Biomorphs
Bringing Nature to life
What Are biomorphs?
Biomorph is from the Greek words ‘bio’, meaning life, and ‘morphe’, meaning form. Rather than life form, it means the tendency to exhibit the appearance or qualities of a living thing.
For all of his career, Wild Connect co-founder Todd has expressed the wild through art.
“It’s about communicating with people…
I give the name – I say, “It is a rhino”. “A bear”. “An osprey, a fish, a mouse, a worm, a beetle, or something fantastical.”
You suspend disbelief and through your imagination… it lives.
Thank you for giving me a career conjuring life.”
Rollin Rhino
London Marathon ’24
Rollin Rhino is part of Todd’s decades long drive to ensure everyone has the chance to do something in the service of the environment.
Designed by Todd, RR was built with the help of Coleg y Cymoedd British Airways apprentices, creative art and vocational students.
Generously supported by Motivation, OrangeBox & Welsh Rugby League Wheelchair team
Ceisiwr
Osprey Ambassador
We built Ceisiwr as an ambassador of the wild – to accompany the expedition mounted by Conservation Without Borders , that followed the migration of the UK osprey from their nesting grounds to their summer hunting areas in the Gambia, West Africa
Here’s a short essay by Sacha Dench, UN Ambassador for Migratory Species and CWB’s CEO & founder
‘From the UK to Africa, our aim was to bring together people to share knowledge, fears, and ideas around the conservation of migratory birds, like the osprey. We wanted to hear – not just those already-known and respected voices of conservation, but listen to the testimony of individuals & communities under the osprey’s flight path. To get their take on where the problems were and listen to their suggestions, as to how those problems might be solved.
We wanted to speak to ordinary people, who lived around the key sites these amazing birds pass through, to discover… why so many die en route?
Our main challenges were a) we were strangers to these people so had to build trust from scratch, b) we were arriving in 3 large vehicles and potentially looked threatening, c) there were language barriers, particularly where most people spoke regional languages, with perhaps French or Arabic as a second language. In addition, we were speaking to people who faced many challenges – so why would they want to give some of their precious time to us?
This is where Ceisiwr came in. My initial reaction of adding a full size osprey biomorph to our already full vehicles, should have been a very polite refusal on practical grounds, but something about the idea made me stop, got my imagination going. I have seen before the power of an animated creature to allow people a moment to escape, to imagine, to wonder. I have also seen how getting people in that mindset of wonder, is the precursor to getting them engaged and offering to help.
I knew it was worth a try.
We found that Ceisiwr made it very clear to anyone, in any language, that ospreys are distinctive large, fish eating birds with brown ‘shades’. Introducing it to young people, gave the adults space to approach and engage. It created the space and tone for storytelling, inspiring people to tell us the stories of the ospreys they’d seen locally (what we could call data), that helped us fill in the picture.
Ceisiwr the biomorph – can turn its head and look you in the eye. It gives people shivers and connects.
They can touch it and sense life.’
It was a real gift.
Sacha Dench
The Last Curlew
Animated mix of Human & Nature and voices
If you listen – you will hear…
To listen to the wild, Wild Connect has created a device and pipeline to record soundscapes
Iorek Brynisson
Representing Nature for Film
Interactive puppets are valuable in film-making… known as Creature FX
Though the final on-screen character will almost always by computer generated, the on-set version will be a proxy, as in the full scale version of Iorek that Wild Connect’s Todd designed for the recent BBC adaptation of Philip Pullman’s “His Dark Materials”.
This work garnered BAFTAs for the production
Here are our latest articles and posts…
Gil the Beetle
School engagement
Gil tells it like it is… Bugs rule!
Humans are squishy and parasitic, the planet would be better without them.
Bugs on the other hand, are critical to life existing and continuing on Earth