The Covid-19 pandemic was a key issue tackled by teams in this year's N.E.mation! competition.
The annual contest sees students and youth producing animation clips to express their views on Total Defence.
Of the 1,064 submissions for the student and youth categories this year, 70 per cent highlighted how Singaporeans could apply Total Defence during the pandemic.
Themed "Together We Keep Singapore Strong", the 15th edition of the contest was held virtually.
Teams in the youth category produced their clips with online mentoring from industry partners, including Lucasfilm, the production firm behind the Star Wars franchise, and Singapore Press Holdings' content marketing agency Sweet.
Participants in this category were aged 17 to 25, from post-secondary educational institutions.
This year, those in the student category - aged 13 to 16 - competed in storyboarding instead of animation production. The top three teams turned their concepts into animation clips, while the other seven within the top 10 had their storyboards turned into illustrations.
The N.E.mation! open house was held at the Singapore Discovery Centre yesterday, with the top three student category teams and top nine youth category teams presenting their work and ideas behind it. The event was also streamed live on Facebook for family and friends who could not attend due to safe distancing measures.
The public can watch the clips at http://sweetspot.straitstimes.com/ nemation and vote for their favourite entries online from today to Feb 12. The champion in each category will be announced at an awards ceremony next month.
Youth category finalist Team Dragon Fruit, comprising four digital animation students from Nanyang Polytechnic, presented fake news as a virus that turns people into zombies in its clip, which addressed the role that fake news played in triggering a run on supermarkets here last year.
Last February, Singaporeans emptied supermarket shelves after the national disease outbreak response level to the coronavirus situation was raised to "orange". Similar scenes occurred last March after Malaysia announced its first movement control order, as people feared it would halt the supply of food and essential goods here.
Team leader Alicia Lim, 19, said: "People started to hoard products like masks, instant noodles and toilet paper, because they read fake news and didn't fact-check before they started spreading it."
She said she personally knows people, typically in the older generation, who unknowingly spread misinformation through chain messages on platforms such as WhatsApp. "Since they are not as cautious of such news, they pretty much believe what they see, and forward it to all their friends."
Another team of four digital animation students from Nanyang Polytechnic, Cocomelon, produced a video of people morphing into different front-line roles and jobs, to honour the national effort in fighting Covid-19 and to tell people that everyone can play a part.
Team leader Rebekah Chew, 18, said: "It can be anything, even the small things like giving out masks to other people and reminding people to wear their masks and take precautions."
The competition is organised by Nexus, the department responsible for Total Defence and National Education in the Ministry of Defence.
Nexus director Jerica Goh said: "We would like to encourage more young Singaporeans to think about Total Defence and how we have put Total Defence in action in our fight against Covid-19."
Colonel Goh added that the new storyboarding competition for the student category has made it easier for more students to take part.
The online format this year saw a 40 per cent increase in submissions from the previous edition.
