[SousakuAI Agent Creation Cup 2026 Grand Prix Winning Entry🏆]

Click here for the 5-minute short film "Halcyon - The Captive World"
↓
https://x.com/Ryuki_Yano/status/2053112292766883968?s=20


The Making of "Halcyon"

A 5-minute story about a boy reclaiming the question "Why?" in a world dominated by advertisements and ratings.

I have produced a short sci-fi animation titled "Halcyon."

If you haven't seen it yet, I believe you will better appreciate the depth of the work if you watch it before reading this article.

I would be very happy if you could take a look.

The story is set in a near-future city controlled by advertisements and ratings.
People walk while looking at their smartphones, guided by ads, buying products, working, and watching more ads.
No one is ordering them to do so, yet before they know it, they are living within the same cycle.

In such a world, a boy fails his space selection exam.

However, that failure is not the end.
Rather, it is from that point that he begins to find his own life in the true sense.

A broken receiver found in a scrap yard.
Logs from a Mars work robot received through it.
And a single question the boy inputs.

"Why?"

This question gradually shakes the mental stagnation not only within the robot but within the boy himself.

The Starting Point of the Work

What I wanted to depict in "Halcyon" is not simply a "story about a boy who wants to go to space."

What I truly wanted to depict was

the moment a person who was waiting to be chosen by someone
begins to search for a way to ask questions and move forward on their own

.

In modern times, we see advertisements every single day.
Recommended products, recommended lifestyles, recommended ways of working, recommended choices.

They are convenient, clean, and fun.
But amidst that convenience, there are moments when you lose track of whether you are truly choosing for yourself or being made to choose.

I wanted to express this sense of discomfort not through preachy explanations, but as a 5-minute sci-fi animation.
I also aimed to create a work that transcends age and language barriers, reaching people of all backgrounds.

Beginning: The boy is not "choosing," but "being made to choose"

In the early part of the story, the boy is walking through the city.

A giant advertisement.
A smartphone screen.
Product introduction.
The flow of people.
Convenience store shelves.
A drink being picked up.

The boy looks like he is choosing for himself.
But as he keeps looking at the screen, he reacts to the ads, buys the product, and starts walking again.

I didn't want to portray the boy in a bad light here.
Rather, I wanted to make it so that people could feel, 'This happens to us, too.'

He isn't being forced by anyone.
That is exactly why it is scary.

In this society, people are moved naturally not by orders, but by advertisements.
I was conscious of showing that structure in the first few dozen seconds.

A paper flyer interrupts from outside the screen

In front of such a boy, a paper flyer appears.

It is an invitation to the Space Selection Exam.

What was important here was not to make the flyer an ad inside the smartphone.
Instead of an ad appearing inside the smartphone, a real piece of paper interrupts the boy's field of vision from outside the screen.

The boy stops his hand from looking at the smartphone.
He lifts his face from the screen.
He looks at the paper.
The word 'space' is there.

This small movement is the first deviation in the story.

Until then, the boy had been swept along by the information on the screen.
But for this moment only, his consciousness turns to the outside of the screen.

It is nothing exaggerated.
Just a slight change in his gaze.

In 'Halcyon,' we value such small changes.

Space Selection Exam: A world where even dreams are evaluated

The boy goes to take the Space Selection Exam.

This is because, just like before, he went there somewhat because he saw an ad, and also because in his heart, he was actually a little interested in space.

Because of these two points, the direction the boy will take from now on begins to shift little by little.

The venue is clean, bright, and orderly.
However, it is cold in some way.

Reception, waiting room, exam room, interview room.
Everything is too orderly, and the warmth of humanity is thin.

In the exam, the boy receives a high evaluation.
The AI comprehensive evaluation is S.
Thinking ability, endurance, cooperativeness, creativity, spatial awareness, etc., are all at a high level.

Normally, he should pass here.

However, the story does not progress that way.

This is because what is truly sought in this world is not ability itself, but whether one is easy for the system to handle.

Being excellent and being chosen are not the same thing.
I depict this cruelty through the contrast between the exam and the interview.

The reason for failing the interview

The interviewer is looking at the boy's abilities.
The tablet shows a high rating.

Even so, the interviewer does not choose the boy. I added a slight element here suggesting the interviewer does not trust AI.

I did not want to make the interviewer an obvious villain here.
They do not shout, nor do they say anything sarcastic.
Rather, they are quiet, calm, and loyal to the system.

That is precisely why it is scary.

The boy is not rejected because his ability is low.
It is because the 'question' within him is difficult for the system to handle.

'Why do you want to go to space?'

To this question, the boy is not the type to give a model answer.
He does not offer a fawning smile either.
He spoke his own thoughts instead of the words the system demanded.

And then, he fails.

I made sure not to over-explain this part.
I wanted to leave room for the viewers to realize it for themselves.

The meaning of a B-rated person passing

Afterward, the boy watches in the waiting room and hallway as other candidates are chosen.

That person has a lower rating than the boy.
However, they fit the system.

I did not portray this as 'that person being bad' either.
They simply fit the shape the system required.

What I wanted to depict here was,

the reality that it is not always the excellent who are chosen, but sometimes those who are convenient for that place

.

The boy sees it and understands that he has failed.
He does not cry out loud, nor does he get angry.

His gaze simply drops.
His shoulders slump slightly.
His walking pace changes.

Rather than exploding with emotion, he quietly falls apart.
I thought that suited this story better.

On his way home, he tries to head toward the convenience store again.
The boy tries to head there unconsciously.

Here, a major turning point is depicted that changes his usual behavior of heading to the convenience store and buying the items he saw in advertisements.

In the story, the boy tries to head to the convenience store again, but a black cat suddenly appears in front of him. This becomes the major key that causes the boy to deviate from his usual route and start heading in a different direction.

In front of the convenience store.
The night road.
A cat.
An everyday scene that no one pays attention to.

By becoming curious about where the cat is going, the boy finds the catalyst to significantly change his own actions and thoughts.

An entrance to the outside of the system, found in a scrap yard.

From there, the boy approaches the scrap yard.

What he finds there is a broken receiver.

This receiver is not a clean, state-of-the-art device.
It is something that was thrown away.
It is old, dirty, has an unstable screen, and is full of noise.

However, in this story, that discarded machine becomes the entrance that connects the boy to the universe.

The boy was rejected at the exam venue he entered through the front door.
But the true connection point was inside the scrap on the backside.

This inversion is an important structure of 'Halcyon'.

Communication with the Mars robot is not a 'conversation' but a 'reception record'.

Through the receiver, the boy connects with a work robot on Mars.

What I valued here was not having the robot and the boy have a normal conversation.

If the robot starts talking like a human, the story becomes too easy to understand all at once.
That would cause the coldness and stillness of this work to disappear.

Therefore, the communication was expressed strictly as a log.

ID.
Task details.
Status.
Command.
Reason unknown.
Response delay.
Error.

The robot does not speak of its emotions in words.
It simply changes little by little through log delays and operational halts.

The questions the boy inputs are not long sentences either,

Why?

This short question was enough.

The robot was a mirror of the boy.

The robot on Mars continues to work according to its commands.
It does not know why it is moving.
It just continues because there is a command history.

Seeing this, the boy realizes.

That perhaps he was the same.

See an ad, buy it.
Take an exam.
Get evaluated.
Wait to be chosen.
Try to go to space through the entrance prepared by the system.

Was that truly his own will?
Or was he just made to believe that there was no other path?

The "Why?" directed at the robot eventually returns to the boy himself.

I wanted to create this structure.
The Mars robot is not just a sci-fi gimmick.
It is a mirror reflecting the boy himself.

Ending: Ending with a beginning, not a completion

In the initial concept, there were plans to show him starting to build the rocket or even show the unfinished giant rocket.

However, in the final video, I did not explain that far, and ended it where the boy starts drawing something on paper.

This was a very important decision.

The rocket is completed.
It launches.
It goes to space.

If I show that much, the story becomes a success story.

However, what I wanted to depict in "Halcyon" was not success itself.

What I wanted to depict was,

the moment a boy who had been waiting to be chosen starts thinking for himself

is it.

That is why the ending is not a finished product, but a blueprint. It is also because it wouldn't fit into the final five minutes, haha.

A hand moves across the paper. The boy starts to draw something. Nothing is finished yet. But something has certainly begun.

By leaving this lingering feeling, I made it an ending that allows the audience to imagine, "What will happen next?"

Why I kept the dialogue to a minimum

In "Halcyon," I adopted a policy of having the characters speak almost nothing.

The reason is simple. If you explain too much, there is no room left for the audience to think.

The feeling of being swept away by advertisements. The fear of being evaluated. The atmosphere the moment you fail. The silence when you are the only one not chosen. The time spent staring at robot logs.

If you explain these things with dialogue, they become cheap instantly.

Therefore, I was conscious of conveying them through facial expressions, gazes, walking speed, hand movements, screen light, electronic sounds, logs, and silence.

In particular, I made sure not to make the boy's emotions too tear-jerking. No screaming. No getting angry. No exaggerated despair.

Instead, the focus of his eyes shifts slightly. His hand stops. He looks up. He turns back to the paper.

I wanted to make it a work that shows internal changes through such subtle acting. As for the people I want to reach with this work, I aimed for something that reaches men and women of all ages, transcending language barriers.

Whether young or old, whether youth or elderly, everyone can enjoy it. I wanted to create such a work, so I carried out this production this time.

What I valued in AI production

This work was produced using AI.

However, I did not leave it entirely to the AI. Rather, the difficult part was deciding what to have the AI create.

I was particularly conscious of the following points throughout the work.

• Keeping the protagonist's face and art style as consistent as possible

• Avoiding an overly 3D look

• Ensuring that text information such as advertisements, evaluation screens, flyers, and logs does not break down

• Defining the emotional role of each cut

• Conveying meaning through composition and movement rather than dialogue

• Creating a flow within 5 minutes that covers advertisements, exams, rejection, receivers, Mars, questions, and blueprints

In AI video production, even if you can create beautiful individual images, they can suddenly fall apart when connected as a story.

The face changes.
The art style changes.
The text breaks.
They stop looking like the same character.
The meaning of the direction shifts.

Humanity invents a new hell every time it acquires a convenient tool.
But that adjustment is also the fun part of AI video production.

This time, I produced it while confirming for each cut, 'What is the purpose of this cut?'

Receiving the judge's comments

The judges commented that they were impressed by the development where the protagonist realizes the structure of control through communication with the Mars robot, and the meaning behind the scene where the clean-cut man passes the exam.

I was very happy about this.

Because that is exactly what I wanted them to see.

'Halcyon' is not a work driven by flashy battles or easy-to-understand villains.
Rather, it is a work that makes you think after you finish watching it, such as:

'What was that person who passed?'
'Did the boy really fail?'
'What did the robot on Mars realize?'
'What lies beyond those blueprints?'

It is a work designed to make you ponder these things.

It ends in 5 minutes, but I want your thoughts not to stop there, but rather to begin.

Having people think 'I want to see what happens next' meant a lot for this work.

About the title "Halcyon"

The title "Halcyon" embodies both tranquility and unease.

At first glance, it has a clean, transparent, and somewhat gentle sound.
However, the content of the story deals with quite cold themes such as advertising, evaluation, labor, selection, orders, and the suspension of thought.

Within a beautiful world, there is an invisible control.
Within a quiet boy, a question is born.
From a broken machine, a log from a distant star arrives.

I poured that gap into this title.

Finally

"Halcyon" is the story of a boy who was not chosen by anyone.

But being rejected is not a defeat.
Rather, it is precisely because he was rejected that the boy was able to see the outside of the system.

The boy who was swept away by advertisements,
the boy who was dropped by evaluations,
asks a robot on Mars "Why?"
and through that question, he begins to doubt his own way of living.

What I wanted to depict in this work is not the moment a dream comes true.
It is the moment he stops waiting for someone else to prepare the entrance to his dream.

In the finished video, the boy has not yet gone to space.
The rocket is not finished either.
He has only just begun to draw lines on paper.

But those lines are his very first orbit.

Please watch the 5-minute short sci-fi animation "Halcyon".

And after you finish watching, I would be happy if you could think about it for a little while.

Am I truly choosing for myself right now?
Or am I just being made to choose?

If that question remains, then there is meaning in having created this work.

You can view the work below↓
https://x.com/Ryuki_Yano/status/2053112292766883968?s=20