Last year, I had been really inspired and really giddy and ready to start my second year film. I had already learned so much from doing my first year film and not completely finishing it and ect ect. I had this epic idea about this little boy who dreamed of being a little girl and this little girl that dreamed of being a little boy. There was this awesome tree house that morphed into cool things and blah blah blah. It was epic and I thought I could do it, full color and full animation too!!
Boy was I wrong. I made a schedule based on my animatic. I had about 70 or so scenes to do and a crap load of backgrounds to complete as well. I made the schedule so that I'd be doing nine scenes of animation a week and about five background paintings every week as well. It all worked out pretty well the first few weeks. I did everything the way I had planned it an after a while, I just couldn't finish when I wanted to. after all, i gave myself 70 or so scenes to animate! That's crazy. I kept telling myself that the animaition wasn't actually that much and that the backgrounds wouldn't be that hard to draw and that I could do it and ect. Come april, it was a few days before I had to turn my film in. I'm begging people online to help me paint frames, I'm animating stuff, poorly and I'm trying to cut corners. I worked endlessly. Day and night to get it done. I worked all the way up through the turn in date and at around 3 the day it was due, I finally started putting scenes together in final cut. I broke down in tears when I realized that I couldn't finish. That i had set myself an unrealistic goal that really honeslty couldn't have been reached by me at that time. I realized that I wasn't going to finish and that I had to accept that and just walk away from it all together. I told my mentors and myself that I'd finish the film over the summer, but reality hit me, I had to get a job and that required a lot of time. I didn't have the time or the energy to put into finishing a film over the summer. No matter how much I wanted to finish deep down inside, it just wasn't realistic.
When I came back to school, I told my Film Workshop mentor about my prediciment, she made an amazing statement that really made me change my mind about where I"m going with the project. She asked me if I had gotten anything out of it? If I've gotten as much as I could out of it. If there was really any point in continuing the film. I realized that I had. I realized that the mistakes I made with this film and the techniques that I learned were in fact what I was going to get from this project. And that's probably it. She told me that i should focus on my new film instead of trying to finish this one and then have to rush another one and have to finish my third year film in my fourth year of school. It would have been silly. It made total sense.
So I guess, I'm making this for any second year students in case they get the chance to read this before they start. i'd just say to be realistic. It's great to challenge yourself, but dont be unrealistic. Full color and animation was just impossible. I wouldn't have been able to do it. I got really close, but it wouldn't have worked out. at the end of the day, an unpolished film with storyboards is better than no film at all. So I guess, keep it simple and be real with yourself. If you're going to challenge yourself, challenge yourself, but be sure that your entire film doesn't rely on that one challenge.
This year, i'm seriously limiting scenes and backgrounds to 30! My film will still live on since I love the idea, but I have deicded that it is going to be a book and not a film. I think the idea works better as a book and I'd love to see if I can get it published and see where that goes with the entire story and content. Its a shame to waste all the animation, but I have to move on.
anywhos, that's enough ranting, here's some of the backgrounds from my film from last year.
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