The winter can be long and unpredictable, especially when you live in a fickle state like Colorado. In my daydream animation project, I set out to explore the sadness you may feel when the weather is cold and the optimism you feel when daydreaming of brighter days.
My video starts with a real life scene, where I walk along a path full of dead grass and weeds. There is nothing green or beautiful to look at. But instead of looking down at the dry earth below me, I choose to look up.
When the video transitions into animation, a cartoon version of myself appears. Instead of being dressed head-to-toe in all black, she's a softer, brighter version of me. And instead of being surrounded by a field of dry earth, she is now surrounded by a beautiful green landscape filled with sunflowers. Despite reason, the sunflowers burst out of the ground and grow to great heights as I walk around them.
As I continue, I pick up speed and keep running. But just as quick as my daydream started, it's suddenly over. I look down just to realize that I crushed the sunflower I picked up only a few moments before. Its brightness and beauty has now vanished, startling me back into reality.
In this project, I attempted to exemplify the beauty and fragility of optimism. We need optimism, especially in the middle of winter when we are at our darkest points of the year. But we also need to keep in mind the dangers of spending all your time in a daydream.
