Imbibe in painstaking craftsmanship. Take in the sheer bulk of work that is this project. Each frame of the five minute video you are about to view is a fine-art piece of painting. This monumental graduation project is called “Khoda.” Each painting placed in order over a 2 year start-to-finish period of production. The designer, painter, and director of this piece is art student Reza Dolatabadi. It’s a thriller.

What if you watch a film and whenever you pause it, you face a painting? This idea inspired Reza Dolatabadi to make Khoda. Over 6000 paintings were painstakingly produced during two years to create a five minutes film that would meet high personal standards. Khoda is a psychological thriller; a student project which was seen as a ‘mission impossible’ by many people but eventually proved possible!

Director and art director: Reza Dolatabadi
Written by Reza Dolatabadi & Mark Szalos Farkas
Animation by Adam Thomson
Music by Hamed Mafakheri

In addition to the feature film above, you can also find a gallery of sketches for other projects by Dolatabadi below. Keep your eyes on the “full-bleed” sketchbook illustrations. They’re basically worth their own post with the loveliness they shine.

This post is graduated from the World Famous Design Junkies degree project category!