DESIGN EXPLORATION | POTENTIAL IDEAS

April 19, 2026

DESIGN EXPLORATION | POTENTIAL IDEAS

Design Exploration: Week 1-Week 3

Loh Kai Xuan (0365780)

WEEK 1

Task:

We are to create a self directed project with the theme: Mental Health.

Medium:

First of all, I decided the medium of my project. I specialize in animation but so far i haven't been able to animate any 2d animation for degree. So I decided to do frame by frame animation. But using grease pencil to do so for extra challenge. It is something I was interested in but have never dabbled in before.

Fig. 1.1. Main Inspirations

Topic:

After thinking, I thought of my friend who suffers a subtype of OCD, false memory. It is a less known type of OCD because when you talk about OCD, you think about germaphobes or perfectionists. That is why I chose to do this. I consulted my friend and they were eager to help me bring this to life as well. To educate people about this mental health issue.

What is False Memory in OCD?

False memory OCD is a subtype of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) where people experience intrusive doubt about whether past events really occurred. Unlike ordinary forgetfulness, this OCD subtype causes persistent anxiety, intrusive thoughts, and compulsive checking about memories that may have never happened. Research shows that more than 30% of people report experiencing symptoms of false memory OCD.

- NOCD

Moodboard

Fig. 1.2. Moodboard

Interviewing Hatsu

My friend has chosen to stay anonymous so they will be referred to with the alias, "Hatsu" throughout this project. As adviced by Ms. Eunice, our co-lecturer, I entered a call with Hatsu to interview them with a more casual tone so it doesn't pressure them to talk about uncomfortable topics. Below is the link to the journal and summary of what I learnt from it.

Link to journal: Click Here

Summary

OCD: obsessive-compulsive disorder or obsessive-compulsive personality disorder.
May have different sub-types. You usually experience more than one type.

Checking
Contamination
Counting
Existential
Religion/ Spirituality
Pedophilia
Relationship

Interviewee’s most common symptoms are intrusive thoughts, false memory or checking, repetition.
It involves thinking you did something bad but you actually didn't. It's like constantly having to watch something you don't want to watch like ads pop up in a way.
Symptoms appear in high school but are only diagnosed years later. They coped with it themselves until proper methods were learned in therapy.
Has experienced self h*rm. Slapping themselves constantly when thoughts won’t go away.
Barely ate, cried often.
Went to therapy after support from parents. Informed friends after therapy
Became more open about letting friends know their thoughts. Reassurance from loved ones helps a lot.
Examples of daily struggles:

Checking the Door, intruder might appear
Checking the Stove, house might explode
Fear of having hurt someone in past/future
Imagination of posting sensitive information online
Fear of having said something hurtful online or in messages
Afraid of their actions bringing harm to loved ones.

“I still have those thoughts but I was able to control, fight it and understand after understanding I have ocd since ocd is something that won’t go away.” - Hatsu (Interviewee)
Ways to cope:

5 senses method (sight, hear, smell, touch, taste)
Distraction through hobby
Medicine from therapist to calm down. (dosage has been lowered over time)

Emotions

When talking with Hatsu we brought up the movie, "Look Back", which is an adaptation of the story with the same name by Fujimoto. We thought about emulating the emotions shown in certain scenes where action and expression show emotions instead of actual voicelines. So I decide to keep talking to the minimum and focus on sound effects and the animation itself.