Break Through
Created in Toon Boom Harmony
Breakthrough is a deeply personal animated short built around the theme of finding one’s "happy place." At a time when I was struggling with anxiety and depression, I was encouraged to visualize a space in my mind where I felt safe and calm. That exercise was harder than I expected, until one night I dreamt of a quiet meadow and a baby fawn that walked up to me. In seconds, she grew into an adult, lay down beside me, passed away, and turned to bone. Despite the imagery, the entire experience felt strangely peaceful. That dream became the emotional and symbolic foundation for this project.
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The animation follows a character navigating their inner world in search of calm, represented through surreal imagery, symbolic animals, and shifting emotional states. Each animal reflects a different mental block or emotion.​
In the final act, the character (represented but as a thought cloud) journeys through a surreal grocery store, each aisle representing a possible safe space. Only in the “Coming Soon” section does the true space reveal itself, not a physical location, but a feeling. It’s undefined, yet exactly right. That moment of clarity, that breakthrough, is the heart of the piece.
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Stylistically, the short doesn’t follow conventional pacing or structure. From a technical standpoint, it may feel rushed or abstract, but that was intentional. I let instinct guide the process. The imperfections became part of the story, the confusion, the unexpected turns, the emotional honesty.
What’s funny is that every time I talk about this animation, I end up discovering something new about it and myself.
