I drew out the beats of the middle section and put them on my wall so I could arrange and rearrange them - and added some shots in as I went.
Then I translated this into the animatic. This 2nd act in the animatic will probably not be super strictly adhered to in production but used as a rough guide, and I'd like to stretch it out a little. I think this will happen quite naturally through the animation process. Otherwise I'm quite happy with the rhythm and the flow between images.
I edited together the whole animatic and fiddled with timings a little bit, as well as slightly altering the end of the first section and the beginning of the final one to make it more cohesive. At the moment I'm finding I can't see objectively whether it works as a whole but I feel quite happy that my timings work and that there's a convincing arc with the grey hair weaving the narrative together. I think with some feedback and a fresh perspective I'll be able to see where it could benefit with further revision!