Week 1 Blog - Animation Studio 3

Week 1 Blog

With the first week of Animation Studio 3 coming to a close, I've been absorbing everything that has been laid out in front of me of what's to come from this particular unit. Now that I have returned from a half a year break the time has come to get my mindset back into work mode. This no doubt will be a challenge and with the power of hindsight I will have to be careful not to fall into the pitfalls that caught me off guard last semester. 

First impressions of the class were good. I was quite surprised at how small the class was. After doing Studio 1 and 2 I expected another moderate sized class but this one was much more compact with only a handful of students all put together to work on a major project. I feel more comfortable with this situation as it will be less hectic and easier to communicate with the lecturer on any issues that may arise.

The main project being a short animatic got my attention as it is something I haven't done since my time studying animation at Deakin, where I made an animatic with 6 other students. My only concern will be with getting back into the flow of things due to my absence and the potential difficulties to come with this kind of project, especially with only 12 weeks to do it. Time management will be crucial this time as a lack of that last semester lead to my downfall in that unit and I will do whatever it takes not to let that happen again. Unfortunately with another unit once again acting as a distraction on the side I will have to deal with that unit alongside this one and I will have to make sure I don't let it distract me too much this time. I was hoping to jump onto that unit's assignments to knock them out of the way early but due to them being group and week oriented I am unable to do so. so that could be a potential problem.

Even though I have the above concerns I do feel a bit more optimistic about this unit. Compared to previous ones this one seems like more of what I was looking for and the smaller group focus is much cosier then previous setups. I also think we can make some cool stuff with the given script, with it's focus on sci-fi horror. I was having images of potential scenes flashing in my head as we read the script and I'm hoping to bring some of them to life in te upcoing weeks.

The element analysis on the other hand was rather overwhelming. It is certainly one of those things that looks simple on the outside but is actually quite complex once you start to look closer. Just thinking of the word 'Unity' now makes my head hurt as it's quite difficult to really analyse something in such depth in it's basics from line to form to texture. Hopefully as the weeks go on I'll have a better grasp of it because right now it's definitely something to work on.

But for now all my attention needs to go into research for this animatic and with the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo example to look at I'm going to have to really think hard about the approach to this project and to my particular pitch to the group. Honestly I'm happy with whatever we decide to go with style wise, as long as it's achievable within the time restrictions and our current skillsets.