The week of March 5th was a dark week in my short AM history. I received a grade and (more importantly) a critique that were really, REALLY below par. I was very upset, pretty much the entire week. The good that came out of this is that my mentor suggested to Student Care that I take an extra class that Saturday. I had the option to not go to this extra class, but let me say: I am seriously happy I did. My Saturday mentor was Sandy Christensen and she's worked in video games as well as at Pixar. She helped me hone in on what my animations were lacking and let me kind of vent about my frustrations with this class. I think it was exactly what I needed to really break out of my mold and get things done right :) This isn't to say I won't have tough times ahead, surely I will, but at least I know that when the tough times come I'll be able to handle them and learn from them!!
This first video is the dreaded blocking plus I did. Mentor Pete had told me to change the camera to 3/4 so you can get a better sense of whats going on. I wanted the walk up to the base to still be in front camera but was told in the critique to keep the camera 3/4. The swing was also not working for Pete and he gave me a lot of pointers and quick sketches to explain what he wanted to see in the next assignment.
This next video is of the assignment I turned in at the end of bleh week (after having that extra Saturday class). It obviously still needs some work but a lot of things are working better here. Everything my mentor told me helped make this piece so much better. It was worth having a really crappy week to transform my work.
Theres still a long road ahead of me but I'm feeling a little more confident about it now :) Good things to come hopefully!!!
Excelsior!
