UCLA: Research Powers Miracles

UCLA needed a flagship story that refused to feel like “just another university video.” The brief called for something warm, human, and personal enough to speak to donors, alumni, students, faculty, families, and civic leaders while also welcoming a new Chancellor and embodying the promise of “UCLA Connects.” The work had to move beyond institutional messaging and show, in concrete human terms, how UCLA research changes lives and binds a community together.
The solution was a fully cinematic animated film built around a real milestone: UCLA’s first lung transplant using the Organ Care System, and the life it saved. Instead of leading with scientific detail, the piece follows one family’s journey, using their experience to make complex medical innovation immediate, emotional, and understandable.
A simple UCLA plush bear becomes the throughline of the story. Passed from hand to hand—across campus, into the hospital, and through surgery and recovery—it serves as a symbol of connection and hope. The bear traces how UCLA’s impact travels from students to researchers, caregivers to families, and forward into the future, bringing the “UCLA Connects” idea to life without ever naming it outright.
Visually, the film was crafted via a fully handcrafted 3D animation process. The team used references of real UCLA characters and locations, plus AI-assisted and manual tools, to create highly detailed, true-to-life storyboards that streamlined approval and protected authenticity. Writers, designers, storyboard artists, animators, and sound designers then collaborated frame-by-frame, building a world that feels unmistakably UCLA through warm lighting, intimate pacing, the iconic Bruin Bear statue, and recognizable campus and hospital environments.
The final piece gave UCLA a hero story that is human-first yet distinctly on-brand. It moved beyond generic higher-ed messaging, made a complex medical breakthrough accessible through one family’s experience, reinforced themes of lifelong connection, and delivered flexible versions for email, social, executive communications, and broad sharing, ultimately reframing “research” as more time, more moments, and more life.