ch ch ch changes... and cuh cuh cuh couches...

lots of hours later.. i think this'un's bettuh

Storyboarding

First storyboarding assignment: The Establishing Shot: Riverstreet.

First Couch in Maya

to be continued...

keep watching for this in later postings! should be soon :)

Lucasfilm at SCAD

LUCASFILM came to SCAD to present internship and job opportunities and talk about demo reels. Their entry level internship program is called Jedi Academy. Wow.

Madeleine L'Engle's The Small Rain

I love being in Savannah.
I got a library card the other day.

Now, I have access to TWO expansive (and filled with windows-thus, natural lighting) three story libraries within walking distance. One, the Jen Library- is entirely filled with art books galore... never ending. And the Live Oak- I'm not exactly sure how many stories it has- (and by stories, I mean floors), but it's got either three or four.

I just finished Madeleine L'Engle's The Small Rain.
I began reading it on a Saturday trip to the beach and finished on the next Saturday. (My roomate took my first "author photograph"- you know, the photo that's on the back flap of books. I'm not an author yet, but someday.... someday.. I was wearing my white and red Sunday-Morning-in-New York City-dress with the billowy red hat)

During the first week, when we had sooooo much work to do, I got used to being busy again and I LOVE that feeling, so this week- after I used my time very wisely- and got most of my homework done during class workshop time. I do not like to waste time anymore. If I have spare time, I want to invest it in a book by one of my favorite authors. Before I came to school, I spent a week or two reading the manual to Maya. No more unnecessary naps for me! If I do need to take a rest, though, I rest.My room is facing west, so in the afternoon, the sun graciously comes and warms up my bed for me so it's nice and toasty just in case I may need a nap. We also have lots of butterflies and dragonflies flitting around outside our window.

Oh yes, back to The Small Rain. Madeleine L'Engle wrote it when she was about my age.(20-ish) I've decided to begin at the beginning of her collection of writings and read chronologically up through her growing up. I enjoyed her first novel very much, though it was filled with a lot of pain. Her main character, Katherine is a very dedicated pianist and goes through many losses, including the death of her mother and other significant people in her life. I feel like, that through this book, I grew up with Katherine and we got through everything together, so maybe after this, I've grown up a little bit too.

"Mother said when you were unhappy or confused, Bach was the person to play. With almost everybody else you can think, but with Bach there's nothing but the music. It's true, you know."

p. 67 The Small Rain

Poster Project

just finished - Adobe Illustrator Project for Advanced Computer Applications.

This is a poster that is to be featured in a 3-dimensional room created in Maya. A Tribute to one of my favorite artists whose kind and creative heart helped lead me to see the world differently and to also to see the Artist who never changes.

Ira Glass on Storytelling

After watching the Fall of 08 ScadAnimate Senior Animation Short Film Projects, I've been spending a lot of time thinking about story. Looking everywhere for a story.. filling up my little book of small one sentence snips of things that could possibly be stories later...

I don't know when I'm graduating from SCAD- I have an appointment with my advisor coming up in the next 2 weeks. Since seeing the Senior Short Film projects, I was struck with the urgency of gaining a repertoire of stories- so I'm not panicking when I need one for a storyboarding project, animation, illustration, etc. Last year I found myself getting discouraged when I had an assignment due and I knew that I had ideas floating around in my head, but the unsureness of what my message should be in my drawing or what story to come up with .. actually made me become frozen and I think I lost hope in my creativity in the face of challenges that seemed bigger than me.

So, every day, I am going to make a story. It could be one sentence, It could be a page. But I'm keeping it in my book that stays in my pocket (just in case a really good one smacks into me on the bus) and by the time Senior Projects roll around, I'll have a good sized stack of stories to choose from!

That being said: Here's a nugget of wisdom, not only for animators, but for any creative person or storyteller.

movie night... i mean.... study group

Last night marked our third week at SCAD and our third movie night in Studio 265! We've watched Monsters Inc., Back to the Future, and last night: The Fall. Definitely one of the high points of my week!

Savannah Church Search

I visited this neat church last Sunday and enjoyed it a lot. It's called Late Church. I think I'll still look around just in case, but I could totally see myself going there regularly. It's in the Lucas Theatre (which is next to one of my favorite places- SCAD's 3 story Jen Library) The music was contemporary- similar to the the style of Discovery Church in Orlando (I went there when I worked at Disney World over the summer) but I was more familiar with the songs at Late Church than in Orlando. Several of the songs we sang, I learned at Manchester- these were just with guitars and drums and I think a mandolin- [LOVE!] They made me miss Manchester Creek Church and Christabel. The message was good too. Prodigal son, but in a different perspective than I've heard before. (though my illustration doesn't show it. I couldn't seem to put it in a picture this week)

I'm very excited because they seem to really enjoy all of the SCAD students. They had a short film at the beginning of the service and have a lot of lifegroups that are geared toward us artsy youngins. There are several that I think I might check out:

Adventures Group! - anything with the word Adventure in the name is for me. They go camping and kayaking.
Dance Group- ballroom dancing! like Social back home! (little brother if you read this, don't quit! You really do need ballroom dancing skills to succeed in life!
Weekend Activities Group- weekend "happenings". just plain fun.
Prayer Group- self explanatory, but with the addition of going to the beach once a month for an extra dosage of beautiful.
Movie Critic Group- also self explanatory. We go out to movies or watch the ones we have.



If you're interested, watch their video from the Pastor about the move and why they're cool. (Click the photo or the link)


More drawings ahead

First week at SCAD

First week at SCAD has been awesome. There are so many reasons why I know that I'm supposed to be here right now. I am enrolled in 3 classes, which doesn't seem like much, but believe me it is! The average amount of homework for one class is said to be 10 hours a week. I'm starting to believe it's more! I love it though. My classes are awesome (even though I'm not animating super mega action fights or anything yet) and I've met some of the coolest (and most colorful) people I've ever seen! The picture above is at the entrance of where I live! I am in Weston house- and we are conveniently located next to the SCAD Cafe. SCAD has good breakfast - which is my absolute faaavorite part of the day. Every morning, depending on what time it is, the Cafe is my morning home.

This is the courtyard of the dorm I live in. It used to be a hotel of some type- I forget which one, but the rooms are huge and we all have our own bathrooms and showers. My room is at the end of the hall on the right and to the left on the other side. We are facing West, so we can watch the bridge all night long and in the afternoon, if we keep our windows open it gets pretttty dang toasty.

After breakfast, I go hop on a SCAD bus- If it is Monday or Wednesday I get on the South Central Bus to Montgomery (the Animation, Gaming, and Visual Effects building) and if it's Tuesday or Thursday, I head out to Wallin Hall for Storyboarding and then later to Arnold Hall for Speech. There are no buses in this picture because it was in between the half hours when I took it. You can only catch a bus on the :00 or the :30.

The buses are comfy (for being a bus) and convenient for us far away downtown kids. Bus conversations are the best- you're almost always guaranteed to have something in common with the person next to you (because you're going to the same building for basically the same classes).. and we all love art. It's very interesting and weird to be around artists 100% of the time. I'm absolutely loving it so far..

Montgomery Hall. They have a big screen showing animations all the time and there are speakers (somewhere) so we can watch and listen while we wait for the bus. It's almost like Disney! (just kidding) It is pretty awesome though. This building is going to be my home for the next few years. I can't wait to get into some really hard time consuming animating story type stuff.

And here's the bus that takes us back home so we can start doing LOADS of homework!!

Friedrich had gone to bed early that night, around, say 9:00. He woke up around midnight (thinking it was morning) after having a scary dream about his first day at his new school. Friedrich's dad made him a cup of hot chocolate and let him watch a little TV before going back to bed- because everybody knows: A monster with a warm belly full of hot chocolate isn't afraid of anything!

P.S.
Friedrich is looking for a home, any takers? glass frame included :)

he fell asleep with the lights on again.

Thanks for the tatoos, Charlie!

main street break room

life drawings at disney

I finally got the scanner to work- here are some life drawings before the 9:00 parade- Disney World was a great place to get hours worth of drawing time because there are people.... EVERYWHERE! I've never seen so many different looking people from so many places around the world before.

I found that I was more prone to drawing people that were in the same mood as I was. . thus:

tired people!! It was obvious they'd had a long day. I could definitely relate. (12 hour shifts, ouch!)