clicked.

2. What was the biggest inspiration behind What Time Is It?

What time is it? draws from classic time-travel sci-fi like Back to the Future and Terminator. The humour is inspired by Akira Toriyama’s early work Dr. Slump, and the stop-motion feel takes cues from Aardman (e.g., Wallace & Gromit).

3. What message do you want the audience to take away from What Time Is It?

We prefer that audiences find their own takeaway. If we had to name a couple of themes, they would be making peace with regret and the importance of letting things unfold naturally.