A magician and her trusty companion rediscover the joy of magic lost over time—with a little help from Canva—in a heartwarming holiday film created in-house. 

“The Magic Within, A Canva Holiday Story,” tells the story of Stella Sparks and her puppet rabbit Whiskers the Wondrous, a dazzling duo who mesmerized audiences with tricks and illusions during the 1970s.

In the film, Stella and Whiskers are much older and have lost sight of the luster of magic, as life and time caused their dreams to be put aside. However, upon discovering Canva’s AI tools, Whiskers devises a plan to bring joy back into Stella’s life and organize a comeback, designing flyers, posters and photobooks to draw visitors to a new show. 

The film is set in Sydney’s iconic State Theater and began as a passion project in-house that evolved to a full-scale production, for which the creative team used Canva’s own tools at every stage, including scripting, storyboarding, organization and props. 

Also read: Canva helps you ‘love your work’ in joyful new brand campaign

Canva even used Leonardo.AI (which it acquired in July) to create the set design and draft the brief that would be shared with the puppeteer to create the Whiskers character. 

The film aims to show that with a little help, anyone can unlock the creativity within them, the company said. 

“I think I can speak for everyone in the team when I say it was a real pleasure to work on this film, and hopefully that sense of joy comes through in the finished story,” said Matt Nisbet, creative director at Canva. 

"Canva's mission has always been about celebrating creativity and empowering anyone to turn their ideas into something beautiful. At its heart, this film is about just that. Through Stella and Whiskers’ journey to rediscover their magic, we’re reminded of the creative spark that exists in all of us," added Cat van der Werff, executive creative director at Canva.

The campaign will run on YouTube, Meta and LinkedIn.

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