Buy Prints and Donate!

I have a selection of prints up for grabs to anyone that is interested. All of these images are on display (and for sale) in local coffee shops. A donation of $75 will get you a 20x30 print of any one of the images below mailed to your home (In North America). Larger quantities and/or smaller prints can also be arranged. Leave any questions in the comments for details.

Progress So Far

So far I've recieved $350 in donations from you guys. You're all so generous. I've put this information in the bar on the right, and I'll update it as I go in case anyone is interested in checking my progress.

Keep in mind I haven't included any scholarships, grants, bursaries, or local donations yet (Not to mention family support). I have just applied to an enormous grant of $10,000 which I'm really excited about. It's the only one I've been able to find of that size, so while I'm trying not to get my hopes up, could you imagine if I got it? That could make all the difference. The waiting period is 1 to 6 months. Let's hope it's 1 and not 6.

Thank you!

Thank you William, Justin, Jeremy, Paul, Amid, and Jerry for your generous donations. I can't thank you enough for your support.

To anyone else that is considering donating a dollar or two, but is skeptical because of the amount of internet scams out there, you can click the image on the left to see my acceptance letter.

Here is my portfolio

This is the exact portfolio that I sent to CalArts in the exact order. Which reminds me, I have to phone them and get that back. I will post my sketch book work when I get them back from the school as well.

In the meantime here's a few links to some older work, some of which didn't make the final portfolio cut:

http://www.onanimation.com/2008/11/thursday-morning-spreads.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/11/work-from-tuesday-and-wednesday.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/11/some-recent-work.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/11/old-gestures-i-forgot-to-post.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/11/gestures-from-today.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/11/break-from-color-rusty.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/11/tuesday-morning-spreads.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/11/wednesday-fat-man-gestures.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/10/blue-jeans.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/10/some-drawings-from-thursday.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/10/nu-to-pastel.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/10/gestures.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/10/sunday-gestures-loosening-up.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/09/more-color-caine.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/09/color-and-experimentation.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/09/sharpie-gestures.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/08/august-sunday-life-drawing.html
http://www.onanimation.com/2008/07/bridgman.html

I've got a few hours to phone around for some bursary apps before work, so back to work :)

Now Comes The Hard Part

So I got into CalArts. But it remains to be seen if I'll be able to raise the money to go.

[insert sob story here]

Check out the bar on the right if you want to help. I would really appreciate it. I just finished my copy of Walt Disney: An American Original, and I stumbled upon this quote from Walt Disney:

The trouble with universities is that they restrict students from learning about a lot of things. The young people have to get so many credits toward their degree, and they don't have a chance to delve into other subjects. That won't be true at CalArts. Students will be able to take anything - art, drama, music, dance, writing. They'll graduate with a degree of Bachelor of Fine Arts, and if they want a Bachelor of Arts they can go to another colleges and get a few more credits...The student body of CalArts shouldn't be over two thousand, and as many as possible should reside on campus. There should be some allowance for those who are talented. yet are not students; they should be able to express themselves without worrying about grades. There will be a lot of scholarships at CalArts. We don't want any dilettantes at CalArts. We want people with talent. That will be the one factor in getting in to CalArts: talent.

Times have sure changed.

Accepted

Today I'm feeling pretty rough, a bad cold has hit me and left me bed ridden. But my spirits were lifted a little when I got my acceptance letter from CalArts this morning. It's a good day, and a proud day. All the stuff I went through to get this letter has been worth it. I'll update this post later when I'm not feeling so rotten. I plan to outline what I did to prepare my portfolio, and everything that was involved with it, good and bad. But I just had to post today, to mark the occassion. What a day to get the good news. Sheesh!

Well...back to bed.

*UPDATE*

Okay so what did I have to do to get accepted? If you read this blog over the past year, it's all pretty much here. But here's a quick overview. Keep in mind I live in Vancouver, Canada.

• Life drawing 4-5 days a week (minimum!) for 9 months. I went to Basic Inquiry for this.

• The Zoo once a week with pens and a moleskin (Our zoo really sucks!)

• I studied anatomy books by Hogarth and Bridgman

• I filled a few moleskins at the Aquarium (Our aquarium rocks!)

• I went to CalArts. You must do this if you are serious.

• I joined AnimatedBuzz Forums. This community's sole purpose is to help you get in. Last year about 15 members got in. When class sizes are 35-40, that's a pretty good average. This year's count is up to 8 so far, myself included.

• I made friends with current students. They helped me with my portfolio, and now I'll already have friends going in.

It's not always easy getting out to that many life drawing classes a week. I also worked full time, and I re-arranged my work/social life around my life drawing classes.

How bad do you want it? I can now say that after all the bad models (John and Lorna from Basic), and the ones that didn't show up. After the parking tickets, and speeding tickets. After all the rainy days trying to get into class without ruining all my stuff. After being towed and having to drag all my art supplies across the city to the impound lot. After consequently being late to work that day. After the hundreds I spent on supplies and gas...IT WAS ALL WORTH IT!

How bad do you want it?

Ten Hours At Cartoon College

Well I'm back from CalArts, and my head is still spinning. What an experience. Phone the school as much as you want, and read all the blogs in the world. It doesn't even give you the tip of the iceberg. You have to GO THERE.

I spent so much time planning it all out to a "T", but there was only so much I could plan, and only so many appointments I could make, which was frustrating. It seemed like a sort of unwillingness from the school to let me get the most of my one day there. But I realized after the first ten minutes on campus just how lax everything is. Just how layed back and, "meh", life is there. I'd imagine the faculty allows such freedom to the students so they can unwind from the pressures of their films and how hard they push themselves with their actual work. Either way, it broke the ice for me right away, as I was a little nervous of what to expect when I first got there.

I was nervous because I was told to just walk around and ask people for feedback, which seemed kind of random and intrusive to a shy nerd from the great white north such as myself. To the contrary, EVERYONE said yes. EVERYONE was cool. I got so much feedback that I have no doubt in my mind what I have to do now. It's just a matter of doing it well enough to get accepted.

The only bummer was that I forgot two of the caricatures that my friends John, and Sean drew of me (hilarious), and I had to leave early the beat rush hour and catch my flight. So I missed the guest speaker, which was my hero, Ben Ballistreri, of newfound, "Seaweed" fame. Oh well, if I get accepted, I'm sure I'll see him again sometime.

I could go on forever about it, but I'm still digesting the whole experience. I don't know what's to come for me, but I know that my day at CalArts will play a big part in it. It has nothing to do with the school itself. It's all about the people in it.

Fired Up About Animation: New Inspirations

When I first decided to go back to school I really only had one school in mind: Cal Arts. It seems to be the be all and end all of animation education; partially because of the faculty and networking available to students there. One thing I learned from a year at film school is that it's all about who you know. Now I was delighted to find out my government can provide financial aid for Cal Arts, but heart broken when I found out they would only provide a certain amount, not nearly enough to cover even the most modest living situations.

So I went to what I considered was second best: Academy of Art. Why? Because they have an online program, which I can afford to take. I've been here for a little over one school year, pursuing my degree off and on part-time and full-time. But I'm always trying to figure out how I can transfer to Cal Arts. It's pretty hard doing it all on your own. I think the creative environment helps you absorb so much more. Especially when I read Mario Furmanczyk's four year Cal Arts journal. Mario has chronicled the ultimate success story in my eyes. His journal is filled with all the things we students go through: enthusiasm, passion, insecurity, epiphanies, inspiration, the list goes on. I recently read the entire thing, and I honestly feel like I've got a good idea what four years at Cal Arts is like. This only wets my appetite even more. I have got to find a way to get down there!

Here's a little taste of his journal, some of these quotes really speak to me. If they do the same for you, then I would highly recommend giving his whole journal a read. After all, the end result is that he got into Disney. I'm sure you can learn something...

"The artist places time, money, and people at risk because his ambition has life-defining force."


"The measure of the value of a character's desire is in direct proportion to the risk he's willing to take to achieve it; the greater the value, the greater the risk."


I'm beginning to realize that becoming an artist isn't all about how well you can draw. Sure you have to master your medium but you should also express something in your work that you feel passionate about. You must bring your experiences into your art instead of trying desperately to copy something someone else has done. The same films are being done over and over again. There are so many untapped possibilties in animation and I'm hoping that some of us at Calarts will be brave enough to do something about it and get people interested again. I feel really inspired and motivated to do something cool with my career but I have a hell of a lot to learn.


Another good tip that David talked about was to have confidence in yourself as an artist whenever you're drawing. If you have doubts about the way you draw when you're animating, the drawings WILL turn out to be crap. You need to believe, at least while you're animating or drawing, that you're Glenn Keane.


Ok. Just so you know, it's not easy to make a short film. You'll go crazy and your friends and family will hate you because you'll never call them. When you do, all you talk about is animation and they'll hang up midway through the conversation.

Being a student at this school can be pretty frustrating because the minute you start thinking that you're actually any good, you see something five times more amazing from one of your buddies.


I would say that if you can't boil your story idea down to three images your story is most likely way too much to handle for a student film. So for all of you who are thinking about ideas right now do this and save your ass!


But hell, she said that it still could be pushed a bit more! Wow, I really just gotta let loose. So everytime I think of a story idea or gag, instead of questioning whether it's good enough I gotta ask myself if there's any way of taking it further. I wrote down a bunch of quotes and stuck them to my animation desk to remind me that I need to push and pull and squash and stretch more. I need to let loose dammit!

The more I learn about animation and the art making process the more I realize that you need to find your own process and path othewise you'll just be a cheap rip off. I'm constantly fighting with my self confidence. I gues it's all part of becoming an artist.


Confidence is huge when you're an artist. The flow of creativiity is completely shut down if you don't believe in yourself. It can almost seem like you're going backwards when you don't have the right mindset. It's like anything in life. Confidence is key. Always believe in yourself. And when you're not feeling well one day whether it's emotionally, physically or if it has to do with confidence, just take a break. Treat yourself to a movie or take your girlfriend out on a date. Drink some wine. Just live life again and soon you'll put things back into perspective and realize it's not the end of the world if you don't get the overlap right on a particular scene! You'll get it sooner or later. Just remember there's a life out there that's full of experiences for you to go through. Without those life experiences, we can't produce art.


We were talking about how stressful our films were. He told us to "just do it". Stop thinking so damn much about it and just do it. And if somebody tells you otherwise, fuck'm. If anybody sees that you're slightly questioning something about your film, they're all like sharks waiting for a kill.

Whenever you have a doubt that crosses your mind about your art, just think of it as the devil trying to convince you that you suck!!! Ignore it and just go with your instincts!


We shouldn't try to achieve such high standards to the point where it becomes stressful. Shoot for high standards by all means but just keep your sights set on a standard that won't stress you out to the point where it all stops being fun. For God's sake we're making freakin' cartoons! We should be having a blast!So that was like music to my ears because it's one of the struggles I've had to go through all year. I've tried to shoot for standards so high that it completely messed up my self confidence when I realized where I was really at. Wow, what a lesson!

"An Animator's job is to be a decision maker" Basically make a decision and move on. From my experiences, I've encountered so many situations where I would let indecision drive my life. Ultimately, you have to pick something (acting choices) and just do it. If you overthink it it'll drive you crazy and you'll never get anything done! Of course spend time planning the shot but just be a decision maker when it comes down to it.

Sometimes it's so easy to dive right into rendering volumes or forms in the torso before you get the gesture down first. A good teacher will come by and smack you upside the head with one of those rulers and yell, "Gesture first!". So it's kind of a principle, I'd say. Just tatoo it on your hand or something.

If anyone reads this blog, you'll notice I've touched on a few of these areas. Most recently the last one about gestures. It's always refreshing to hear someone else drone on about the same things, especially when they've made it somewhere like Disney in the end.

Another GEM I found, or rediscovered rather, through this journal, was another Cal Arts alumni named JG Quintel. I remember Spine Doctors posting about him a long time ago regarding a student film he did called the The Naive Man from Lolliland. At the time I didn't get it, I didn't see the entertainment in it. I guess I have learned a bit since then, because this is a totally refreshing and original story idea. CLICK. I get it now! But Quintel's best work wasn't even mentioned. Check out 2 in the AM PM. It's absolutely hilarious, and so original. I couldn't stop laughing. You can find it here.

Well that's enough for now, I have my own storyboards and animatic work on. And I sure have enough inspiration now.