alexiss dawn

Yes, that’s right — a momentous occasion. Drum roll please…

I have finally filled a sketchbook. Lol. I know, I know, it’s not as momentous as you would’ve thought. But you see, I always move onto another sketchbook before filling up another. Last night I realized there were no more pages to be sketched on and moved onto yet another partially filled sketchbook.

Well, I was excited.

It’s interesting looking through it. A big portion of it is filled with sketches done for projects at Animation Mentor. I look at the character posing I did this time last year - oh man, it’s bad. I’ve been able to grow a lot animation wise over this last year at AM, but I realized how much it’s helped me grow sketching wise as well. Figuring out what makes a pose appealing is huge! I’ve been spending a lot of time commenting around class 1 public reviews this term and the biggest thing for me is looking for that line of action through a pose. It really does so much for a pose! Of course you need weight, good silhouette, proper mechanics, etc. It’s just crazy to see what I thought was a great pose. I spent last night in Q&As and story sessions, and while listening I was filling up pages just sketching basic poses, playing with curves, and exploring posing. I actually enjoy doing that now.

So there’s one extra bonus of being at AM. Another thing I’ve been noticing is a new confidence about things. Of course that waivers back and forth, but talking about what’s appealing and what’s not in animation, I feel a lot more confident about what I have to say. Doesn’t mean I’m right all the time, but at least I’m confident.

Oh! And I forgot to post this on the actual “anniversary date”, but this last week, on the 28th, marked 1 year of animating for me!

This time last year, having never animated before, I had just spent an entire week working on a basic bouncing ball. I still have so much to learn, but comparing it to where my progress reel is now at, it’s so crazy how far I’ve been able to come in just a year thanks to the amazing set up and people at Animation Mentor. I can’t wait to explore even more this next year!

(Looking back…my first bouncing ball! I did it twice for the assignment to play with different setups.)

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 30th, 2008 at 3:49 pm and is filed under Animation Mentor, Randomness. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.