The Story Process

It started with a pitch -

“A young girl loses her dog and has a whimsical moment in a rainstorm that helps her heal and move on.”

The 2min pitch went well, but obviously there was a lot to figure out. Thankfully, a few awesome people joined our crew and helped push the story to what it is today!

We started off with beat boards and thumbnails and swirled around ideas, then Huda Razzak took our those rough story ideas and wrote out a short script.

We storyboarded and re-boarded again and again. And we handed off hundreds (if not thousands!) of drawings to our fearless editor, Nik Seifke, who cut it altogether and in the process ruthlessly chopped many drawings that we were hopelessly attached to. We went from 6+min to a leaner 3min, and eventually landing at a solid 4min short film.

A few of our lost ideas included a montage of the girl and dog growing up together, the dog getting hit by a car, the dog aging and dying, a tidal wave rain puppy, and more:

Early Sketch by Thalia Nalapraya (2023)

Early Sketch of Dog’s Death Scene by Thalia Nalapraya (2023)

Early Sketch of Girl on Prom Night by Thalia Nalapraya (2023)

Early boards for a Rain Puppy Tidal Wave by Easton Andrykowski (2023)

First boarded scene on RCaD by Alishea Gibson

We also shared our early animatics with friends and colleagues and got loads of great feedback and notes and ideas that pushed and pulled our story. When we screened our animatic with our tech crew and they had a lot of great feedback on how we could create this film that brought us back to the drawing board to re-stage and reframe shots with future tech challenges in mind.

Speaking of challenges…crafting an ending that feels equally satisfying and heartwarming has been our greatest challenge. More on that later!

Cheers for now,

Alishea

xoxo