The psychological self-protection mechanism is a phenomenon, which will appear when people cannot address their stress or anxious feelings. With this mechanism, people could release their unconscious anxiety in their mind. Therefore, it helps people get back their inner balance smoothly. In this study, the author investigated common psychological self-protection mechanism cases and hedgehog principles in order to analyze various methods that were used in animation. Moreover, this research is realized in the visual arts of the graduation works “The love of cactus” by using psychological visual languages.

The graduation work “Thorn and Love” combined three specific features. First, applying 2D animation technologies created it. Second, the designer made use of the symbol of cactus sparks to represent psychological self-protection mechanism. Lastly, the designer wants to convey a spirit of resilience by storytelling in this animation. Thus, with these three features, the designer could successfully produce proper visual languages in this animation work.