I was sitting around at home the other night and I realized something pretty cool. Something I wish I'd know before... I don't want to get melodramatic, but if anyone else can relate to this post maybe it might help out...
If you're an artist, you've probably been through the highs and lows. You have times when you really feel good about a piece of work you did, or an animation turned out really cool and everyone loved it. There's also the times that feel crappy... the ones where you just can't get something right, or you just don't know what to work on, or you feel like you're lacking the drive to be an artist, like you're losing interest in what used to be so much fun! but is now so bloody difficult....
I've come to believe, that despite the anxiousness and doubts, the truth is we are actually at our best during these down times.
I can say 100% that I recently went through a pretty heavy down time. I've worked in video games my whole career, and I've never developed a proper approach to animation other than just kind of "doing it" and "pushing and pulling stuff around until it works" and this is because video game animation often has a very loose and sometimes non-existent direction process for individual animations. My methods became very "organic" and to be honest it was almost impossible for me to get constructive feedback on my animation work as I created it, or in fact, to even really properly evaluate it until it was finished. I'm sure this is not an uncommon problem amongst animators who are self-taught.
So I started researching and investigating different ways of animating. I looked at workflows, breakdown reels, sent emails to animators, looked at demo reels, student work, AM blogs... the whole nine yards. I also started looking more and more at 2D animation and appreciating it much more than I had before. To tell you the truth, I quickly became near obsessed with the process of blocking animation, treating each pose like a drawing, and thinking more and more in a 2D way. I could see the benefits that people were finding in working this way.. using the 'stepped key' method, and more importantly just how easy it was for them to show their ideas and get feedback in a way that was constructive. Its this approach that lends itself to feature animation, or at least to acting animation... and I really wanted to understand it and to work that way.
Oh man... I just couldn't do it though. Honestly.. it was like learning to animate all over again.. and I just found it so difficult to think about animation in this way. I practiced it at work, and at home. I threw away acting shots that frustrated me, and I started to get annoyed with animation and feel shitty that I wasn't animating the way I wanted to. I started thinking "I don't even want to animate the acting shots.. I'm good at the physical stuff"... it got a bit crazy for a while... in fact this doubt came on and off constantly for about 2.5 years. My wife could tell you how much I used to ramble on about it.
The truth is though... now I've sweated and struggled with it over and over... I now get it! I really feel like I get what blocking is about. I get when to use it and not to use it, and I understand what's important about it and what's not. I also have the best of both worlds now, because I'm confident I can take my knowledge of straight-ahead and layering, and mix it up with blocking. I have a shot at home that I'm animating in the stepped key approach and its helping me get better results than my old method would ever have got for me. I'm new to this technique so I know I still have a bucket load more stuff to learn, but the key thing is that I have my confidence back, and I'm starting to enjoy the process rather than fight it.
So what I'm trying to say is... its during these times when we really struggle with something, and doubt our abilities or even doubt our passions, that we are actually learning the most and developing ourselves more than ever as animators.
The trouble is, its super hard to see whats happening until you come out of it the other side...
When I finish this little acting shot at home, I'm hoping to post something up about the processes, the details of blocking...the kind of post I wish I'd found when I was trying to figure this stuff out.
If you're an artist, you've probably been through the highs and lows. You have times when you really feel good about a piece of work you did, or an animation turned out really cool and everyone loved it. There's also the times that feel crappy... the ones where you just can't get something right, or you just don't know what to work on, or you feel like you're lacking the drive to be an artist, like you're losing interest in what used to be so much fun! but is now so bloody difficult....
I've come to believe, that despite the anxiousness and doubts, the truth is we are actually at our best during these down times.
I can say 100% that I recently went through a pretty heavy down time. I've worked in video games my whole career, and I've never developed a proper approach to animation other than just kind of "doing it" and "pushing and pulling stuff around until it works" and this is because video game animation often has a very loose and sometimes non-existent direction process for individual animations. My methods became very "organic" and to be honest it was almost impossible for me to get constructive feedback on my animation work as I created it, or in fact, to even really properly evaluate it until it was finished. I'm sure this is not an uncommon problem amongst animators who are self-taught.
So I started researching and investigating different ways of animating. I looked at workflows, breakdown reels, sent emails to animators, looked at demo reels, student work, AM blogs... the whole nine yards. I also started looking more and more at 2D animation and appreciating it much more than I had before. To tell you the truth, I quickly became near obsessed with the process of blocking animation, treating each pose like a drawing, and thinking more and more in a 2D way. I could see the benefits that people were finding in working this way.. using the 'stepped key' method, and more importantly just how easy it was for them to show their ideas and get feedback in a way that was constructive. Its this approach that lends itself to feature animation, or at least to acting animation... and I really wanted to understand it and to work that way.
Oh man... I just couldn't do it though. Honestly.. it was like learning to animate all over again.. and I just found it so difficult to think about animation in this way. I practiced it at work, and at home. I threw away acting shots that frustrated me, and I started to get annoyed with animation and feel shitty that I wasn't animating the way I wanted to. I started thinking "I don't even want to animate the acting shots.. I'm good at the physical stuff"... it got a bit crazy for a while... in fact this doubt came on and off constantly for about 2.5 years. My wife could tell you how much I used to ramble on about it.
The truth is though... now I've sweated and struggled with it over and over... I now get it! I really feel like I get what blocking is about. I get when to use it and not to use it, and I understand what's important about it and what's not. I also have the best of both worlds now, because I'm confident I can take my knowledge of straight-ahead and layering, and mix it up with blocking. I have a shot at home that I'm animating in the stepped key approach and its helping me get better results than my old method would ever have got for me. I'm new to this technique so I know I still have a bucket load more stuff to learn, but the key thing is that I have my confidence back, and I'm starting to enjoy the process rather than fight it.
So what I'm trying to say is... its during these times when we really struggle with something, and doubt our abilities or even doubt our passions, that we are actually learning the most and developing ourselves more than ever as animators.
The trouble is, its super hard to see whats happening until you come out of it the other side...
When I finish this little acting shot at home, I'm hoping to post something up about the processes, the details of blocking...the kind of post I wish I'd found when I was trying to figure this stuff out.
