Senior Thesis
"Grandma"
My thesis is a gift dedicated to my grandmother, the person who means the world to me. She is the one who taught me strength, resilience, responsibility, and kindness. Through this work, I hope to express my deepest gratitude for her unwavering love and guidance, which have shaped who I am today.
Media: Adobe Photoshop, Adobe After Effects
Story
Among all the thesis options, I chose to create a personal story, which I will narrate in Chinese. I made this choice because I want my primary audience—my grandmother—to be able to understand it directly. From there, I began writing the voiceover for my story, and that marked the beginning of my creative process.
Chinese Script
English Script
我姥姥年轻的时候是个篮球运动员。不像别的姥姥那样，她长的又高又壮。她能在刚生完小孩以后就回归球队打赢篮球比赛，也能在闹饥荒的年代攒好几个月的钱，一个人从火车站扛着30斤的胡萝卜带回家。
我出生以后，她的肚子比年轻时胖了不少，可还是那么强壮。她可以一只胳膊就提起哭闹着不愿意从幼儿园回家的我到公交车上，也可以一个人照顾生病的姥爷，一照顾就是十二年。
前年，她生了一场大病。这场病大到我以为我差点就失去她了，可她还是很坚强地挺过来了。啊～所以，那胖胖的肚子里应该装的都是福气吧！
现在，你总说你老了，姥姥,可我认为，我们的路还很长很长。谢谢你让我一直都是个幸福的小孩。也请继续做我的超人吧！
爱你的小朋友，张婧煊。
My grandma was a basketball player when she was young. Unlike other grandmas, she was tall and strong. She could return to the team and win games soon after giving birth. She could also save money for months and carry 30 pounds of carrots home from the train station all by herself during times of famine.
Her belly became much rounder than in her youth after I was born, but she was still just as strong. She could lift me onto the bus with just one arm when I cried and refused to leave kindergarten. She could also take care of my sick grandpa on her own for twelve years.
Two years ago, she became seriously ill. The illness was so severe that I thought I might lose her, but she held on with incredible strength and made it through. Ah — so maybe that round belly is full of good fortune after all.
Now you often say you’re getting old, grandma, but I believe our road ahead is still long, very long.Thank you for letting me always be a happy child. And please continue to be my superhero.
With love, Your little one.
Process
Character Designs
I began by designing the character of my grandmother, who is the central figure in the story. Then I created a rough storyboard for each sentence and developed style frames for every segment based on those ideas. Once the style frames were approved, I moved on to animating each one for its corresponding segment.
Storyboards
FNL Selection!
Character Look Dev
Design Board (Style Frames)
Animating Process
In most cases, each shot features either a still background/foreground or a simple line-boil cycle of three frames, which are relatively quick to complete. The character animation, however, makes up the bulk of the work. I typically approach it in three stages: a pencil test, cleanup, and then the final colored animation.
Challenges
This short film is designed to be around one minute long, and since I am creating all the animation frame by frame in Adobe Photoshop, the first challenge is completing all the drawings within the three-month timeframe. To manage this, I decided to animate at 12 frames per second, which not only makes the workload more feasible but also gives the film a more childlike, playful feel that pairs well with the soft, rounded character design.
Another big challenge was creating environmental animation for specific scenes. For instance, in a scene where my grandmother walks through the snow carrying a sack, I needed foreground snow drifting diagonally at a 45-degree angle. Animating this frame by frame would have been very time-consuming due to the number and variation of the snowflakes.
To speed things up, I used AI to generate a rough looping animation of falling snow, then rotoscoped over it. While there were some unnatural movements, such as snowflakes growing as they fell or briefly changing shape, it was sufficient for my needs. I corrected these inconsistencies by omitting or adjusting the unnatural elements and refining the loop. This reduced the process from several days to just one afternoon and evening.
But just as everything seemed resolved......
I usually back up my work to Google Drive every time I finish an animation or make changes, and I had copies of my entire thesis folder saved there.
But the one time I didn’t manage to back up my work after making edits the night before, I ran into trouble.
Just a few days later, the file I had worked on wouldn’t open. Adobe Photoshop reported that the file was damaged.
......I encountered the most challenging technical issue: file damage.
