HAPPILY EVER AFTER (Production Blog)
Happily Ever After is my capstone project at the University of Southern California's animation program.
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This 5-minute 3D animated short film tells the story of a girl facing a dilemma where her family pressures her to enter an unwanted marriage, and she goes through a series of inner struggles portrayed through visions of her battling her groom.
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Software: Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Premiere, Autodesk Maya, Blender, ZBrush, Substance 3D Painter, Motive, Nuke
Stills from Film
12.7.24
Throughout the film, I hint at whoever is in control of the situation by placing them on screen left, so I knew I wanted to end the film with the protagonist, Orchid, on screen left, but to achieve this while maintaining continuity throughout the scenes was a big challenge! Here's an edit of the progression of the final wedding and battle scene.​
5.9.24
Happily Ever After will be screened at USC Norris Theatre on May 11th! Here's the full screening version. I won't be releasing the film until after its festival run. Contact me via email for the password to view the film :D
Stills from Film
3.4.24
Here's a clip of Aang and Orchid in action!
2.4.24
All main characters models and rigs done (modeled and textured by me, rigged by Zhe Li and Bob Wu)! See visdev vs. final rendered look below :)
12.6.24
Here are the color keys that my color key artist Rebecca and I created for the wedding world. Based on the second color key (by me), I created the following test shot with final animation and work in progress compositing in Nuke - mainly to experiment with tracking the roto shapes to achieve the look from the color key.
11.19.23
With my mocap stunts team, we finished shooting all the mocap animation we need for the film! I will bake these mocap data onto my character rigs and use the key poses for blocking out the animation.
9.15.24
I settled on the film's look of picture with this style frame. With the finalized set and character models in the scene, I took only the base color and composited the render in Nuke.
8.1.23
Over the summer, while continuing to develop and revise the storyboards, I began sculpting the protagonist Orchid and the character Mom in ZBrush, while using the sculpted body as a base for creating clothing and hairstyle variations before locking the design.
At the same time, my modelers Norman, Thomas, Kaijie, and I have started modeling the wedding set and the dressing room set, as well as some props such as the bouquet (at the wedding), the spear, and the flag (at the battle).
7.22.23
I've been rethinking about the story again and again and the significance of every action's relation to the protagonist Orchid's emotional arc, because it is this arc that pieces this non-linear-narrative film together.
5.15.23
Over the past three months, I came up with an idea for the story I wanted to tell with my senior thesis film: A girl faces a dilemma where her family pressures her to enter an unwanted marriage, and she goes through a series of inner struggles portrayed through visions of her battling her groom.
I designed concept art, key art, environments, and characters for the films while also working on locking the storyboards and color script.
