The concept for this piece is to tell a short story about grief and loss. The piece will focus on portraying the emotions and feelings people feel when experiencing loss. Often people struggle with isolation after experiencing loss and also develop fears of abandonment which hinder the person in moving on and accepting the loss. This story will express this isolation and the fears associated with grief and the struggle all people have when they lose something that is a part of them. Ultimately the goal is for the person to accept and come to terms with the loss to move on with their life, but often a loss is so great that the person is never the same again. This short story will explore all these concepts and attempt to express these feelings and ideas in a visual and immersive way

The story of this animation follows a lone character walking through a desolate and barren alien planet. The landscape is mostly void of life apart from our main character Jak. Jak makes his way through this treacherous environment that gets more and more dangerous. Jak makes a difficult climb up the mountain as the sand filled wind impairs his vision more and more. Suddenly Jak hears a familiar voice and looks out into the sandstorm and sees a vague vision of two figures in the distance. Jak desperately tries to reach the figures, but in his eagerness to reach the figures he trips and begins to fall down a slope. Jak falls from the edge but manages to save himself with his grapple hook. Jak heads higher up the mountain and reaches a cave. He enters the cave and finds what he was looking for. He seals the object into a canister and puts it in his bag. Jak arrives back home and inspects the canister. He begins to work on something and it is revealed to be a special glowing plant. Jak takes the plant and places it into a shrine he has created dedicated to his family. It is clear from the withered plants on the altar that he has placed many such flowers at the shrine. Jak sleeps on his bed. The next day Jak is trecking through the desert when he hears the low rumble of a ship flying in the distance. Jak cant beliebe it as he hasn't seen a ship in a long long time. He arms the flare gun on his arm and points it upwards to shoot. Jak stalls with his hand raised to shoot but doesn't. Jak lowers his flare gun and takes a moment to himself before continuing walking in the desert.

To make sure the film has the right pacing I will refine the storyboards and later the animatic so that the story moves at a good pace and is realistic to produce in the time frame. To create this animation I will use a mix of 3D environments and 2D paintings. To create the environment I will create 3D assets such as rocks, ground planes, etc for use in the film. I will then set up my camera and render the environment. I will then take this render and make a painting on top of it for projecting in 3D.I will animate the character for this film using traditional 2D animation techniques. I will also create visual effects using 2D hand drawn animation. I will use after effects to create additional effects and shot transitions.