Traditionally, animation has been dominated by men in the past. I don't know why it attracted guys.

A lot of the issues I faced in junior high was what got me into animation. It was easier to sit on the side and draw cartoons than to engage with people.

So this idea of moving seemed like a good way to sort of represent that metaphorically. It also is something for me personally. When I was in fifth grade - so about 11 - my folks moved us to Denmark.

And it's about a three-month process every screening. And that way we have seven or eight chances at the film before we have to actually build the models, build the sets, do the animation and all of that. So it's a - I think that's a real key to the way we make films.

One of the other experts we consulted with, this guy named Dacher Keltner, he was big on sadness as community bonding - I think is the word he used.

And in part that's good but then, like any emotion - and this is something we learned from the research as well - there are positive and negative aspects to all of these.

Well, what if we did this in the mind as opposed to the brain? So instead of blood vessels and dendrites, what if it was consciousness and dream production? And that would allow us to have characters that represent emotions. And that felt like, man, that's exactly what animation does best - strong, opinionated, caricatured personalities. And that just got me excited.