The film featured a number of first timers. It was the first film of the director, the writer, the producer, 7 of the 9 lead actors, the music director, the art director, the sound designer and the poster designer. It was also just the 3rd film of the cinematographer and the makeup man and the 5th film of the editor and production controller. Making the total number of films of all the lead technicians combined just 13. On top of all this, the film also featured one of the youngest ever crew, with the average age being 23-24 years of age. The oldest technician on set was jut 32 years old with 90% of the crew being under 25. The 26 year old director was the 3rd oldest person on set.
Ganesh Raj got the idea for the film while he was working on Thattathin Marayathu (2012) his first film as an assistant director. He immediately pitched the idea to his director and mentor Vineeth Sreenivasan who found the idea very interesting and asked him to start writing immediately. Ganesh Raj started research for the film and in the meantime went on to work in three more films as an Assistant Director namely Thira (2013), Bangalore Days (2014) and Jacob's Kingdom of Heaven (2016) before finishing his script and starting Aanandam (2016).
The film was shot almost exclusively using natural light.
While shooting inside the bus, due to the humid conditions, the camera battery caught fire and almost exploded before a technician noticed it and threw it outside. The bus was immediately stopped and the still burning battery was disposed off safely before continuing the journey.
The director and the crew had a difficult time coming up with an apt title for the film. Finally the title Aanandam was suggested by producer Vineeth Sreenivasan just two weeks before filming started. Rejected titles include "Dooreyo", "Sunshine", "I-We" etc.