'Reaching Our Star' - Blending Animation With Real-life

‘Reaching Our Star’, made by Jihwan Lee, is an original children’s storybook ambitiously brought to life through the blend of animation and conventional filmmaking techniques. Centering around themes such as perseverance, struggle, and hope, the story features a frog named Stottie and a dog named Plato, who choose to progress in their journey toward reaching the bright yellow star in the sky despite their past failures. This short was designed to further immerse the viewers into the story by breaking down the barrier between reality and colorful animations, as Jihwan wanted to keep the magic of immersion alive in new and creative ways. He used his skills in video editing to overlay his drawings onto real-life footage. He then researched methods such as transitioning and scaling to make this blend appear more believable. Jihwan also enhanced the auditory experience by importing the video into Ableton, which allowed him to manipulate sound for visually impaired viewers to immerse themselves in the story.