Paper Tiger

I finally, FINALLY finished putting my Honours Paper together this afternoon . . unfortunately not in time to get it to the printers ("Hi, what time do you close?" "In 18 minutes" "Oh") . . but it's done. I'll just have to send it in on Monday.

Above is a sample of some of the pages . . it came out alright . . I like the tactile look of it . . I just hope it prints near as nice and that the markers appreciate it too. I'm glad I got the chance to put together my paper like that . . it's out of the way now. All that stressing, borrowing of books, renewing of books, trawling of websites, collecting of receipts and ticket stubs (to scan), printing, highlighting, drafting, typing, consulting, scanning, planning, rewriting, retyping, editing . . it's (practically) over. I don't have to worry about it again! But perhaps I'm speaking too soon?

Anyway, now I can get back to my animation . . but not before a break. I have a headache.

One Week, One Day

Hmm . . wow . . this is coming to an end . . it's surreal . . like the heading of this post, it's only a week and a day till Honours is over (well, not counting setting up for the Annual, etc). In terms of submitting stuff tho, it's only a few days.

Since Tuesday I've been compositing. Yesterday I finished Scene 1 (above is a screen shot) . . according to the revised schedule (which Will made me detail . . "this week is for compositing" didn't cut it. :P) I am supposed to have Scene 1, 2 & 3 in the can and beginning Scene 4 atm. But my Honours Paper needs attending.

I saw Lynne last Thursday and she is genuinely happy with it . . only a few tiny ammendments needed to be made. I emailed my (assumedly) final draft to her and Will Tuesday but haven't heard anything so am assuming no news is good news?

Because my paper is about story v. production I decided to layout my paper in a really tactile kinda way . . make it look like a production diary/book thing. Get it printed at a proper printing place. In which case, I should give the printing place at least a week to get my book/s printed? Which means I need to have it finished TONIGHT. So I can go tomorrow to the printers. And I haven't touched InDesign yet, let alone scanned a single image . . so today will be an intense paper compositing one.

We have our last Honours class today. We are merely meeting up for the sake of meeting up. It has been a good class. At the beginning of the year I was skeptical into thinking I'd really get that attached to the class, but I have.

Anyhoo, this is the schedule of my last few days:

Today (23rd Oct) : Finalise Honours Paper for print.

Friday (24th Oct) : Send Honours Paper for print. Start compositing Scene 2/3

Saturday & Sunday (25th & 26th Oct): Composite Scene 2/3. I can't get much done because I work and work . . just drains sometimes. Mostly, I like my part time job. They generally treat me well. But the annual I applied for for October (though I had given them enough time to process it, and the store manager had told me it was approved) was denied. I could rant more, but what's the point? I've been juggling work with Honours still . . but it's been okay.

Monday (27th Oct) : Scene 4

Tuesday (28th Oct) : Scene 4

Wednesday (29th): Sound @ COFA

Thursday (30th Oct) : Sound @ COFA

Friday (31st Oct) : Export if I haven't already. IT'S DUE! Speaking of which, I better find out who I hand it into . . hmmm . .

So that, is my revised schedule . . I've given sound less time than I had planned (sorry Simon, if you are reading this. ) but two days is an improvement on last year's allocation to sound. At one point I had contemplated a silent film . . ehehe . . thankfully I was saved from my ignorance.

Okay, well, best be working on the paper now . . :)

This pile of paper makes me smile

Pictures speak better than words. I think the above picture says a lot more than I could hope. Last night I finally, FINALLY finished animating my shots. Not to say that I won't be redoing some of them in the coming days, but essentially - - it's done . . .

It feels good and fits in with my revised (my original one was/is long gone) schedule of devoting the next fortnight to photographing (my drawings), editing and compositing . . then the last week of October to sound.

I still have backgrounds to do . . hmm . . but most of them are not too detailed, so can probably be done in a few days.

I don't know what else to say really . . besides that I've kinda reached one milestone in this project.

And that I'm feeling very preachy on the topic of PLANNING. I haven't adhered to that completely during this project - particularly when it came to picking an aesthetic (isn't it much easier to live in denial hoping someone will bail you out? well, at least in the short term?) until Will woke me up with a "Why are you trying to sabotage yourself?" - but for the things I have planned . . I can see now how important planning is. . planning is so essential to managing all of this. It isn't always the answer to things, but it is the answer to a lot of things.

It's scary initially, as planning can be overwhelming - and in some instances I'm glad I approached this project somewhat naive. I would have thought twice if I had known that Scene 4 would result in about a ream of paper. But on the otherhand, it can be an encouragement to know how each bit of work fits into the overall picture, especially when you've laboured 3 days over a shot that the line test playback spits out in 1 second.

Planning has meant that I haven't lost weight (from stress) this year. Not that it was too hard to put it back on again after . . haha.

Planning has meant that I haven't stopped eating properly (well, unless you count snacking on chocolate, biscuits and seaweed - it's an asian thing - as falling off the healthy eating bandwagon - in which case I've somewhat failed . .)

Planning has meant that I've been able to sleep properly and NOT see a sunrise (yet). Sunrises are beautiful things but not when you saw the sunset before that also and haven't had time to rest in between. In those situations sunrises are depressing.

Anyway, that's about it for now . . I have to work on my Honours Paper now . . class has resumed again and I need to make changes to the draft Lynne marked. On the whole though, the paper is looking a lot better than two months ago . . I get it now. Like I really get it. Before it was like a tumor growing on my project (gross, but this analogy works . . i think) sucking away time and energy from it . . but now I see it more as . . a conjoined twin? . . a part of my project. It does involve time and energy but essentially so . . and not in a negative way. That is probably the worst analogy ever . . but yeah . . I hope you get the idea? :P

T Minus 10 Days (for Animation)

Again . . I've neglected this. I'm getting into a habit of neglecting this . . but more so because I'm working on it rather than writing about it?

I'm nearing the end of animation which is exciting seeing I've been working at it since the beginning of June! Though at that time I was taking things in a more laid back fashion and would pat my own back about completing 24 frames of simple animation in a day . .

I bought Betty Edwards' "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" a few weeks back and have been reading bits of that in between drawing. She comments that

". . . draw everyday . . . In a way, art is like athletics: If you don't practice, the visual sense quickly gets flabby and out of shape."

I've been finding that truer as I progress with my animation. My benchmark for "challenging" keeps rising . . which is good. I don't know where my efforts truely fit in the scheme of things, but I find myself becoming a stronger drawer . . if they're the right words.

Anyway, back to work. I've given myself the 10th of October as a deadline for animation. Frustratingly, as a solo artist on this project I have to take care of post production too . . grr. Not my strength at all!