Learning about learning

It has been a poor season for me. I am only just beginning to make animation now. I fear I am going to fail this term. Well Lets see what I can learn from this.

 

The year started badly. Last year I cut myself off from most personal projects so they wouldn’t occupy my time. It meant I could put all my focus into my work. And it paid off. I think I did pretty well in my first term last year. But I found once summer came I felt left out and returned to my old hobbies with a vengeance. I got too involved. By the time I was back in college I had a handful of private projects all going at once and was unwilling to abandon any of them. It ate up all my time. I had trouble sleeping. All my creative energy was drained. But worst of all, I just couldn’t concentrate when in uni. I could only think of what I was working on in my spare time. Sometimes I would even work on those projects in class because it was all I could think of.

It’s clear my strategy from last year was necessary for me to proceed. I’ve been weaning myself off them, and unsurprisingly I’m now working again.

 

I don’t want to pretend that this isn’t my fault. But I feel the fact we were told that we had plenty of time and could get the animation part done towards the end. I bought into this. But I should have trusted my instincts and gotten hard to work immediately.

Another thing that just isn’t helping is the fact this term has been a lot more computer heavy. I need to turn the PC on to listen to the music I’m animating to. And worse the registration is now totally online. So I have to turn the thing on every day to sign in. The irony being as soon as the internet is on I forget why it’s turned on and most days I forget to sign in at all. I’ve asked Owen, Tom, and Spencer if an alternative could be found. So far nothing has happened.

I needed to cut myself off from the internet when in uni last year to get anything done. And the problem is just as bad now. Maybe I need to find away around my addiction on my own long term. But for now it really would help me if I could get my old grove back.

 

Constellation is just as useless this year as it was last year. In fact given that both it and Subject are at maximum intensity this term is actually harder than any of the others. I’d hoped this would be an “Easing you back in” term. I was wrong.

 

As I started to get my head back together I found I was now doing my constellation work in class. It was still wasting time. I normally do Constellation work at home. But it was at least something. I feel bad about it because as far as I can tell Constellation doesn’t matter this year. It’s just a time waster. I can write about whatever I want whether it’s related to what we’ve studied or not, and I don’t know if the mark I get for it even matters So why am I doing it?

 

I’m also really seeing why the sleep routine I imposed on myself last year was so important. Obviously I can’t work if I’m sleeping in class. But even when, like now. I figure out a way to achieve a three hour sleep pattern, it has other effects. I feel very cold in class. Or maybe I find I need to rest for periods at a time, even if I’m awake. Clearly getting a strong, six hour routine last year was another thing I did right last year I need to relearn.

 

It’s shocking how much I’ve forgotten. I feel like I’m back to zero when I start animating. All that knowledge I thought I had seems to have dried up. Even small things seem to hurt my brain. It’s like when I forgot how to work well I also forgot what I learned when I was working well. Simple things are costing me a great deal of effort.

Ironically I just don’t feel alive until I’m animating. That’s another thing that might have slowed me down. It seems pretty clear to me that while I can do all the other bits, concept art, storyboarding, sound work, and editing well enough, I don’t feel any passion rise in me until I’m at the animator’s easel and ready to work. It’s scary. But I feel my head filling full of ideas. I know where my strength lies. How I’m going to work with this handicap I don’t know.

 

There’s a dead zone in my head. A place where thoughts are, but I can’t see what I’m thinking. It’s really uncomfortable because sometimes I don’t know what those thoughts are.

When I’m trying to get  ideas for my work, but they’re in the dead zone, my life becomes hellish, and I’ve no idea what to do to combat this. In fact I feel like the real reason I wanted to right about this dead zone is currently in the dead zone.

I normally just wait for thoughts to come out of this dead zone, and sometimes they do. But now I don’y have time.

 

There where other things I felt I’d learned about how I learn. But ironically I’ve forgotten what they where. and now I’m running low on time.

Expect A journal on what I’ve done, how I did it, and what (If anything) I’ve learned from it soon. Hopefully I can salvage something out of this mess.