WierszoNutki: W lesie (In the Forest)

A squirrel leads a cinematic journey through a classic Polish poem, exploring the forest's play of light and shadow 🍓🐿️🌳

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Inspiration

The "Wierszonutki" project was born from a personal need to provide my young son with valuable, high-quality content, which is often hard to find on Polish YouTube for kids. This motivation grew into a larger mission, and to date, I have created over 30 animated musical adaptations of classic Polish children's poetry.

My journey into W lesie (In the Forest) began with Maria Konopnicka's classic poem, written around 1910. I wanted to portray the forest not just as a place of wonder and adventure, but also as a realm of mystery and respectful danger, hinted at through scenes inspired by classic folklore.

To guide my young audience through this world, I envisioned a nimble, charismatic squirrel. This character allowed me to explore the forest from a unique perspective and bring her energetic journey to life with cutting-edge technology.

How I Built It

This project was a deliberate showcase for the Hailuo-02 video model, chosen for its unparalleled ability to generate fluid, dynamic action.

The creative process began by transforming Konopnicka's 115-year-old poem into a modern song using Suno AI v4.5. This musical foundation then became the blueprint for the animation. My entire creative workflow, from script concepts to scene-by-scene analysis, was managed within Gemini 2.5 Pro. Its ability to "see and hear" my video drafts allowed for a uniquely collaborative and iterative process.

"W lesie" represents the absolute peak of what I could achieve with generative AI animation in July 2025 (it was published then), which is why I am submitting it to the Chroma Awards.

Challenges I Faced

While some scenes materialized perfectly on the first attempt (surprisingly, the scene of the squirrel playing drums on mushroom caps came out flawlessly), others, like a key sequence on an old wooden bridge, required over 20 distinct iterations of re-engineering prompts, rethinking camera angles, and changing the core concept to overcome the AI's limitations. This was not a process of intense curation.

My greatest challenge was maintaining the highest standard of quality. Every generated clip was judged based on two core principles:

  1. Technical Perfection: A zero-tolerance policy for the glitches/hallucinations that can break immersion.
  2. Emotional Resonance: The animation had to feel alive. I rejected some technically perfect clips that lacked the spark of emotion or the feeling of life that was essential to the story.

A similar challenge and creative discovery occurred in sound design. For the first time I used ElevenLabs to generate all the SFX, including the squirrel's character sounds. It was a pleasure to work with, but I quickly learned that to achieve the perfect, high-energy chatter for the squirrel, I had to prompt the tool for "chipmunk" sounds.

Accomplishments That I'm Proud Of

I am proud of having crafted a visual interpretation that feels both faithful to Konopnicka's spirit and daringly contemporary. I am also proud of pushing the Hailuo-02 model to its limits, proving that with persistence, iteration, and human judgment, AI can become a tool for genuine artistic expression.

What I Learned

  • I learned that working with AI requires patience, flexibility, and a willingness to treat the process as dialogue.
  • The best results came not from expecting perfection, but from learning to adapt and appreciate the unpredictability of the outcome.
  • I also learned that to create a variety of beautiful scenes, all you need is a good set of extreme close-up shots of your character uploaded as the starting frame.

Note:

  • The poem is in the public domain, so it can be freely adapted and creatively reimagined in this film.
  • Turn on CC subtitles to follow the full text of the poem.

Built With

  • elevenlabs
  • gemini-2.5-pro
  • gpt-image-1
  • hailuo-02
  • suno-v4.5
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