There are things in this life I love, and they happen to fall in line with some talents that the Universe decided to bestow upon me. One of those things happens to be Animated Films (big surprise). Here… lemme back up a little…
I’m stuck in a dead end graphic design job, playing the part of an art director in an internal creative department at a crappy company. What used to be very satisfying about a job like this, has over time, lost some of it’s charm. In a word: boring.
Well, obviously, I effed up.
Not too long ago, it dawned on me that I’d rather have an audience, than a client. Now, it’s too late. There are ways of entering the entertainment biz, that I apparently ignored, in order to live the glamorous life of a graphic designer.
One caveat: I happen to work with my friends. It’s the only thing that makes coming here day to day bearable. And it just so happens that my friend here is talented, and of like mind. And what did I do to the poor soul? I convinced him that we can create an animated CG short. In reality I believe that we can do this… it’s monumental task that would make any sane person’s sphincter retract and enter some sort of indefinite stasis. But in the end we will have CREATED something. But is that going to get us anywhere. Are independently created films (and I really mean independent) worth doing in this day and age? Who knows.
Not sure why I’m bringing this up, just feeling a little intimidated by my own desparate ambitions. Any other simpatico souls out there?
Thanks, Bill. We really just got up and running last month. We are trying to make posts every day or two.
I’m interested, in fact, to see if there are any other Dopers that may be doing something along the same lines. Whether it be a short film (live action or animated), or any other independent project that you’ve always wanted to do, and finally have it underway.
Well, I’m heading in that direction as well. I’ve got some fairly-solid DVD-authoring skills now, and am learning audio and video editing and have joined a film co-op and, more specifically, its screenwriting circle.
What kind of screenplays have you written? That whole process has always fastinated me, and i’ve always felt it’s the hardest aspect of film making. If you don’t have a solid screenplay… the production is doomed.
Back in high school, for US First (I think that’s what it was called… my memory is not so good and it was more than 7 hours ago… or years), one of the tasks was to make a 30 second animated clip of our robot in action. Kind of like a commercial for our 'bot. We had a team of 5 high school students. Between us we probably had about a tablespoon of artistic talent, and maybe a picosecond of experience with 3d animation. They gave us a couple copies of 3D Studio Max and set us to work. After months and months of late night sessions, sometimes all night, giving up weekends and other activities, we had our finished product. It was easily one of the worst 30 second animations I’ve ever seen.
In short, I respect you for even trying, and from your website, I triple respect you for actually being good.
Thanks for the kind words and interesting story, audiobottle. You wouldn’t happen to have your project posted anywhere that we might be able to see it would you? Whether you think it was terrible or not, I love to watch things that take an eternity to make (especially if it involves the dull ache of self-sacrifice) and yet only have a few seconds of footage to show for it all.
Sadly, I think it’s only on VHS locked somewhere in our company sponsor’s basement. Trust me, it’s best left there. Let’s just say that the two solid weeks I spent on trying to make the missile actually look like it was flying toward the stadium was not the best spent time. Don’t even get me started on trying to actually design hands, much less animate them. That part was thankfully left on the cutting room floor.
