'Life Drawings' and 'Maddie & the Test' on Disney+: Inside the Making of Two Short Circuit Experimental Films from Disney Animation

'Life Drawings' and 'Maddie & the Test' on Disney+: Inside the Making of Two Short Circuit Experimental Films from Disney Animation

This year marks the 10th anniversary of Short Circuit Experimental Films, Walt Disney Animation Studios' innovative short film program where anyone at the Studio can pitch an idea in the hopes of being selected to create their own project. The goal of the Short Circuit program is to take risks, surface new voices, and experiment with new technical innovation. Two new shorts will premiere Wednesday, March 18, on Disney+. In interviews below, directors Larry Wu and Heather M. Roberts Russell describe what went into bringing their respective projects, Life Drawings and Maddie & the Test, to life at the Studio.

Life Drawings

Wu joined Walt Disney Animation Studios in 2004, and his credits include Bolt (2008), Tangled (2010), Wreck-It Ralph (2012), Frozen (2013), Big Hero 6 (2014), Moana (2016), Raya and the Last Dragon (2021), Strange World (2022), and Moana 2 (2024). But, about 10 years ago, Wu first pitched his idea for Life Drawings to the Studio, drawing from personal experiences to tell a story about three generations of artistic aspirations within one family.

Told through a series of self-portraits, Life Drawings begins with the main character displaying an appreciation and an aptitude for art throughout his childhood and adolescence. As he matures, he begins to look at life more practically, eventually sharing his artistic ambitions with his daughter.

It's about passing down your knowledge, wisdom, and experience to the next generation. It starts when the main character gets a crayon from his father, and you see him go through his life journey. After going through all these challenges and opportunities, he realizes that what brings him joy is to pass it all down to his daughter… It's the circle of life.

"It's about passing down your knowledge, wisdom, and experience to the next generation," Wu said. "It starts when the main character gets a crayon from his father, and you see him go through his life journey. After going through all these challenges and opportunities, he realizes that what brings him joy is to pass it all down to his daughter… It's the circle of life."

Stylistically, Life Drawings uses a combination of hand-drawn animation for the characters and places them in a mostly CG world. Nearly half of the shots are hand-drawn, with CG backgrounds and elements comprising the rest. Two of Disney Animation's rising young hand-drawn animation stars, Tyler Pacana and Austin Traylor, helped Wu realize his vision.

"It was really important to tell the story in a way that makes sense in every stage of life," Wu said. "Some stages tended to benefit from hand-drawn, and some from all CG. There were a few times where you needed to blend it and have the perfect composition of both."

Maddie & the Test

Roberts Russell joined Walt Disney Animation Studios in 2018, and her credits include Ralph Breaks the Internet (2018), Frozen 2 (2019), Raya and the Last Dragon, Encanto (2022), Strange World, Wish (2023), Moana 2, and Zootopia 2 (2025). Her Short Circuit pitch was inspired by her niece, who has dyslexia, a learning disorder that affects reading and spelling. That pitch became Maddie & the Test, in which 10-year-old Maddie takes a test and must summon her inner strength to tackle her biggest fears and overcome her anxiety.

"I was having some difficult moments in my life [when I pitched this], so I thought, 'I'm going to do this creative thing, get some feedback, learn from it, and grow from it," Roberts Russell recalled. "Then I got picked, and I had a moment of, 'Oh, my goodness! Now I have to direct a short at Walt Disney Animation Studios!' Luckily, we have a lot of development time, and I used it to learn as much as I could about each of the disciplines in our Studio."

"My vision for this was twofold," Roberts Russell continued. "First, it was about showing what this one experience of dyslexia could look like on the page, and we achieved that beyond my expectations. Second, it was about nailing the emotional component of the story. What is this experience for that character, and how does the audience relate to that?"

Dyslexia runs in Roberts Russell's family; her two nieces, her sister, and her father have it. When she first told her niece, Amelia, about Maddie & the Test, she "was very trepidatious, because she wanted it to be accurate," she said. "I knew that was super important to her, so I spent a lot of time interviewing folks with dyslexia and doing research. We talked to an expert, a consultant out of the UCLA Center for Dyslexia. We had folks from within the Studio come forward to give us advice for what this one version of what it could look like."

My vision for this was twofold. First, it was about showing what this one experience of dyslexia could look like on the page, and we achieved that beyond my expectations. Second, it was about nailing the emotional component of the story. What is this experience for that character, and how does the audience relate to that?

Maddie & the Test combines hand-drawn animation, expertly supervised and animated by

Disney Legend Mark Henn and his trusted team, with innovative CG animation and effects from some of the top artists and technical experts across Walt Disney Animation Studios.

"Mark was gracious enough to offer up his support and to actually do the animation. He's the loveliest human; he was so gracious and kind," Roberts Russell said. "For him to say, 'Hey, you're the director! What do you want?' That's the experience of a lifetime, honestly."