The taskbar needed to stay flexible, so I built a set of Essential Properties around it. That gave us broad control without forcing a rebuild every time something changed.

From there, we could swap the taskbar color, update the date and time, turn different states on and off, and drop in different app combinations depending on the shot.

Below is a look at some of the elements I built as part of a larger UI template system we still use when animating scenes. The goal was to make the taskbar flexible enough to survive revisions and new projects without starting over every time.

I used Marker Remap in After Effects so scenes could be moved around quickly and still hold together. That made placement faster and gave us a lot more room to adapt as the edit changed.

Alongside the templates, I also helped build a number of the final scenes in the video. The process was structured, but it gave us room to keep refining as the piece came together.

I worked with the storyboard artist to map the frames first. Then we used provisional UI to test interactions and flow before the final screens were locked.

Once the UI was refined and approved, I handed the finished animations to the 3D artists on my team so they could take the last pass. Keeping those stages clear is a big part of why the final video felt polished.