Inspiration

Today I attended the Industry Giants presentation hosted by A Bunch of Short Guys and various other sponsors. It was really cool to hear industry professionals that work with animation of all kinds...from the director of a feature 3D animated film, to a couple of professional animators, to an F/X artist, to an animation reporter and producer...talking about their jobs and their careers, how they got started, and why they love it.

Here's my subtext: I'm totally jealous. But, hey, it's only been just over 10 years since I finally realized what I would really love to do with my career...and I've been trying ever since to gain those skills to get my first creative job in the animation industry. Yes, my first demo reel sucked. Surprise. At the last ABOSG meeting, one of the guys from some local studio even said...as soon as they see that it's from AID, they trash the tape. That's nice. That's real. Seems that everyone feels that way about their first demo tape, tho...even if it really did suck or maybe was the best thing ever. Not mine, ha. I'm sure I can find a few more ways yet to reinvent myself and find something good about whatever fucking job I have...I've had so many: telemarketer, McDonald's staff, cleaning lady/janitor, kennel help, credit collector, admin assistant...I could go on and on...and no, I don't put any of those on my resume. Ever.

I took a few notes during the IG presentations, whenever there was enough light or some point that was mentioned seemed of particular value. While quite a bit of the presentation today covered techniques that character animators use to bring life to their animations, I felt that it could also be applied to illustration or even layout for story art. So, while I'm not a 3D animator or character animator/performance artist, those points mentioned were definitely worth considering for developing my next illustrations and layouts. Maybe a different language but the end result or goal is the same. Sorta. Feels that way to me anyways.

Awesome stuff we got to see from Disney Animation: Destino by Salvador Dali, and Lorenzo by Ron Barbagallo. Loved the Dali surrealistic art of the one, and totally laughed at that cat character and his crazy tail in the other. Both showed excellent animation, but even better were the different ways of combining traditional and CG animation. I'm really curious about the proprietary software that David Bossert mentioned, called "SABLE". Evidently the artists can paint on their "computer canvas", but somehow the brush strokes are also recognized and presented as 3D. Not like 3D Paint. Something else. You just have to see Lorenzo and then you'll see what I'm talking about. There's a mention of the process in the Lorenzo link I included.

And no, I'm not going to post all my notes online here. Maybe elsewhere. I'm just too tired right now and I have sinus headache. Bleh. But when I do, I'll post a link on my blog.

On a side note, it's kinda funny how in the past five years or so, I've gotten to really know the names of various artists and animators in the industry and what the studios they work at are doing or not doing. I like that. I guess I'm an animation fan-grrl. heh.

My next "shot-in-the-arm" for creativity is the upcoming San Diego Comic-Con. Can't wait! It's a wonderful chance to talk to other artists about what they do and how they do it. Hopefully, I can get a few pointers on how to improve my own work. Even if I don't it will just be so cool to simply be there.