On December 11, 2018, The Smithsonian Institute and the National Cathedral partnered to present The Spirit of Apollo, a 50th anniversary celebration of the Apollo 8 mission. It was an evening reflecting on mankind's first-ever circumnavigation of the moon, and the effect it had on everyone on earth as they watched on Christmas Eve, 1968. The evening featured talks from Jim Lovell, Captain of the Apollo 8 & 13 missions; Jim Bridenstine, NASA Administrator; Ellen Stofan of the National Air and Space Museum; Bishop Michael Curry; and a choral arrangement representing our foray into the stars. 

For the event, I had the honor of directing an animated piece of the Cathedral's stained glass Space Window. In many ways, the window represents the harmony of science and faith, and I wanted the animation to convey that concept. The idea was to show the window slowly glowing to life, the bits of stained glass blossoming as planets appear within the frame, a reference to both the Big Bang and the creation story of Genesis. What starts in darkness, ends with radiating light; faith amidst doubt, enlightenment amidst ignorance. 

The Space Window itself was completed in 1974 by artist Rodney Winfield, and it depicts Apollo 8's mission around the moon. At its center is an actual moonrock donated by the crew of the Apollo 11 mission: a 3.6-billion-year-old basalt chip from the Sea of Tranquility, enshrined in the red body representing the moon.

The animation was created through a combination of Cinema4D, Illustrator, Photoshop and After Effects. The masonry frame was modeled in 3D, with the individual pieces of glass created in Illustrator and textured in Photoshop. The window was then animated in After Effects, brought into Cinema 4D for the camera movement and surrounding masonry, before being reassembled back in After Effects for the final comp. 

The video featured a choral arrangement by the Cathedral's Director of Music Michael McCarthy, who also arranged choral pieces for the Lord of the Rings trilogy and Harry Potter.