Owen was a high school student in Ithaca, New York. He had directed his first short film, "Symptoms of Incarceration," and felt a deep pride in the result. It was the third short film he had worked on, but he had also created and contributed to various other video-based projects, including advertisements, news shows, sketches, and documentaries.

"Symptoms of Incarceration" revolved around a man struggling to navigate life after prison. He faced rejection at every turn and ultimately had to make a choice between attempting to fit into a society that refused to accept him or reverting to his criminal past. As a student, Owen had conducted extensive research and writing on criminal justice systems, particularly the US criminal justice system. He viewed this film as a means to transform his findings into a narrative form, believing that storytelling could deliver a message more powerfully than the lengthy research papers he had previously written on the topic. He hoped that audiences would appreciate the film.