Return to Subject: First week

I’m not sure if I’m relieved or not. But I think this week went well?

 

I came in on Monday with my agoraphobia flaring up hard. I really didn’t want to move. But I made it. When I arrived we were learning about walk cycles and the 12 Principles of Animation. Both things you can’t interalise enough (At least that’s what I’m told).

We would have to design a character and make him or her take two steps (The minimum needed for a cycle). Morgan was quite firm with me in that he wanted me to do this using digital drawing. I felt pretty damn nervous about this. But he made it clear he’d be there to help me whenever he could. That was a  relief.

I started out doodling an anthro rabbit, keen to have something interesting to look at. To say my skills with the digipen were poor would be an understatement. I had trouble making it do anything I wanted. But I did get a rabbit done eventually.

After that things got worse. Trying to make stick figure keyframes on different layer, backgrounds, and frames produced an epic mess. But Morgan came to my aid. And got me to a point where I was able to work with the software even if I didn’t understand it.

I had trouble figuring out how to do the poses. But drawing them out on paper first helped me get to grips with it.

Despite my lack of skill with the stylus (Digipen) I was able to get the requisite 5 key poses needed to start a walk cycle, and left for the day (I even needed help figuring out how to save in and turn off the program).

 

On Tuesday my Agoraphobia was still strong. But I got in again. With my keys done I now had to do my inbetweening. Hard work, dull too, but very rewarding. I soon had a full step. Now I had to make the keys for the second step. Same job, new challenges. Because now the arms and legs were backwards from where they started. Even if I don’t go into every detail I need to say what a huge help Morgan was through out all this week.

I did my keys and I started inbetweening them again.

 

Wednesday was great. We had a guest speaker. Michael Collins a film story boarder and comic book artist of thirty years experience as a pro.

He was huge fun to listen to. And very humble considering how many famous people in film and comics he’s worked with. The lecture was short but the Q&A was very long. He had a lot a great tips about storyboarding. But I couldn’t resist asking him about the inside stories of life in comics, or just asking silly stuff. And I wasn’t alone. He took it all well. When I found out he worked on Transformers UK (My favourite comic of all time) I could not resist getting out of my chair and hugging him. He took it well. I don’t think it was the first time something like this had happened to him.

If there’s one thing I really took away from him it was that the hardest things to draw are the quiet things. The scenes that are just people talking in a dull room. He mentioned the time he’d been given a Batman comic. He was looking forward to drawing Batman swinging on ropes and punching people. Instead the comic was mostly a scene of Commissioner Gordon interrogating a witness. Michael had to get creative to keep the scene interesting to read and to keep his own interest up. But he pulled through. I will probably face a similar challenge some day.

I also learned from Michael that you really have to hold your nose and work. He’d had to work on hundreds of unglamorous, poorly managed, or just shitty projects (My words, not his) but had given them his all each time because having a reputation for being reliable is what gets you ahead in the industry and what keeps you afloat. He said the only things he would not do on moral grounds were gambling adverts and had only heard of a storyboarder quitting a film due to the script being terrible once (It was Tomb Raider 2: The Cradle of Light). I know I’m going to have to remember this sobering advice too one day.

 

In the afternoon I finished my inbetweening. Morgan told me to now redraw the scene with my rabbit character instead of a stick man. I kept at it a while But fell asleep. And by the time I woke up I had to go home.

I was had trouble with sleeping on Monday and Tuesday too. But At least they were short bursts, as opposed to last week when it was always over 2 hours.

 

Thursday was Constellation. This one wasn’t too bad. Looking at how city planning tries to inform our behaviour and maybe even our values. It went a bit in the conspiracy theory direction. But it at least got me thinking. Also. The old hippy lady behind me seems to be enjoying this as much as I am hating it. Said it was the only thing keeping her on the course. I am genuinely nervous around her as she seems to be one of those people who sees emotional distress and physical harm as the same thing. And she gets very distressed if anyone disagrees with her. I fear if I argue with her she will try to send me to jail.

My lecturer on the other hand cannot get enough of my disputing his ideas. Being contradicted seems to get physical pleasure from my debating him. I feel bad about the fact I’m not enjoying his stuff because he seems to adore me.

 

After that I came in and did a bit more redrawing. Even if I was tracing over my stick figures animating an actual character was proving very hard. And I soon ran out of energy. But I resolved to try to get more work done in future Thursdays. In the past I would go straight home after Constellation, but I’m going to try to change that. I can get a lot of work done in that 2:30 to 6:00 slot. If I only try.

 

On Friday I came in with one goal. Do more animation. I had been suffering from very low energy all week. I didn’t expect to get much done. But I would try.

I worked sporadically throughout the day. Often drifting away or checking the internet. But somehow. Against logic. I finished it!

It’s not much. My pieres could probably have done the whole thing in a day. But here it is.

 

 

I like it. Probably more than I should. But Morgan also liked it. So I probably did something right. Try using the loop function on YouTube to get the full effect.

Morgan says he’ll help me clean it up and fix the ears next week. So that’s awesome.

 

It feels good to be back.