Inside Qiaoyu Liaos Suuugar The Clay Animated Cheesecake Disaster That Shows What Happens When You Get Distracted

Creative Boom: Inside Qiaoyu Liao's Suuugar!, the clay-animated cheesecake disaster that shows what happens when you get distracted In her grad film, a clay squirrel gets so distracted making tea that she forgets the cake completely. Here, the animator explains how live-action reference, a multiplane set, and lots of handmade clay brought the story to life. Summertime Buzz (2026), a stop-motion piece created for guldies' Summer Contest Summertime Buzz (2026), a stop-motion piece created for guldies' Summer Contest You see a squirrel baking a cheesecake. Mid-recipe, she reaches for the sugar and pours it into her tea instead, without quite noticing.

She sips it, enjoys it, and completely forgets what she was meant to be doing, until the oven timer goes off and she remembers: there's no sugar in the cake. That's the plot of Suuugar!, Qiaoyu Liao's graduate film, and before you ask – yes, it's supposed to be utterly relatable. And it made me think of the many times I've nearly, and wholly, poured coffee into my yoghurt bowl. "The idea came from something very simple: how easily we can get distracted by small things, even when we're in the middle of doing something important," she says.

"It's something I recognise in myself a lot, and I wanted to turn that very ordinary experience into a playful story." Scene from Suuugar! (2026) Scene from Suuugar! (2026) Scene from Suuugar! (2026) Scene from Suuugar! (2026) Scene from Suuugar! (2026) Scene from Suuugar! (2026) Scene from Suuugar! (2026) Scene from Suuugar! (2026) Liao is a stop motion animator from China, though animation wasn't her starting point. She studied traditional Chinese painting for her undergraduate degree in Shanghai before moving to London for an MA in Character Animation at Central Saint Martins, where she first encountered stop motion and became hooked.

"There is something really special to me about bringing something handmade to life frame by frame," she says, "the physicality of the materials, the imperfections, and the fact that everything you see on screen has existed and been touched in the real world." When it comes to her inspiration, it usually comes from observations in everyday life and from "looking inward at my own habits, emotions and experiences".

She adds, "I'm often drawn to small, ordinary moments that might seem insignificant at first, and I enjoy finding something playful or slightly absurd within them." This is why Suuugar has that familiar feeling to it, because it's influenced by the real, human-centred things that happen to, well, every human. And these moments are exaggerated just enough to become funny and rouse a little smirk in us all. Qiaoyu on set with the multiplane setup for Suuugar! Qiaoyu on set with the multiplane setup for Suuugar! Animating Suuugar!

in Dragonframe, using my live-action reference and animatics as guides for the character performance. Animating Suuugar! in Dragonframe, using my live-action reference and animatics as guides for the character performance. BTS of the multiplane setup for Suuugar!, with props arranged across different layers. BTS of the multiplane setup for Suuugar!, with props arranged across different layers. Scene from Suuugar! (2026) Scene from Suuugar! (2026) As for the process, Liao shot everything from directly overhead, a top-down approach she'd first tried in an earlier short, Jamming!, which gives the film a flat, illustration-like feel.

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While the animated film presents a creative take on distraction, its implications for brand strategy are somewhat indirect and not groundbreaking in the industry.