Kai is an English born, New Zealand raised artist working and living in Melbourne. He works on web based animation, music videos, 3D stills, and plenty more. Kai is self taught in all respects of what he does. He is the product of online tutorials, trial and error and the creative people around him.
His work can be seen across the Australian Open throughout all 3 arena’s at the event. He has recently produced video’s for Radio New Zealand, Cup Of Kings App, IceBreak, Szymon’s “Blue Coloured Mountain” and many more.
Kai Higham.
Designer, Animator and Creative Director.
Showreel.
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I was commissioned to design this music video for the new single from Szymon called Blue Coloured Mountain. The video was directed by my friend Darcy Predergast from Oh Yeah Wow. Below you can see some frames from the video and also one of my favourite pieces of concept art as the first image.
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This is now the result of two consecutive years building custom content for the Australian Open. They were predominantly to be used as 15 second LED screen activation’s in all 3 arena’s with a strong focus on Rod Laver Arena. Always a tonne of fun, and a great chance to work with my dear friend Mighty Boots.
It was important to create dynamic contrasting images that would engage the audience, however that needed to be done at some rather extreme aspect ratios. Which is like designing on the surface of a needle. Though that needle is 2.5 meters high and runs around the circumference of each court.
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Radio NZ got in touch with me to produce a video for them as part of a series they were doing to promote awareness around environmental challenges that we face today. The first hurdle for me was to find a way to present something that felt so naturally unaesthetic (a plastic bag) in a beautiful way.
In a way that I could use it as almost a protagonist in a story through which it could dance across colourfully illustrated frames. A stark contrast in juxtaposition with the narrative content and the gruff and oily textures we see embedded in various objects.
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The guys at Cup of Kings were really fun to work with. It felt immediately important after our first meeting that a vibrant, fast paced kind of energy was going to be the priority. We wanted it to feel exhilarating, but also sincere. It was a commercial, but nonetheless it was an ad for an app that is totally free and has been a total passion project for these guys.
It was going to be marketed on social media however, so it was important that it didn’t just feel like another commercial. We wanted it to feel sincere, and more than anything fun. We tried to make that energy the foundation of our design choices.
