Story Time

Hey everyone!

Today, I'd like to start off this post with this comment from Tia (a senior at BASIS Scottsdale who's doing an awesome project involving art therapy, check out her blog!) on my last update:

Love all these inspiring sketches! (I was stuck in the hospital for quite some time and had my sketchbook with me, so I know how fun it can be to use drawing as "productive procrastination") But I also know the feeling of just pure laziness and not wanting to sketch, even though I know I should. I think it might be because I'm afraid to create something that isn't absolutely perfect. Do you ever experience the same sort of feeling? Any tips for overcoming a lack of sketching motivation? Keep up the great work :) I'm excited to see how your animation is coming along!  

First off, Tia, thank you so much for the kind words!

Second off, yes; unfortunately, I have experienced that pure feeling of bleh, that lack of will to do anything at all even though you know you should. And knowing you should is part of the stress that makes you feel... well... bleh (that lack of will to do anything at all even though you know you should).

And my answer would be that it's definitely one of those things you have to consistently and consciously push yourself and work to get over.

And the thing is, it's not so much the drawing process itself; it's getting up and putting pencil to paper in the first place. Once you get into the groove, all of that dread goes away.

Because, as you said, there's almost always this fear that you've lost artistic talent until you actually make something! It's astounding how many times I look at a finished work and think, "How the heck did I do that??"

So. What I do when I'm doubting my abilities is I get out something like watercolor or a really thick marker (or, if those supplies are lacking and you're stuck somewhere, even a pen can work!).

Something permanent and big.

With pencil, it's always so easy to obsess and erase and redo. But if you're working with fluid paint or a marker, you have to let go of all that fear and just put whatever you can onto that paper (or whatever medium you're using), no going back.

And if you mess up, well, you have to be creative and make the piece into something else, no matter if it's not what you initially thought you were going to make.

And, for me at least, that can be very liberating.

Speaking of watercolors, here are a few products of productive procrastination this week!

Yayyy flowery hair!

She leans on the chair as if to say, "Ha! I'm awesome."
She is awesome.
Also, never be afraid of shadows, kids. Gotta put that orange in there.

Yayyy flowery... everything...!

"Ugh. I forgot my chocolate at home. Again."
Hey; it's okay.
We've all been there.

And in pencil, a one-second shenanigan-y thing of a stick figure failing a cartwheel:

I also wanted to quickly go through how I made the little smooches and flowers animation from my last post, per the request of the illustrious Mr. Bloom:

So this is how the window looks when I open it in Photoshop Cs5, the software I usually use for digital work:

Hmmm

Wait a sec, let me adjust that a bit.

There we go!

As you can see, on the righthand side, there are layers. So I keep making new layers, adding on flowers every time. And then I make layers for the moving mouth (I can choose which layers to display/not display on the screen at any time, so it makes it easy to draw over a previous layer when animating!). When it comes down to the animation itself, for each frame, I combine what layers I want for the desired effect; so for the first few frames it's just adding on flowers, and then for the last few it's the mouth with the final number of flowers as a backdrop.

I hope that clears things up.

And finally, let's talk about my project!

The first page of my storyboard! *gasp*

Huzzah!

Now, I don't want to reveal too much of my story before it's done. However, I'll give you that first page as a teaser.

It all started because the little girl wanted cotton candy.

"Whoa wait, Daria, you decided on a character?"

Yeah! The little girl was what I'd used in my initial sketches, and I became really comfortable drawing her in different positions and expressions. So I ended up sticking with her. And the fact that she's a little girl is going to make for some sharp (and amusing) contrasts with some of the voices I'm giving her.

The first voice being:

You heard (saw?) it here first, folks. A gruff manly man voice.

At one point, though, I did make a whole page of potential characters for the role (though some of them, as you see, were more silly than anything):

I'm pretty sure the dude in the suspenders was subconsciously inspired by Cameron from Ferris Bueller's Day Off, as I'd just rewatched the movie... it's a great movie, by the by. I highly recommend it. 
But I digress.

So storyboarding is basically like making a comic! Except instead of speech bubbles, you make little notes about the scene to accompany the poses and expressions. It's really fun.

And, as you can tell, I'm going for a pretty simple style. No funky angles or zoom-ins on faces or anything. The characters are always gonna be flat on the page, and the setting/scenery will usually be implied through context when need be (there isn't even a ground!). Which I think will add to its light-heartedness, in that it's a bit reminiscent of the type of illustration you'd find in a children's book.

Speaking of storyboarding, before I got into it, I did have writer's/drawer's block! At which point I pulled out some watercolors, and started storyboarding without much attention to the quality, which resulted in this:

Shabby. But not too shabby.

As you can see, I was working those different perspectives and settings initially, though it was a bit of a mess. But it was stress-free, and it got the ideas rolling. And that's what's important.

Anyhow, I hope you're all enjoying the onset of spring as much as I am.

Except for you allergy-prone folk. I am very sorry for the pain the pesky pollen will prompt. Stay strong. We're all rooting for you.

Question time!

1. Do you have a favorite color? If so, what is it?

2. What is an odd hobby of yours?

And, to give you a break from all this reading of my ramblings, a short!

What?

You didn't actually think I'd forget to give you a short, did you?

Here is an animated short from Ringling College of Art and Design that reminds me a lot of the concept for Inside Out, a movie from Disney and Pixar that's coming out this summer:

Alright, that's it for today.

I hope everyone's having a great weekend!