Jack Dunphy, a co-writer on Nathan Silver’s Stinking Heaven and a frequent collaborator of Caveh Zahedi, is currently raising funds for his first feature, Living With Others, on Kickstarter. To celebrate crossing his initial goal, Dunphy has released his animated, Sundance-selected short Serenity online. Living With Others, which just added Zahedi as an executive producer, will blend live action and animation, and Dunphy had the following to say about his choice:

I’m punctuating the movie with animation because it makes it easier for me to communicate difficult thoughts and emotions. Subconscious hang-ups are brought to the surface when I animate, and that helps me realize what I’m actually trying to say. Mixing live action with animation is a good way to represent the desparity between the inner and the outer lives of the characters. I imagine everyone’s interior life as a fucked up cartoon. Plus, it’s sort of a crutch—like, “hey guys, don’t leave, here’s a cartoon!”