actually...she's sitting on my cintiq!!!
a bit difficult to draw ha ha
managed to get three more scenes done in the last week..still way behind target though...
but if i can keep the momentum up, it just ets easier to draw things out...
but i keep adding AND adding and adding things and of course it takes even longer...
have to be patient.
restructure my expected 'outcomes'...
a rough animatic is about ALL that will come out of this six months...
plus some random notes about methodologies and a bunch more info about postnatal depression, and something of a draft for the exegesis structure...
now..i AM still being too ambitious.
meantime - the garden is looking beautiful
we've had lovely people over for dinners
currently smelling a splendid beef n bacon casserole wafting down from the slow-cooker in the kitchen
my grandson is an angel...sitting up, crawling, laughing, eating granma's chicken soup...and his mother is on the UP (Yay!!)
is PND congenital???
god knows.
anyway..
bunch of books from Amazon arrived last week - thankyou Tony for the gift voucher for my birthday last year... i finally spent it! you rock!
except they are all 'work' books... stuff that's useful for teaching...but also a bit inspirational for myself i spose
both Walt Stanchfield's "Drawn to Life"...lovely books from the notes he'd made over the many years of inspiring Disney animators
Chris Robinson's collection of ramblings, essays, writings from AWN.com - the "Animation Pimp" - i used to LOVE reading his stuff on the website... but i dunno what it is, the book just made me feel a bit depressed - so many cynical rants and bites of bitterness coming through all in one collection...kinda put me into a bit of a funk as to why the hell I am making this film anyway...
perspective girl!! remember the perspective...
and also "Re-Imagining Animation: Contemporary Moving Image Cultures"..
one of the latest Paul Wells collaborations - he is truly an awesomely prolific writer on theories of animation - i feel humbled and don't even know if there's anything to ADD..
anyway...they'll be useful
plus got a lotta books from the library about the approach to screenwriting/scriptwriting so will pick and choose bits from there that will add to my grand theory.
been reading them in bed each night and morning...a good excuse to loll around in bed each morning til 8am when i have to actually get UP and get my daughter to school.
only 8 more weeks of this bliss left...
i better get a cracking schedule happening and get this to all come together
less blogging, more drawing
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
Friday, May 14, 2010
painting...and crashing
ohhhh frstrrrrrrration
got up to sequence 6 (it is friday) - - target was sequence 8 - - however decided it really needed some painting play.
however - my sweet little netbook machine is just too too weak to handle all this heavy bitmap stuff and going so slow and periodically crashing when i save
grrrrrrrrr
am backing up like a mad cowboy, but methinks i may need some more grunt if I'm going to be able to keep speeding ahead.
must be patient
will post some tests by lunchtime i hope.
i really like painting
another process of working it out as you go along..
i start with a hazy idea in my head about what it should look like based on what is going on in the story...she is disappearing into the 'black hole'... but the actual tools (software paintbrushes, papers etc) are somewhat dictating what happens frame by frame and therefore on screen, and by inference, what goes on in the story.
it's a bit scary and random
got up to sequence 6 (it is friday) - - target was sequence 8 - - however decided it really needed some painting play.
however - my sweet little netbook machine is just too too weak to handle all this heavy bitmap stuff and going so slow and periodically crashing when i save
grrrrrrrrr
am backing up like a mad cowboy, but methinks i may need some more grunt if I'm going to be able to keep speeding ahead.
must be patient
will post some tests by lunchtime i hope.
i really like painting
another process of working it out as you go along..
i start with a hazy idea in my head about what it should look like based on what is going on in the story...she is disappearing into the 'black hole'... but the actual tools (software paintbrushes, papers etc) are somewhat dictating what happens frame by frame and therefore on screen, and by inference, what goes on in the story.
it's a bit scary and random
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
back to drawing
interesting process sometimes...
feel like i've gone rusty all over again...trying to sketch out the updated 'script'...all these images in my head, and when i come to draw them they don't come out fast enough...and basically look crap...
i get disheartened.
But
must remember that the first draft of the first scene looked VERY crap to start with...by draft two it started to come together...by draft 4...and the clean-up stage it looked kinda alright...
and of course it STILL needs so much extra work.
but the 'writing' process becomes more important as a SCHEDULE of sorts...
at least it's a bit like a List or a Map..I have a clearer idea of what else i have to do...maybe easier to prioritise with this document rather than drawing blindly what's milling in my head...
but i still don't think it is LOCKED IN - and nor should it be at this point either - because so many things emerge from the actual DOING of it, the MAKING of it..
am i just making excuses?
I DO know that i also need to get some more experimenting done with the treatments for each scene and shot...means playing around more with the software...
why does it always feel like i am 'wasting time' by playing around witht he software...
is it from my old days of studio and commercial work where you just Locked something In and got On with It beacuse time and money were of the essence..
This is an important point.
How much time and money should be allocated for this kind of development? - where to stop? - does it stop?
i mean, my (possibly spurious) argument is that this short-animated-filmmaking process is Not about locking off a text script and then joining the dots like they only even seem to talk about in the "how to" books, but about evolving and emerging visual stories...from the Visual, not the Scriptual.
so
i must Argue with myself that spending more time in development is the Most CRUCIAL..
i just need three of myself though..
anyway...first thing i spose is to get these rough sketched shots completed for the next draft rough animatic and then decide which one i am going to work up with some painterly treatmenting..
but i have uncontrollable urges just to DO the bloody painterly treatmenting right now also.
hmmm...am up to "scene 5"... or should say "sequence 5" out of 14 at the moment...
target by friday - sequence 8,
.......plus some painting fun to quell the beast >_<
and i also need some sleep or some peace.
spent the night weeping and gnashing teeth like my dear girl in the film.
maybe it's a kind of "method animating" ha ha
feel like i've gone rusty all over again...trying to sketch out the updated 'script'...all these images in my head, and when i come to draw them they don't come out fast enough...and basically look crap...
i get disheartened.
But
must remember that the first draft of the first scene looked VERY crap to start with...by draft two it started to come together...by draft 4...and the clean-up stage it looked kinda alright...
and of course it STILL needs so much extra work.
but the 'writing' process becomes more important as a SCHEDULE of sorts...
at least it's a bit like a List or a Map..I have a clearer idea of what else i have to do...maybe easier to prioritise with this document rather than drawing blindly what's milling in my head...
but i still don't think it is LOCKED IN - and nor should it be at this point either - because so many things emerge from the actual DOING of it, the MAKING of it..
am i just making excuses?
I DO know that i also need to get some more experimenting done with the treatments for each scene and shot...means playing around more with the software...
why does it always feel like i am 'wasting time' by playing around witht he software...
is it from my old days of studio and commercial work where you just Locked something In and got On with It beacuse time and money were of the essence..
This is an important point.
How much time and money should be allocated for this kind of development? - where to stop? - does it stop?
i mean, my (possibly spurious) argument is that this short-animated-filmmaking process is Not about locking off a text script and then joining the dots like they only even seem to talk about in the "how to" books, but about evolving and emerging visual stories...from the Visual, not the Scriptual.
so
i must Argue with myself that spending more time in development is the Most CRUCIAL..
i just need three of myself though..
anyway...first thing i spose is to get these rough sketched shots completed for the next draft rough animatic and then decide which one i am going to work up with some painterly treatmenting..
but i have uncontrollable urges just to DO the bloody painterly treatmenting right now also.
hmmm...am up to "scene 5"... or should say "sequence 5" out of 14 at the moment...
target by friday - sequence 8,
.......plus some painting fun to quell the beast >_<
and i also need some sleep or some peace.
spent the night weeping and gnashing teeth like my dear girl in the film.
maybe it's a kind of "method animating" ha ha
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Coming Through - treatment 'script' - draft 2a
Coming Through - script draft 2a....there's already been a big bunch of changes since I've put this on paper...largely due to some more visualising, and some more input from 'quotes' and 'real-life stories i've come across...
and largely to make it a bit pithier...tighten up those images a bit...
I know it will change quite significantly again once i get pencil to screen in the next couple of days...
and largely to make it a bit pithier...tighten up those images a bit...
I know it will change quite significantly again once i get pencil to screen in the next couple of days...
sick of the pink
hmmmmmm, the pink!
especially when i was scrolling through blogs and i came across another one with the same template that was for some crazed fundamentalist christians from mid-west usa...
i really need to rig up a decent template myself...don't really want to waste too much time on this though...
maybe p0ut some pics together...
anyway...spent quite a bit of time re-writing up the 'script' as such./..
sequences of images and ideas in text form that expand upon the visual images that sketched up in pencil...
now i really need to flesh out these images...
i noticed how frustrating it was when writing in word doc...that i breally wanted to sketch the sequences then and there..
but couldn't be bothered adding another column to my table and then switching softwars to draw,,,
so i just ploughed on with the writing bits..
meantime, surfing through many PND blogs and sites...lots of pithy quotes eher and there that add to the "dialogue" part of the film...
i am still in two minds about the 'dialogue'/'voice-over...really wanted to try and do it WITHOUT voice...unless it is diagetic...
but we'll see... will add these lines anyway...some of them flesh things out...dewscribe elements not necessarily visualised..
like a yin/yang thing...they shoudl prop each other up...
also grabbed a bunch of books again from the libabry about scriptwriting...
mainly to start putting together a succinct Vidsual writing methodology for animation...
grabbing evidence as such of what is currently written about the way animated 'scripts' are crafted...
my argument is that short films (animated films) rely conspicuously in the visual script in crafting the 'story'..and not the written word script...
particulary when you are working independently or with a small crew..
the major example of this weas working obn "the Way of the Boirds" with Sarah Watt... it truly opened my eyes to the whole concept of visual storytelling and scripting..largely because i had been working in mainstream production pipelines for so many years before that...by the time it got to me in the layout or animation department...(even storyboarding things) it was largely a join-the-dots activity...it was SO locked in to the written script we really didn't have to think much...just make great visyuals out of what was there...regardless of how flimsy and stupid most of the 'scripts' were - even on paper...
and the fact that there was little understanding from the writers point of view about the magical penetrative and transformative qaulities in animation - they were SO literal, and severely based on live-action film sit-com style - which MOST TV animation remains (eg Simpsons et al).
anyway...some interesting bits and pieces gathered...
now to put it together into a methodological argument..
as i said...I have been supervising, teaching and practising the 'organic visual' approach to animation short story development for nearly 10 years now, so it's time to put it into some form of a Paper,..
at least to get it Down on paper so it's like a "how-to" as a teaching method...in the same way we have so many 'how-to' books for the traditional approach to scriptwriting, or technical elements including 'cinematography' framing, editing etc for animation.
thankfully there IS a few books around now that address this JUST for animation - will be helpful for teaching too..
there's a conference in sydney coming up...think i need to get the abstract in by tomorrow! - and it's in June.
will be a good draft for a 'chapter' in the exegesis...
if in fact, i can make it more coherent than THIS.
meantime, also need to get back to the drawing board...
too much typing lately...
will post up the 'script outline' - draft 2
time for a beer now
especially when i was scrolling through blogs and i came across another one with the same template that was for some crazed fundamentalist christians from mid-west usa...
i really need to rig up a decent template myself...don't really want to waste too much time on this though...
maybe p0ut some pics together...
anyway...spent quite a bit of time re-writing up the 'script' as such./..
sequences of images and ideas in text form that expand upon the visual images that sketched up in pencil...
now i really need to flesh out these images...
i noticed how frustrating it was when writing in word doc...that i breally wanted to sketch the sequences then and there..
but couldn't be bothered adding another column to my table and then switching softwars to draw,,,
so i just ploughed on with the writing bits..
meantime, surfing through many PND blogs and sites...lots of pithy quotes eher and there that add to the "dialogue" part of the film...
i am still in two minds about the 'dialogue'/'voice-over...really wanted to try and do it WITHOUT voice...unless it is diagetic...
but we'll see... will add these lines anyway...some of them flesh things out...dewscribe elements not necessarily visualised..
like a yin/yang thing...they shoudl prop each other up...
also grabbed a bunch of books again from the libabry about scriptwriting...
mainly to start putting together a succinct Vidsual writing methodology for animation...
grabbing evidence as such of what is currently written about the way animated 'scripts' are crafted...
my argument is that short films (animated films) rely conspicuously in the visual script in crafting the 'story'..and not the written word script...
particulary when you are working independently or with a small crew..
the major example of this weas working obn "the Way of the Boirds" with Sarah Watt... it truly opened my eyes to the whole concept of visual storytelling and scripting..largely because i had been working in mainstream production pipelines for so many years before that...by the time it got to me in the layout or animation department...(even storyboarding things) it was largely a join-the-dots activity...it was SO locked in to the written script we really didn't have to think much...just make great visyuals out of what was there...regardless of how flimsy and stupid most of the 'scripts' were - even on paper...
and the fact that there was little understanding from the writers point of view about the magical penetrative and transformative qaulities in animation - they were SO literal, and severely based on live-action film sit-com style - which MOST TV animation remains (eg Simpsons et al).
anyway...some interesting bits and pieces gathered...
now to put it together into a methodological argument..
as i said...I have been supervising, teaching and practising the 'organic visual' approach to animation short story development for nearly 10 years now, so it's time to put it into some form of a Paper,..
at least to get it Down on paper so it's like a "how-to" as a teaching method...in the same way we have so many 'how-to' books for the traditional approach to scriptwriting, or technical elements including 'cinematography' framing, editing etc for animation.
thankfully there IS a few books around now that address this JUST for animation - will be helpful for teaching too..
there's a conference in sydney coming up...think i need to get the abstract in by tomorrow! - and it's in June.
will be a good draft for a 'chapter' in the exegesis...
if in fact, i can make it more coherent than THIS.
meantime, also need to get back to the drawing board...
too much typing lately...
will post up the 'script outline' - draft 2
time for a beer now
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