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WONDERFUL GOODBYES follows a little girl and her furry best friend, who spend their last day together doing all their favorite things one last time.
This is a personal story and a love letter to my first dog & my best friend, Bailey, who passed away unexpectedly in 2020. It was during my third year at RISD and COVID-19 and I really struggled to accept her passing.
When the final project in Picture and Word (children's book class) was to write about anything we wanted, I just started writing about Bailey as a way to cope and remember her. It took a long time to polish the story and approach the topic of grief and loss, as well as my own evolving emotions and mindset. I've learned a lot on this journey hope this story can help readers see death in a different light and treasure the moments we have with our loved ones.
Early sketches exploring style and tone of characters.
I first started Wonderful Goodbyes by down all the things Bailey and I loved doing together that slowly turned into a manuscript, all while having some visual images of our story in my head. As I continued to write, I sketched out various compositions and the environment where my story takes place to find the one that expresses the right emotions.
Once I narrowed down a few compositions, I drew cleaner versions and painted some color tests.
Then take it to final!
More color scripts to explore the mood throughout the emotional beats of the story.