Aminata inspired me - its quite good therapy actually :)
I am letting my group work more independently today, feel a bit tired of all these long meetings that we use to have so today we have an online meeting and everyone is just supposed to upload their work so that they fast can get fedback and go and do the changes and give fedback to everyone elses work. I need to take some shots for my Cambodia trip so I will not go in to college today, have a Dr's appointment and quite a lot of shots, malaria pills n stuff to sort out.
New trainstation sketches from the weekend :
I prefer the old sketches though. I did a lot of weird backgrounds for Aminata during the weekend as well:
And started on Character Sheets for Sofie:
I have been asked to sell some of my illustrations on a German Christmas market for charity that loads of famous designers are involved with, offcourse I want to do that so I have to get started on that as well and shape up my work and wrap it up nicely and ship it of to Germany :)
..and now the Dr is finished.
Well letting my group work independent didnt really work either. I am really tired and stressed. I find it weird that we are supoose to pitch group films and projetcs for our final year - yes I know that we are supoose to get ready for the industry but so many that I have talked with have problems with their groups. People that doesnt do any work, dont attened meetings and some just simply disappeared and are not even picking up the phone or answering e-mails. Surely hard working students shouldn't pay for others lazyness and get completly stressed out and not get time for other college work as they have to cover up for lazy ones? I have had two meetings now where some people hasn's presented ANY work. Next meeting I will fire those who repeat that. I am not on this course to baby sit. I pay a f lot of money to be here and I gave up a good full time job and an apartment in sweden for this course ( even if I don't want to be an animator, i came this far and now I want to finish it ) so people better be serious about my time. I am really tired of it and don't know what to do. I will see if it repeats itself on tomorrow's meeting, then I might ask some people to go and do something else some where else or shape the fuck up. I rather work with a small group then a big one that stresses me out. I noticed that the drawing skills in my group was low very early and thats when I approached James L, Aminata and Becca and asked them for concept help. We all don't have to be good at drawing- I am not that good, but shit I tryyyyyy!
Aminata has been a star so I am trying to give her something back for her film. Jessica S is considering modeling the Dr during the X-mas break and Caspar the train so that is very good. I gat a third year sound student who is really hard working who is interested inhelping us out with sound effects so I ahve e-mailed him some concept work to get a feel of the film and a new script that I wrote quickly, he also has the group Blog link and a list of the kind of sound effects that we need. Sound makes such an massive difference! I have been on different websites with classical music but not found anything so I asked my friends and that started e-mailing mesome stuff and I might have the music for the beginning for the film when the girl is in the Dead World.
Wednesday:
Didn't like the old cut outs of the girl so I made new ones, want a nice animatic if possible. Painted to different background just to try n show the feel of the film some how. Started my scenes of the animatic. Shit if people did their shit we sould have been done with this weeks ago..
Thursday: Okej little miss asa..now its gonna be f hardcore work for u!
* Last meeting protocol on Blog]
* Fix scene one and make my own version of the entire animatic for meeting with Mike on Monday ( jesuuuuuus, no i am not doing that, this year is group work so i am not gonna kill myself )
* Finish Mike H's essay and hand out and prepare presentation
* Go through all the sounds I gat from Marcus and the sound guy from college
* Gareth's essay
* framed illustrations to sell on the design market in Germany
* New Mods/UK gangster pigeons to Jessica
* More Paris backgrounds for Aminata, less abstract, bigger buildings infront and more typical french buildings ( haha, how am I gonna draw that, I am so so shit in drawing buildings hahaha! Betta go to Catord and get some crack or speed or something cos I will not get any sleep this weekend..)
Had a meeting today, the protocol is on the group Blog. Talked to Patrick on the phone and said that I cant have it like this and that he can work on other films instead, he was really sorry and said that he done loads of work but have had massive problems coming into college. I said that he doesnt have to come in all the time but he has to communicate and show us his work so that we know where we are - me and Patrick will have an online meeting tonite. Nnamdi was a week late with his train that he has been workig on for a month so i told him not to bother any more and that I will let someone else do the train. When I came home at nite he had sent me really nice drawings so I said okej, u still gat the train but stick to deadlines.
So I am straight on point and I have given them a new chance but its the last one cos I can't stand being this stressed.
Sketched on Mike's lecture, I always sketch in class, might look bad but I focus and listen better when I sketch some how.
Friday: Jessica is trying to get the final pigeons done so I asked her if she wanted me to do some even though I don't work on her film any more, I did some really fast today but I can do better, just need some more time so I will sketch on them tonie.
Had a very good meeting with Mike H about my film but Mike S has his visions of it, Dan D has his and Mike H has his - I am listening and discussing it with my group but in the end of the day its my film. So we did two changes today - Sofie will say good bye to Bobo before she leaves and gets on the train cos I realised when I was talking to Mike that it is really weird that Sofies best friend and companion isnt allowed to foolow her so we need to do soemthing about it and this is the solution that we came up with. Sofie will suddenly stop and turn around and put her hand as a stop sign towards Bobo so that he also stops and looks at her, she looks seriously at him (. Mike H wanted dialog but I want to do all that I can to aviod dialog and I discussed this with Josie and Wan and they agreed.) and we paus while they seriously look eachother in the eye in a way that u understand tat this is good bye, then they hug and say farwell, the train whisthe blows so they have to run and catch it as in the old version. We will also make the shadow look more like the Dr. Mike H had really really nice ideas that made the film more positive and the environment of the dead world warmer but me, josie and wan want to keep the mysterious feeling and the conflict with being draggaed back to the hospital. But we will add that little toy cat ball that I found, it will boune by in the dead world cos even if the dead world is a bit mysterious it is still warm and nice happy and friendly. Now I am going to go and record my voice for the animtic. Yeah, I talked to Aminata today about her background, should do it in layers to get more depth and she liked that Idea. I asked what colors she wanted me to focus on and she said yellow and pink.
One more thing, Josie and Wan - I am so happy to have u on my team! Thanks for all the hard work!! :)
I like the top ones but the polo pigeion is a bit shit, need some more time.
I am not happy with the old Bobo design, think this one is sligthly better but I am not sure its teh final one. Nnamdi are working on it as well but the drawings he gave me looked to much like he drawn of famous characters as Winnie Pooh etc so I asked him to draw his own way and not copy things as I want this film to has its own style.
I am thinking about the hospital room. Hving a birthday image in there that shows that she celebrated her birthday their ones is good, then I was thinking a bout some more toys like that horse that Josie did that was really nice, a game that she can play with her mom and others and some drawings. I worked with children in this age for 4 years haha, but can I remember how an 7 year old in general draw? No I don't. And it can vary. So I tried to find some stuff online and tried to make my own 7-year old looking drawings. I have e-mailed my old colleges at Alviskskolan in Sweden- they could probably get a bunch of 7 year old girls to draw for me.
from internet
and from me..
What I have learned this term? Loads!! I was to democratic and nice in the beginning of this project, I thought that if everyone felt important and that I really listened to their ideas etc and not just threw out orders then it would be more fun to work on this film and motivate people more.. I was wrong. I was alo a bit insecure I think and really felt that I wanted more fedback and point of views to be able to make a good film and make the right decisions. Vey nice people in my group, we have fun together, but wokwise shit is not really happening. We just gat delayed and delayed and I tried to point out how much we had to do and that everyone must read the blog and stick to their deadlines etc etc. Josie and me just gat more and more tired and talked about it and I said that we had to be tuffer and make clear limits. It is only one week left now, I dont want to write to much on this Blog but this weekend I seriously had enough. I am a student who wants to make a film. I am not responsible over people that doesnt show up, dont call or e-mail and say why. I have been very stressed about these things - more stressed about the group the the actual work. I am not gonna get stressed out any more. The entire concept of group work and having a meetings where u decide things and write them up and some students go and do something completly different is really tireing but thats just what group work is, now i know what to exepct from people and know who does their work and put effort in it and who's bullshiting and always being two weeks late. So next term will be different. I am just a bit angry about it cos this was my term, I love doing concept and need to improve my drawing skills, now I had to stop working for jess and is not doing very much for Aminata cos I havent had time cos I had to jump in and do work that others was supposed to do on my film. Grr. Well well, enough about that. This term felt like the basic of the film though, feels like if we are behind now - how will we catch up? I dont have a lap top but will have to try n sort something out so that I can work in Thailand.
peace n luv and one week left to survive and then I am off to Thailand!!
I have asked Wan to produce and direct n keep an eye on things while I am gone.
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