2D CEL ANIMATION

through the dust

CLIENT: THE ATLANTIC

Fifteen years since the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. Directors Brandon Lavoie and Jonah Markowitz reached out to me to employ animation to retell the experiences of first responders, and the health effects they still experience to this day.

The short film Through The Dust features heartrending testimonies from first responders to the site of the attacks, and unpacks the lingering trauma.

ROTOMATIC

The animated sequence was rotoscoped at 8 frames per second. The rotoscope portion uses a mix of shot footage and archival clips from the 9/11 attack. Director Brandon Lavoie filmed me as a stand-in for Chucky. I then used Mocha to replace my face with his likeness in After Effects, before rotoscoping in Photoshop. This allowed me to easily retain his likeness in animation.

In addition to filming the rotoscope portion, I compiled it with found footage and news clips of the towers collapsing. These had to be stabilized and tracked into the scene, so that the handdrawn animation sequence could feel as close to the reality of that event as possible.