The theme of my FYP animation comes from the notion that entering a new relationship can feel like ‘replacing’ or ‘invalidating’ the previous one. My animation follows an owner and the spirit of their dog as they try to deal with their loss and the impact of a new dog’s arrival.

My inspiration comes from experience with friends and family. People who had recently lost a pet would wish for the companionship of an animal in their lives again but would refuse to adopt another for various reasons like ‘I’d feel like I was replacing them’.

My animation deals with this concept of replacement by including the ghost of a previous pet in the owner’s attempt to move on without forgetting the past. From the ghost’s perspective, it is also a lesson in learning to let someone you love be happy, even if you cannot be the one to provide that happiness anymore.

I chose a lineless style for the aesthetic of the character’s colour palettes blending without the interruption of lineart. I textured the backgrounds with personalised brushes to help the characters stand out and to detract just slightly from the clean and ‘digital’ appearance of the piece and make it look a little more ‘hand-made’.