Date and time

Wednesday May 25 2022, 4.00 pm to 5.00 pm

Delivery mode

Online – a Zoom link will be provided 24 hours prior to the event

Audience 

This learning event is right for you if you are a teacher of Art, Science, Visual Communication and Design or Biology.

Description                                  

Join multi-award winning Biomedical Animator Dr Maja Divjak of the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, as she explains why visualising the world we can’t see is now more important than ever. Dr Divjak’s creations have exhibited twice at the Vivid Festival of Light, Music and Ideas and have won multiple awards including a Platinum Remi award at the Worldfest Houston International Film Festival, Finalist at the Raw Science Film Festival and Official Selection at the Melbourne Documentary Film Festival. Maja will discuss why biomedical animation is so vital for communicating science in the digital age, her pathway to becoming a biomedical animator and what is involved in creating an award-winning animation. Explore this inspiring and unique world as an introduction to hands-on animation workshops Dr Divjak will be presenting in 2022.

“A great online session today. I saw two of my Year 11 students were present today (on their school holidays).” – past participant

This learning event supports creating best practice toward meeting the following VRQA standard(s):

• The minimum standards for schools offering a senior secondary course – Teaching and learning                         

Relevant Australian professional standards for teachers

2.  Know the content and how to teach it

3.  Plan for and implement effective teaching and learning

Key takeaways               

• a greater understanding of what  Biomedical Animation is 
• an understanding of how this work can communicate complex ideas and knowledge that are not easily accessible through other means
• knowledge about how biomedical animation can be used for mass communication to inform and protect public health issues
• deeper connections/ intersections between disciplinary fields of knowledge which can bring new and innovative ways of working and learning.

Presenter information

Dr Maja Divjak  

Dr Maja Divjak is a Biomedical Animator who recently took up the inaugural role of Biomedical Animator at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, where she is creating animations about cellular and molecular mechanisms leading to cancer. Prior to this, she was resident Science Animator at the Gene Technology Access Centre. She was also privileged to undertake a fellowship with world-renowned Biomedical Animator Dr Drew Berry, at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research. The fellowship was part of the VizbiPlus project, which aimed to train three new animators to communicate cutting edge research at their host institutions, using visually stunning and engaging 3D animation.

Her creations have twice been exhibited at the Vivid Festival of Light, Music and Ideas and have won awards, including the Warren Sturgis Motion Media Award at BioImages 2017 and several Awards of Excellence at the Doctors Without Borders Film Festival, 2017. The first official flagship animation for Peter Mac ‘What Goes Wrong in Cancer’ is an ambitious project designed to showcase the invisible molecular world within our cells and how this finely tuned world can occasionally be disrupted, leading to cancer. This animation was awarded a Platinum Remi award at the Worldfest Houston International Film Festival, the Medical Education Award- Motion Media at BioImages 2020, Finalist at the Raw Science Film Festival and Official Selection at the Melbourne Documentary Film Festival and the Doctors Without Borders Film Festival.