Plastic Animation Paper – PAP:Pro 4.0 for free.

Woah!  plastic animation paper for free!

sweeeeeeeeeeet!

Comic Con Panel – Megamind with Will Ferrell.

There was a megamind panel at comicon this morning at 10, and the buzz is coming back that it was a lot of fun!  They showed 5 minutes of the movie, which has shots from all through the film.. Everything should be on Yahoo movies tomorrow, so hopefully people will watch and enjoy!

I spoke with the friggin amazing Bobby Beck, and am now able to offer a discount on the Animator Friendly Rigging products to all Animation Mentor students and alumni!

Bobby will be distributing the information to students and alum on how to get the discounts!

Enjoy!

I’m super jazzed about what the awesome people at Rigging Dojo are doing to help people interested in character rigging learn more about the craft.  They’re all fantastic teachers, excellent riggers, and just darn-right awesome human beings.  I’m really excited to be able to offer a 10% discount on the Animator Friendly Rigging DVD series for rigging dojo students!

If you’re a student there, please contact brad, josh, or chad to find out how to get your discount!

Woot!

I’ve modified my toodledo system a tiny bit.  Previously I mentioned that I had 4 folders set up in toodledo:

1. Inbox
2. Projects
3. Discussions
4. Someday / Maybe

This worked for a little while, but I soon found that my Projects folder was getting a bit overrun, so I decided to change Projects to Areas of Focus.  This lets me separate the areas where I don’t have any overlap to allow me to focus better.

My folder structure now looks like:

1. Inbox
2. Focus – Work
3. Focus – Home
4. Focus – Animator Friendly Rigging
5. Discussions
6. Someday / Maybe
7. Calendar

As you can see I also added a Calendar folder.  This is where I’m keeping things like birthdays and other events that I want to find quickly and easily.

What’s really been helping me keep on track however is being SUPER diligent about not letting my email inbox balloon out of control.  My goal is to get it to zero every night, but that’s not always possible to do before heading home to be with the family.

That means I also don’t skim through and start reading my work emails until I get into work in the morning (or sit down at the computer at night) and have time to process everything.

I absolute refuse to let an email sit in my inbox read.  If it’s sitting there, and I’ve read it, I force myself to make a decision on it.  Is it a task?  Is it an action?  Do I need to read it later and figure out what I’m going to do with it?  Even if that last option is the one I need to do, I make it a project, drag it to my Active folder in outlook, and then make a task in toodledo to read the email and process it.

This works for my physical inbox as well.  I spent a good 4 hours on Saturday going through my entire office and cleaning up all my old files, todo notes, etc.  I got everything current, emptied my inbox, and made sure to have a good clean space that’s enjoyable to sit in.

It’s amazing how just having a clean area and a clean inbox can allow you to focus 100% on a task at hand and really plow through it.

I think I’m totally hooked!

Now.. I still wish I had a cleaner UI for toodledo.. it’s okay, but check this out.. has anyone used smartytask?

Smartytask for GTD (Smartytask.com) from Smarty Task on Vimeo.

It looks super slick.. I’d love to give it a try, but 100 bucks a year is a little steep.

Why should we rig the way we do?
What are we looking for?
What would help the animator the most?
etc.

That’s why I was totally jazzed to see this post on Vimeo:

AFR Rivalry! from MTracer on Vimeo.

It’s someone doing some of the same animator friendly rigging techniques I talk about in the material, but doing it in Blender!

That’s great! I love seeing stuff like this!

This past week I’ve been doing my darndest to try and maintain a zero-sized inbox, both at home and at work.  This is an incredibly daunting task.  As work I receive a TON of email every day.  And by a ton, I mean a metric buttload of email.

One quick example.. on wednesday at 4pm I had my inbox down to 0.  That’s right, not a single email in my inbox.  Not one.  Zero. Kaput.  Nada.  Bupkis. I went off to walkies for one hour and when I returned I had over 150 messages in my email inbox.

Yeah.  One hour.  150 messages.  Expand that over an entire day, and you can see that my email inbox is constantly pinging me.   Expand that to a week.. imagine how much information is coming at me that might require some sort of action from me.  Yep, a bunch.

So this week I thought.. you know what?  I’m going to see if I can practice Inbox Zero, and I’m going to use toodledo to do it.

What is inbox zero you ask?

Only the coolest thing ever.

Yeah, that’s right.. cooler than than anything ever.  That’s right.  I said it.

Oh, you want me to elaborate?  It’s simply a way of maintaing your sanity with the amount of email coming at you.  The main idea is to process your email out of your inbox into a trusted system so you’re only taking in this input ONCE.

How many of you have an email sitting in your inbox that you’ve read once before?  What about twice?  What about knowing that there might be an email in your inbox that you might have read that might have something important in it maybe?

That’s sooooo stressful!

So here’s what I do.. I basically follow david allen’s GTD stuff with some Merlin Mann’s inbox zero stuff, and process it into my toodledo system.

First, I set up toodledo so I had a few folders:

1. Inbox
2. Projects
3. Discussions
4. Someday / Maybe

Next, I went to my toodledo settings and told it to put any new tasks directly into 1. Inbox.

Then I went to the tools and services area and configred my email so that I could email directly into my inbox.

Now that toodledo was set up, I went to my email program and created a few folders in there

1. My Projects
2. Others Projects
3. Reference
4. Archived

Finally, I went to my work email and started processing my email.  For every single piece of email I followed a flowchart similar to this one where I asked myself:

1. Do I need this email?  No?  DELETE it.
2. Is it actionable?  Can I or someone else do something about it? No? Archive it – What I would then do is assign this email a tag (gmail) or category (outlook) and drag it to my References folder.
3. Do I have to do something about it? No? Delegate it – Assign a tag (gmail) or category (outlook) drag it to my Others Projects folder
4. Can I do it in 2 minutes or less?  Yes?  Do it

If an email made it through each of these things and was still around, it most likely was a project of some kind. I would then tag or assign a category to the email, drag it to the My Projects folder, and then forward the email to toodledo with a subject that defined the outcome of the project.

For example, if I got an email that said “My AFR download isn’t working”, I would forward that to toodledo with a subject that said “Fix this person’s AFR download”.  If I knew what the absolute next action was that I needed to do I would add that to the notes.  If I didn’t, then I knew I would think about this later and just sent it to toodledo anyway.

Then, I would continue on to the next email and the next and the next until my entire inbox was ZERO.

Then I hopped over to gmail and did the same thing.

The nice thing about this is that I found that I could head to My Projects in my email and list by tag or by category and get a good sense of all my projects that I’m currently working on.  I could also head to Others Projects and see where they’re at on things.  It is a really great way of seeing quickly where everything is at.

The most important thing about this is that I’m now NEVER going into my email unless I give myself time to process what’s in there.  Even if I don’t have time to do those 2 minute tasks, I will simply forward those to my toodledo account knowing that I’ll get to them.  This allows me to get my email down to zero and maintain it being zero.  If I see that i have 30 messages sitting in there, in the past I would start cherry-picking things to read and not read, and I’d end up leaving stuff sitting there forever.  Now I have the strength to say “nope, no time to process.. I’m not going to even look.”

Talk about a stress relief!

In my next post, I’ll talk about how I dealt with processing all my items that are now sitting in my Inbox at toodledo.

Thought it might be interesting to put it up again in case people haven’t seen it before.

Here’s an example of the movie for part 4a:

Now that all of the parts are up and available for purchase either independently, or as a bundle, I’m continuing to try and make as much information available on this site as possible. Over the next few weeks I’ll be filling out the FAQ, updating the main AFR page, and hopefully updating scripts and such as they become available.

Thanks again to everyone for purchasing the material, I love that it’s getting out there!

cheers!

-jason

I have some great news!  As of tonight, the entire 8 set of Animator Friendly Rigging materials are available for purchase from my new store at fastspring.com!

You can buy bit individually for $14.99 a piece, or you can jump in with both feet and buy the entire set at once!  If you buy the whole thing, you get 8 bits for the price of 7!

I’m down in LA this week, so I’ll be putting the official pages together on how to buy this stuff with example pdf’s and movies and such probably this weekend, but I wanted to get this stuff up for you all now asap!

To purchase the individual materials, please go to the following pages:

Part 1 -> Introduction to Rigging, the bouncy ball

Part 2a -> Introduction to bipeds, the torso

Part 2b -> The torso continued, and the head

Part 3a -> The arm

Part 3b -> The arm continued

Part 3c -> The hand and fingers

Part 4a -> The foot and leg

Part 4b -> Completing the rig: mirroring, ui, presentation, etc

Or you can purchase the entire bundle with all the training materials at once!

I hope this new store works well for everyone and that the material is useful!

Enjoy!

Sorry for the delay in the rest of the AFR series being available. The content is ready, but I’m having trouble getting it available on lulu.com. For some reason the movies aren’t uploading correctly, so I’m not able to make a product for purchasing.

I’m looking into alternative vendors besides lulu.. if any of you know of good eCommerce websites that will host and distribute content, please let me know!

Hopefully we’ll have this sorted soon!!

The latest trailer has come out and is available online now..

This has been a real epic journey, and a real learning experience for me.  It’s a joy to be able to now have some of our film out there for people to see!

enjoy!

-jason

Go straight to the page, or check out the preview video:

Go straight to the page, or check out the preview video:

There are 2 other parts to section 3.  They continue with more arm work, and also getting into the hands and the fingers.  I’m currently selling each part individually much as Autodesk did (‘cept for nearly 15 cheaper per part).  If people are interested in purchasing entire sections as a bundle, or the entire AFR series as a bundle, I’m more than happy to do it.  Just let me know if this is something you’d be interested in, and I’ll make it happen!

To re-iterate..  Currently the parts break up like this:

part 1 | parts 2a & 2b | parts 3a, 3b, 3c, | parts 4a, 4b

I can sell them all individually, as bundles for each section, and/or as a bundle for the whole.

What would you guys prefer?

-jason

This part focuses on finishing the Torso rig, and gets into the head and neck.  It’s quite a long one.. the movie file that comes with it is over 800 megs (yipes!), and is about 2 hours and 40 minutes long.

Here’s a preview of the section where I talk about the head:

And a demo of what types of controls you have with the head and torso:

Currently part 2 is broken into two bits.. 2a and 2b, simply because that’s how Autodesk had broken it up originally.  I’m happy to continue providing them as a separate bits, or combining them into a single part 2 if people are interested.  Let me know if that’s desirable, and I’ll do the same with parts 3 and parts 4.

So I uploaded the movie to youtube and put it on the downloads page.  You can also see it here:

Some day I’d like to re-write greasePencil so it’s actually got good drawing tools and isn’t such a hack.. but I probably won’t get around to it for a while.  Of course, if Autodesk wrote it appropriately for integration with Maya, that would be AWESOME, too.

Just as before with part 1, I’ve uploaded an example pdf with about 13 or so pages demonstrating some of the documentation, and also provided a 6+ minute example video (low resolution, but gives you a little bit of an idea as to what you’ll be getting, presentation style, etc).

And if you haven’t seen the reference I’m talking about in this example video, you can see a low-resolution version here:

Yes.  We do look like idiots.

Thanks again for all the kind words about the series!  I’m going to keep uploading them as I get them ready!

-jason

As I mentioned earlier, the Animator Friendly Rigging instructional series will no longer be available through Autodesk.  It’s been a great run with Autodesk, and they have done a wonderful job selling the series.  However, they decided that they will no longer be selling the DVD online.

I have received such great feedback on the material, that I decided to keep selling it through lulu.com.  So over the next week I’ll be making sure all the material is available online, and as a special bonus I’m going to be dropping the price for a little while!

I’ve posted the first dvd on lulu.com already, and will get the rest up ASAP.

If you go to the AFR – part 1 page, you can find a PDF and video excerpt to show you an example of what it is you will receive when you purchase the material.

I look forward to getting all the material up and available for people to see!

Thanks for all the kind words and support!

-jason

A lot of people have asked me over the years where they can find the js_greasePencil script for Maya that I wrote a while ago.

This is a handy script that lets you draw on top of your Maya scene. You can use it for thumbnails, roughing out timing, drawing arcs, etc. It’s pretty basic, but handy to have!

Anyway, I’ve added the script to the downloads page.  If you’re logged in, you can download it here:

Enjoy!

I’ve received a few emails from people saying they’re having troubles with some of the scripts from the Animator Friendly Rigging series. I’d like to get all those issues solved, so if you are having trouble, please comment in this post so we can get it all sorted out!

It looks like Autodesk may stop selling the DVDs on their website soon, so I’m going to try and sell them myself through lulu.. the same way I’ve got the other two dvds selling. Once I make this move, I plan on putting up some specific information on this site about each DVD, including an example of the documentation, a sample of the movie, and quotes from anyone who has used the DVDs and found them useful. If you’re one of those people.. I’d love a quote or two!

Hope everyone is doing well!

Woot!

Animation Insiders is a new series of books dedicated to animation, put together by Patrick Beaulieu.  I’m really excited to be a part of this series.  It’s a whole bunch of interviews with a number of incredibly talented animators all talking about various parts of animation.  This first book is on Workflow and contains total gems by some good friends, and some people I’m hoping to meet some day!

It’s available April 27th, check it out!

Ugh, another studio shutting down.. just a few days after IMD closes it’s doors.

I just wanted to send out my heartfelt well wishes to those affected by the closure of both studios.. looks like it’s about 600 artists out of work (450 at IMD, and 150 at C.O.R.E.)

if you know anyone at either studio, please send them a hug & best wishes.. It’s a very small industry, and the closure of any studio, let alone two big ones that had works in development is never a good thing.

Sorry it’s been so long since I’ve updated, life has been busy and exciting. I’m now going full tilt in production on MegaMind and our animation department is completely staffed up. We’re cranking away on shots and it’s keeping me quite busy. Exhausting, but really exciting and fun.

Being a head of character animation is a wonderful challenge.. it’s part cheerleader, part strategist, part animator, part hard nosed negotiator, and part flexible team player.. all wrapped up into a single package. Like I said.. Exhausting, but Exciting!

Anyway, I saw this post today and thought I’d show it.. it’s not related to MegaMind, but any professional craftsperson who deals with clients on a daily basis will LOVE it.

Speaking of Animation.

A few animators from Dreamworks have started their own animation blog and so far it looks pretty cool!  Go check it out!

Woo!

Integrating a Creature Rig Into a Production Pipeline

1. Definition of a “Pipeline”
   1. Examples: Film, Modeling, Shot
   2. Determining how animation rig itself fits into the rest of the pipeline
   3. Animation-based transfer
   4. Control-based transfer
2. Definition of a “creature”
   1. Creating a node to represent the “creature”
   2. Defining Types of nodes
3. Orienting Joints
   1. Manually Re-orienting joints
   2. Automatic re-ordering
4. Animation Control Concepts
   1. Iconic Representation
   2. Limiting Selection and keyability
   3. Rotation Order
   4. Extra Gimbal Control
   5. Customized PickWalking
5. Automatic vs Manual Shoulder Control
   1. History of the discussion
   2. Constraint based control
   3. SetDrivenKey based control
6. Creating a “realistic” forearm
   1. Radius and Ulna
   2. Creating the Control Structure
7. FK/IK Back Control
   1. History
   2. Creating the spline IK
   3. Adding Stretching
   4. Creating the IK Control Structure
   5. Adding FK
   6. Adding Twist
   7. Adding Stretch Warning
8. Procedural Animation Rigs
   1. What is a procedural rig?
   2. Creating the rig
   3. Updating the rig
9. Included MEL Scripts
   1. endName.mel
   2. jsChannelCtrl.mel
   3. jsConstObj.mel
   4. jsCreateCreature.mel
   5. jsDefineCreature.mel
   6. jsGetShape.mel
   7. jsListCreatures.mel
   8. jsMovIn.mel
   9. jsMovOut.mel
   10. jsOrientJointUI.mel
   11. jsPickWalk.mel
   12. jsRenameWindow.mel
   13. jsRotateOrder.mel
   14. jsScaleJointsByCurve.mel
   15. jsUnlockTransforms.mel

Fast Animation Rigs – Bridging the Gap between Speed and Functionality

1. Fast Animation Rigs
   1. Global Concepts
      1. Display Layers
      2. Easily identifiable Controls
      3. Appropriate Rotation Orders
      4. Tidy Scene
   2. Leg Control – fast reverse foot setup
   3. Isolation of Movement
      1. History
      2. Head
   4. FK/IK Arms
      1. Maya’s fk/ik toggle
      2. jsFkIKSetup – a better solution
   5. Misc Speed Techniques – What’s fastest?
      1. Direct Connections
      2. Expressions
      3. Point Constraint
      4. Drive from same source
      5. Math Nodes
   6. Other Speed Techniques
      1. Object visibility
      2. Shaded Mode
      3. Nurbs vs Polys
      4. Keeping track of FPS
2. Pipeline Methodology
   1. File Structure
      1. Base Directory
      2. Revision System
      3. Resolution System
      4. Updating
   2. Incremental Rigging – Blocking, Animating, Finessing
      1. Switching Between Rigs
      2. File Referencing
      3. Transferring Animation
3. Fast Animation Technique
   1. Gather Information
   2. Thumbnail
   3. Staging
   4. Blocking
   5. First pass
   6. Second pass
   7. Third Pass
   8. Facial
   9. Secondary/External
4. Included Mel Scripts
   1. jsAddBoolAttr.mel
   2. jsAddMessageAttr.mel
   3. jsAddStringAttr.mel
   4. jsAlignToJoint.mel
   5. jsChooseItem.mel
   6. jsCopyAnim.mel
   7. jsCopyPos.mel
   8. jsCopyRot.mel
   9. jsDuplicateControl.mel
   10. jsErrorMsg.mel
   11. jsFindChildJoint.mel
   12. jsFindConnected.mel
   13. jsFindFkIkChars.mel
   14. jsFixPrefix.mel
   15. jsFkIkArmRig.mel
   16. jsFkIkSetup.mel
   17. jsFkIkSetupEverything.mel
   18. jsFkIkWin.mel
   19. jsGetRefFile.mel
   20. jsMakeFkIkConnections.mel
   21. jsreferenceRig.mel
   22. jsReferenceRigUI.mel
   23. jsRigUI.mel
   24. jsToggleFkIk.mel
   25. moveIkToFk.mel

First Come First Serve!

Update: 0 invites left!  All gone!

Jeffrey Katzenberg Plans on Living Happily Ever After | Fast Company.

This is a nice interview with JK, our main head honcho at Dreamworks Animation.

The first time I ever spoke to Jeffrey was when I was applying for a job at Dreamworks.  I was actually still living in New Zealand finishing up on The Lord of the Rings.  I believe it was a saturday morning, and I was at home showering before heading in to work.  I heard the phone ring & my wife poked her head in the bathroom to say “There’s a call for you.”

“Who is it?”  I asked, massaging shampoo into my hair.

“Jeffrey Katzenberg?” She said.

I nearly slipped in the tub and cracked my skull.

“WHAT?!?!”

“Yeah, some guy named Jeffrey Katzenberg.  Who is he?”

“KATZENBERG?  JEFFREY KATZENBERG CALLED HERE?”

“Yeah.. and he is….”

“KATZENBERG!  SPIELBERG!  GEFFEN!   DREAMWORKS!  SKG!  KATZENBERG!”  I sputtered and slipped and rinsed and threw on a towel and somehow managed to answer the phone.  “Mr. Katzenberg.. *squeek* Hello sir, how are you…”

We spoke for a bit about the company, what Dreamworks was doing, how exciting it is here, and other things.  I think the conversation lasted all of two minutes, but in that time I was immediately impressed with Jeffrey’s passion for animation, his excitement about the studio, and I knew I wanted to work here.

I’ve been fortunate to have been in meetings with Jeffrey a few times in my nearly 6 years at Dreamworks, and have to say that even though it’s nerve-wracking at times (he IS the big boss, after all), he’s always been really engaging, intelligent, honest, and 99.9% of the time completely correct.  I really value his notes and love the dedication he has to his staff.

Anyway, the article great read & really gives some good insight into his head.  Enjoy!

That being said.. the trailer looks great!

Big congrats to Simon Otto and everyone else on the animation crew (and other departments too!).

I’m not going to get into specific tricks and techniques for what we’re going to do (this is a public blog, after all), but I thought others might find it interesting at least to hear what I feel are the 3 areas of focus that are important to having a creative, successful, and happy team dynamic. I think that these values probably apply to almost any team dynamic.

You’ll notice that I’ve labeled each area A, B, and C, not 1, 2, 3, because I don’t think there is a hierarchy as to which area should be considered first.  Each area is of equal importance, and while not every decision one makes can have each area “win”, I believe if each area is considered while making decisions, in the long run you can achieve growth and success in all of them.

Area A: The Best Quality Product

This area of focus is on making the best quality product (whatever it is you’re creating.  In my case, the best animation and acting we can produce).  Here, all of your decisions should be focused on the good of the product.  This include things like – who do you have working on the most key components of your product?  Have you done your research?  What is the end goal?  What tools do you need to reach that goal?  What are the possible pitfalls that can get in the way?   When I started on this show I pictured the end result of what we would need to have a successful show.  What would our rigs need to do?  What specific tools would we need?  Who knowledge would I have needed to have?

Picturing the end result allowed me to work backwards and ask important questions about the features we needed.  If the rigs had to support “x”-feature, then what do I need to do to ensure that could happen?  How much planning do we need to have?  Are the tools even available to support this feature?  Who do I know that can create it?  How much time would it take?

By asking these things at the head of the show, I could build a path and plan on how to ensure we would be ready once the show started.  Knowing that it’s impossible to foresee every eventual hurdle and hiccup, we also created a plan for how to handle problems we don’t know about yet.  It’s important to realize that something will happen that will try and keep you from reaching this goal.  Instead of being surprised and reacting to it, create a plan ahead of time so when it occurs, you have a method for dealing with it that keeps everyone sane and “happy”.

Area B: The Happiest and Most Productive Team

Of course it’s impossible to create a great product without a great team behind it.  This second area of focus is all about your team and how it works together.  You have to think about what THEY need to achieve this goal.  What can you do to help the team morale (always an issue when people are working hard and putting their hearts on the line every day in dailies).  How can you help them grow together, learn to trust each other, and work in harmony?  How can you remove any of the political back-stabbing that can happen in group dynamics and help them nurture each other instead?  How can you ensure that perception of your team is one of compassion, cooperation, and inspiration?

Area C: The Individual

Of course, each team is made up of unique individuals, and if every person isn’t feeling satisfied and creative, then it’s difficult to have the team work successfully.  And if the team isn’t working, then there’s no way you’re going to achieve the best product you can.

I like to think broader than that, though.  I’m not just trying to help animators be great so this particular film is great.  I want the animators to be happy, creative, successful, fulfilled, empowered, and passionate because that’s the kind of environment that I feel is a great place to work.  I want every animator to feel like they’re growing, that there is a future for them, and that they “control” that future.  I know that I always work my best when I feel like I have a personal stake in the results of what I’m doing.  I want every animator to have goals that are greater than their current abilities, and know that they’ve got a team of people supporting and encouraging them to achieve those goals.  Knowing that it’s okay for them to reach and fall, because we’re there to help pick them up and allow them to reach again.  If your team doesn’t feel safe reaching and failing, then they’ll never reach and achieve.

Growth.. personal and professional are important to me.   That’s why we’ve asked each animator to create a list of goals for themselves.. for the show, for their careers, for their personal lives.  They can share it with me or not, but I want them to at least think about it.  Then, they should think about what the next physical action they should take that would help them achieve the goal.  This is actually something I did a few years ago when I was animating on Shrek the Third.  I had a goal to become a supervising animator, but I felt like I didn’t quite have the acting chops to achieve it.  So I thought about what I needed to reach this goal.  I wrote to my Head of Character Animation and my Department Supervisor and said that I had an eventual goal to be a supervisor, but felt like I was lacking in subtle acting ability.  In order to achieve my goal, I wanted to focus more of my animation time on subtle shots so I could learn and grow.  I wrote about what things I would be doing personally to become better in this area, and then asked for their support and the opportunity to try these more challenging shots.   Sure enough, I was given more subtle shots and was pushed beyond my comfort level.  I knew I had their support to grow, and felt okay failing because they were behind me.  It was hard, but I worked at it, and I soon became a supervising animator (and now a Head of Character Animation).

Making Decisions..

As I mentioned earlier, not every decision we make can support each area of focus.  Sometimes we have to give certain shots to animators we know can achieve the level required in the short time we have.   Sometimes we can’t afford a training class for the entire department even though it would be incredibly useful and in the long run would help everyone become stronger.  Sometimes an individual animator’s goal on a particular shot or sequence will not work with our current schedule and we can’t accommodate them.  However, we are always thinking of each area of focus with every decision.  We try hard when there are conflicting goals to find a way to still achieve a desired result by looking at things over the course of time.

Maybe this particular shot can’t go to this particular animator, but we can give that animator two simpler shots, and then on the next sequence we’ll give them the shot that will really push them, and in order to support them in their growth, we’ll make sure the supervisor has extra time put aside to help them and work with them so they’re supported and not just left dangling in the wind.

Maybe once in a while we’d have to work saturdays during crunch in order to get the show done on time, and maybe that means that parents won’t get to see their families as much.. but what if everyone in the department took a few bucks every day and put it in a pot, and then we took some money from the department morale budget and set up a family picnic one saturday every month with food and drinks and games for the kids to play?  And what if we personally thanked all the family members for their understanding and patience?

Maybe we have to make hard decisions that make some people unhappy, or it may take longer to achieve their goals.. but I firmly believe that by focusing on these three areas with every decision, and letting the teams know that we’re actively doing this, we can really help create a creative, supported, artistic, professional, forward-thinking, engaged, successful team that will produce the most amazing work possible.

At least, that’s my thought.

I’d love to hear yours!

This past weekend my wife spent some time working on the blog for her business.  She runs an interior design company – Penelope Jones Interior Design – and is quite amazing, I must say. Her sense of color, texture, form, and light blows me away.  I love watching her step into a room, look around, and immediately her brain starts churning as she works out what walls need to go, how the flow of the room should work, and what the place should feel like.

We recently renovated our bathroom, and I was in the lucky position to not see any of it until it was done.  I was blown away.  She took this really disgusting little room that I hated being in & turned it into a gorgeous, elegant, and beautiful room that just feels “right”.  AND she did it on a budget, not that you can tell by looking at it.

Enjoy!

You can access them and other items in the store.

I’m often asked if these titles are still relevant in the industry today, and I have to say I still think they are. They’re obviously older techniques (they came out in 2001 and 2002), but many people consider them to be really great learning tools and I’ve had amazing feedback from them over the years.

I hope people find these useful!

Yes, I’m going to bite the bullet and commit.

This is a really big deal for me, because this search has gone on for quite a while.  I’ve tried numerous systems, and even used multiple todo lists at the same time.

I’ve tried pure web-based applications and pure iPhone apps.  I’ve tried using Outlook to manage my tasks and a OS X to email combination.

Through everything I’ve tried, only one application has had the best customer support, iPhone application, and web application that makes it easy, cheap, and possible to use a GTD system to manage my tasks, be they management, animation, home, etc.

That application is raman amplifier Toodledo.com.

Yes, I hate the web-based UI.  I can’t stand that I can’t have subtasks unless I pay for support.  The name makes me think of the Denny’s “rooty tooty fresh ‘n fruity” commercial from the 90′s.

But even with all that, every other todo application I’ve tried has been lacking in some area, and Toodledo (shudder) lacks the least.  The only thing I really don’t like about it is the UI on the web page, and there are so many other ways of integrating with it that I can get over that.

Here are the things I dig about it:

• The iPhone application – easy to use, syncs fast, 4 bucks
• The forums – super crazy active with great advice!
• The developers – actively working to improve their product.  This is more than I can say about RTM and Todoist, my two other favorite apps
• Integration with other tools – iPhone, twitter, email, google gadgets, firefox, ical, rss, jott… the list goes on and on!
• Customized saved searches
• Tags and contexts and folders and goals.. and subtasks if you’re a pro subscriber!

So if you haven’t tried Toodledo, give it a try.. but use this link:
http://www.toodledo.com/index.php?ref=td49a592734c5eb
if you do, because if 4 people sign up I get pro access for life!

Right off the bat I am definitely liking the ability to quickly add tasks using the simple “a” hotkey.  You can also organically add contexts as you work by simply typing something like:

Email ron@happyhollow.com about the backpacking adventure @email

and it will quickly add the context for you.  Very handy!

You can also have nested projects, and you can color them to make it easier to tell them apart. Below, you can see my task list for the next 7 days.  Notice how clean it looks?  I love the nested projects, the clear color separation, the projects & contexts.  It’s just clean and easy to read.

Now this doesn’t mean I don’t have any issues with how todoist works currently.  Firstly, switching a task between projects isn’t as easy as it could be.  Currently you have to click on a little down arrow, choose “move to another project” and then choose that project from a list.  It would be better if you could just drag it to the project.. after all, it’s listed right there on the left!

Also, you can’t do group edits yet, you have to edit things one at a time which is frustrating.

When entering a task, you have to click on the date field.  I wish I could just tab over to the date, or just enter “wednesday”.. but right now I have to click on the date field.

Of course the biggie.. there’s no mobile application for it yet.  Arrgh!

Since I’m an animator at heart (even though I do more managing and meetings now), I decided to try adding tasks to make notes of each fix I wanted to do on a shot I’m currently working on.

I created a project specifically for this shot, and then started listing tasks.

I went stream of consciousness to add as many tasks as I could, just scrubbing back and forth over the animation, adding a task for each.  I was able to add a lot of tasks relatively quickly.  Click Add Task, type, click Save.  Not too bad.  It could be faster if I could enter a bunch of tasks at once, but it’s certainly not a deal-breaker.

The problem came when I went to then order the tasks so I could tackle them most efficiently.  I couldn’t find a way to order them quickly and easily.

In fact, I don’t think there’s any way other than editing the task and changing priority. It literally takes 4 clicks to change the priority from 1-5 of a task.  The other tough thing is that you need to be aware of all other task priorities to make sure you set this task’s priority correctly.  Is the eye tweak a higher priority than the nose tweak?  They’re both facial priorities, so maybe they both go under a priority 3.  But then there’s another eyeline change I want to tackle.  So that’s priority 3 as well.  The big problem there is that I can’t re-order within that level 3 priority to plan my attack.  Very frustrating. * See the update below for a faster workflow!

This is quite the problem for me, it means I really have to think about the tasks as I log them and make sure I do it in the right order.  I don’t want to work that way.. I want to tackle the order of tasks as when I’m in the mode of processing them and figuring out what I have time and energy for.  I could just sort of skip around through the task list itself, but that means that I have to keep re-evaluating each item to see what I have energy for.  I’d rather make the plan once, and then just go through tick tick tick.

I’m hoping that I am missing a feature somewhere, or that the Developer is working on this.  It could certainly make it tough for me to use GTDAgenda to handle shot tasks.

Anyway, here are a few other thoughts that came up throughout the day.

??????
• Notes per task – need more room than just 1 line.
• Really missing the ability to create a whole bunch of tasks at once.
• Too much mouse traffic with the clicking on Add Task, filling out all the data, and then having to click Add Task.  Would much rather a system where I do quick-add & add @contexts and .Projects at the same time.
• The ability to submit tasks via Twitter is really cool.  It allows me to enter tasks much faster, and then head to GTDAgenda to edit them.
• You can also apply tasks via email.  The subject is the name of the task, and the body is the note.  I don’t know if you can automatically assign the email tasks to projects or not.. it would be great if you could.

Hope people are finding these posts useful!

Update -

Dan contacted me with an update to some of the notes I have above.  I thought I’d include his reply here because there’s some really great news for you gtdAgenda lovin people!   I don’t know when these issues will be released, but the fact that Dan is working on them is great!

One of the next features that will be released is the possibility to insert multiple tasks at once.

Regarding changing priorities, it can be done faster if you select the task(s) and then use the drop-down menu (More Actions) for this action. No need to edit.

When you send tasks by email, it’s not possible to assign a project to it, or context. However, each project and context has its unique email address too, and if you send tasks to its email the task will be added to that project/context.

Again, I’ll just say that all of these thoughts are for how *I* like to work. You may agree or disagree, and that’s totally fine. If this helps you make a decision on what kind of task software you’d like to use, great! If not, then that’s fine too. My main goal is to help me decide what workflow I like and determine whether or not to keep using a particular piece of code.

I also hope that these notes help the developers of GTDAgenda. If it’s helpful for you.. great, glad to be of service! I really appreciate the opportunity to use the software!

Anyway, on to the thoughts for Day 2..

First of all, I realized that in order to really get a handle on my next actions, I had to figure out how to order them better on the Next Actions page. By default I had everything listed as a #1 priority, so everything just sort of showed up in whatever order they appeared in. Since I had some @waiting tasks, and some specific actions I figured I could use the Priority feature to at least do some ordering. So I went with the following scheme:

Priority 1 – tasks that I need to do

Priority 2 – Tasks that I need to talk to people about

Priority 3 – Tasks that I’m waiting anxiously on information about

Priority 4 – Tasks that I want to see on this page, but I’ll be periodically checking in on.

This allowed me to have a much cleaner Next Actions list. There are actually 5 priorities, but 4 suited me nicely.

Some other thoughts that have come up throughout the day:

• Pre-defined Someday/Maybe and Archived areas is very handy!
• When using the mobile version of GTDAgenda, i noticed that the Next Actions page doesn’t display the task’s context. It does this in the online version. Personally, I like to see it and I wish it were there.
• If adding a task in project view (gtdagenda mobile), it should know what project you’re already adding to. Currently you have to add that yourself. (Note: I just received a note from the developer, this is a bug that’s been fixed! sweet!)
• When marking a task as done, you currently have to select it first, and then mark it done. I’d much rather just have it automatically marked done when I click it & then allow me to go back and unmark it.
• Can’t edit/modify global goals in the mobile version.
• Would really like a “quick entry” mode so I can just power through all my tasks and add them as quick as possible. Then, once the tasks are in my inbox I could process them into projects and contexts. Currently you have to enter and process all at once. I find I’m using paper to write down my tasks, then I enter them into GTDagenda all at once.
• I like the fact that you can have Repeating tasks, that’s very handy.

Like I said, I’m starting to get into the swing of it. I’m finding areas of GTDAgenda I like, and also areas that I’d like to work with differently. I appreciate all the links to other todo and gtd management tools, I’m putting them on my to do list and checking them out!

Hopefully later this week I’ll get to start using some of this methodology for my shots & we’ll see how it holds up.

1. It has to be cross-platform.  At work I use Linux, at home I use Mac, and in meetings I use my iPhone and pen/paper.  So I need to be able to add tasks in any environment, and get access to my information at any point as well.
2. It has to be fast.  If it takes too long to enter data, it’s not worth it.
3. It has to be flexible.  There’s no way I’m going to be able to develop the proper system right off the bat.  I’m expecting it to modify and change over time, so I want it to be flexible and easily scalable.
4. It has to be fun. If I don’t like using it, I never will.
5. It has to be visually pleasing.  Seems shallow, but when I look at it I want to think “woah momma!” not “oh grandpa, put your pants back on”.

Thanks to a quick email by the developer of http://gtdagenda.com who is doing a great job of getting the word out about his system, I’m making it my first pick to try using a GTD methodology for my work.  I’ve been using it for day and a half, and will post the results of my findings over the course of this week.  Since I’m learning this software as I use it, I’m sure there are going to be things I discover or things that power-users can tell me that I’m not aware of.  If you have particular tips and tricks about various softwares, please let me know!

This isn’t a full review, just some first impressions based on using it for the past day and a half.  Your mileage may vary.

GTD Agenta – First Impressions

My initial thought as signing up was that the website itself does a great job of giving you an overview of how the tool works.  It’s got screen shots, breaks things down into sections, and a quick read gives you the basics of how you can use gtdagenda rather quickly.  It even gives some examples of how to impliment GTD and ZTD with their tool.  Very handy!

Below I’ve listed some Pros and Cons based on my initial experience.

Pros

Dan (the developer) is very responsive. I’ve emailed him a few times and he’s been very quick to get back to me with responses and notes.  I’ve certainly used other software where the developers take a long time to get back to their users, or never do.  Dan responds personally to email, and also does a great job about getting the word out about GTDagenda.  He obviously is very passionate about it.

Eventual IPhone application (no ETA). One of my requirements is an iPhone application that syncs with the tool.  Currently GTDagenda has no iPhone app, but it does have a mobile version that works pretty well.  Unfortunately, I’m often in meetings where I have no internet access, and need to be able to have something local that I can sync with.  Dan has mentioned that there is an iPhone app on the way, but there’s no ETA on it.

Context/Projects list on right is very nice. I really like that on the right hand side of the screen are you list of contexts and projects.  You can quickly filter by either of these and each one shows you how many tasks are in those contexts or project.  Cool!

Projects with tasks but no “Next Action” flag turn red. This is a great way to make sure that all your projects can move forward.  Super awesome fantastic!

Interaction is relatively fast, no long redraw time . While not the speediest web app, it’s certainly no dog.

Checklists.  A great way to help you form productive habits.  Like going to the gym every day.  Nice.

Calendar on the sidebar. I like the calendar on the right to quickly see what’s due or done on any given day.

High Level Goals. Basically this is like grouping the projects into bigger projects. Handy for doing things like “Projects – Mine” and “Projects – Others” for projects you’re responsible for, but other people are doing them.

Email Notification – you can have GTDagenda email you every day with your “next actions”.  Nice!

Cons

No current iPhone app, only web access. If you work where you have spotty access, this limits ability to use GTDAgenda

Only 1 context per task. I like to use multiple contexts to handle people, departments, locations, etc

Can’t assign a “person” to a task. For example, if I’m waiting for John to finish a shot, I want the @waiting for context, and the @john context.

Very linear workflow.  You MUST create a project and a context before you create  a task.  If you’re in the middle of creating a task and then you need to add a context, you loose your task creation.  This really inhibits my workflow.

No quick way to add a task. You must be in Task/Next Action, or project pages.

Adding contexts and projects wasn’t intuitive right off the bat. The first time I wanted to add a context I had to hunt around to find it.

UI seems a bit messy. I prefer the clean UI of Todoist

Date due can’t have a specific time, only a day

Not “AJAX”ey enough. This is totally subjective, but I prefer the interaction of Todoist.

Can’t reorder tasks on Today. If I have a whole bunch of Next Actions, I would like to be able to look at them and then order them in the order I want to attack them.

No automatic assignment of Next Action. I would like to be able to automatically assign the next todo in a project to Next Action as soon as I complete the current Next Action.  This way I can stay in the Next Action page and just keep cruzing instead of having to then go over to the Projects page, set my next action, and then head back to the Next Action page.

Difficult to separate various tags in page lists. When looking at my list of things to do today, it would be great to easily see what I’m waiting for, what’s a @work task, etc. Having colored lines for specific tags would help this workflow.

So there you go.. first impressions after using the tool for one day.  I’ll keep on it for the week and then see how it goes with my weekly review at the end of the week.  Thoughts?  Suggestions? Opinions?  Send ‘em my way!

This is from my example of my “Fixing the bathroom” project in my previous post.

One of the tasks was to “restock the bathroom with supplies”.

So in the course of processing that list, I figure it’s a good idea to make a list of all the supplies I might possibly need. Let’s just mind-sweep this and get everything out.

• toilet paper
• soap
• soap dish
• extra toothpaste
• deodorant
• bath balls
• kids soap
• towels
• plunger
• kids toys
• candles
• shaver
• shaving cream
• face wash
• contact lens solution
• tooth brushes

There’s probably a bunch more, but this is enough for now.  So, I’ve made my mind sweep of all the things I might need for the bathroom.  However, we’re about 4 weeks out from having the bathroom ready to be stocked and used because we still need to clean it out, paint it, etc etc.  So should I wait to purchase these things?   Maybe, maybe not.  It all depends on my schedule, how busy I am, where I’m shopping, what my travel schedule looks like, etc.  It could be that I’m going to be heading to a shop where it might be really convenient to get this stuff while purchasing paint (for example) to paint the bathroom.  If I’m already there, I should pick up stuff that’s convenient, right?

But how do I know what’s convenient?  Should I keep this list with me at all times?  Probably not.  If I keep the list this way, every time I go to the store I’ll read through the entire list and re-process everything to see if there’s anything there that I need to buy.  What a waste of time!  Instead, let’s process this list by adding contexts!

• toilet paper @supermarket
• soap @supermarket
• soap dish @Bed Bath and Beyond
• extra toothpaste @supermarket
• deodorant @supermarket
• bath balls @Bed Bath and Beyond
• kids soap @Babies R Us
• towels @Wash
• plunger @Home Depot
• kids toys @Babies R Us
• candles @Scent-amental
• shaver @supermarket
• shaving cream @supermarket
• face wash @drug store
• contact lens solution @drug store
• tooth brushes @supermarket

The cool thing about this is that if I’m going to the supermarket, I can bring up a list of all my items that are tagged with @supermarket and pick them up right away.  Then I just store them until I’m ready to use them!   When I’m getting painting supplies at Home Depot, I see that I’ve got a plunger I need to buy.  So I get it then.  It simplifies my life because I’m able to create lists that are totally dependent on context.

It’s also possible to tag all these things with a context like @errand, so you can run over them quickly if you’re going to head out on some errands.  Then you can say “oh, I’ve got a bunch of things to pick up at Babies R Us and it’s on the way home.  I’ll head on past!”.  While you’re in the store, you check your @babies r us and grab everything you may need for any project you may be working on.

So friggin’ cool!

It’s a common problem in the animation industry.. We have to be creative, unconventional, unique, exciting and so does our work. We try hard not to resort to cliché and formulaic animation, and in order to do this we need the time and freedom to experiment.

We are also charged with meeting very specific and hard deadlines whose very nature can make it difficult to be in the head space to be creative. The closer the deadline, the more pressure, the harder it is to be creative and the quicker we resort to animation tricks and techniques to try and get a step ahead.

While sometimes necessary, I have often wondered if there is a method for handling notes and changes better to be able to keep our focus on being creative, and not on the looming deadline.

I found that by following a specific methodology for blocking my shots I could worry less about the technical alpects of animating and could focus on the performance. I discovered the same thing about moving to first pass.. Keep strict control over my methods, and any anxiety over process is gone, again allowing me to focus on the tAsk at hand.

Focus.

That really is the key to this whole thing. Having the ability to focus on the right thing at the right moment for the right amount of time.

So how do we work on our ability to focus? How do we cut out all other distractions and make sure we don’t have anything else bogging us down?

Getting Things Done

Lately I’ve been reading a lot about something called “Getting Things Done”, or GTD. This is based on a book by David Allen. It’s a pretty interesting concept, and I think it could work really well for helping animators focus on their notes and tasks, getting them done quickly and on time/budget/etc.

David like to talk about this idea of “mind like water”. It’s getting everything out of your mind and into a trusted system so you don’t have all these little “oh I’ve gotta..” and “oh, that reminds me..” and “what was that thing I had to do..” thoughts floating around in your head. Once that stuff is down somewhere, you can easily review it and know exactly what things you can do in any given context, and most importantly what the next action is that you need to do on any project to move it along.

A quick example.. let’s say we do a mind sweep about fixing the bathroom and we come up with the following tasks:

• clean out bathroom
• paint the wall
• strip the drawers
• put up blinds
• put up artwork
• mop the floor
• re-stock the bathroom with supplies

Those are a good list of tasks, but some of them are more involved than others.  Before starting any of these that are now in our “inbox”, we should go through and figure out exactly what each of these tasks involves.  We can look at each one at a time and then figure out if they’re one task or multiple.  If each of these is actually too complicated to be a single task, we can make it a project and then create a list of sub-tasks for each project that will help us achieve it.  Then we’ll mark the “next physical action” we can take on any of those projects, and also specify the CONTEXT in which the action takes place.  I’ll demonstrate:

• Clean Out Bathroom

This task seems simple, but there’s a lot of junk in there.  In fact, there’s so much old junk, that we really need a debris box in order to effectively clean out the bathroom.  So here’s what my new project “clean out bathroom” becomes:

• Clean Out Bathroom
  • Order Debris box – Boxes ‘R Us – 555-2121 @call @next
  • Ask brother for help @call @next
  • Haul everything out to debris box @bathroom
  • Ask to remove debris box 555-2121 @call

As you can see, I’ve broken up the “Clean out bathroom” task into 4 separate tasks that are actual physical acts that I can do.  I’ve also added “contexts” to each of these.  For example, I have 3 @call contexts, meaning that those tasks need to be done when i’m near a phone and can call somebody.  The @bathroom context means I need to be at the bathroom to do the task.  The @next context means it’s the next action I can take in this project.  I actually have two @next actions, because I can do both of them next, and it doesn’t matter really which one I do first.

Why do I need to add a “context”?  Simply put, the GTD method asks us to do this type of planning with EVERY task/project/thought we have.  It doesn’t matter if it’s as simple as buying soap at the super market, or as complicated as planning a corporate takeover.  The thought is that if you get this stuff out of your head into a series of lists and trusted systems, you free your mind to have more thoughts and be more creative.  Once you’ve got all this stuff out, you can make smart decisions about what to do.  You make those decisions based on the “context” you’re in.  For example, if I’m near a phone, I can look at a list of @call tasks and start making phone calls.  If I’m not near a phone, then I should need to look at that list and I shouldn’t be bothered by those things I can’t physically do.  Just like the @bathroom context.  Why should I be thinking “oh, I need to clean out the bathroom” if I’m on an airplane flying to bombay?  Once I’ve got that task down, I shouldn’t need to think about it until I’m in the situation where it comes up.

So, how does this apply to animation?

Well, I’m wondering if making these types of lists and contexts can help when dealing with notes or fixing shots.  I’ve often suggested to people that they make lists of all the changes they want to do on their shots before they start making those fixes, allowing them to get a better idea of what types of changes they’ll need to make in the amount of time they have.  This then lets them determine WHAT is the most important thing to fix.  Maybe if we include this idea of @contexts, we can enhance this process.

Let’s look at an example.

Let’s say you show your shot to your director and you get a series of notes.  You put all these notes in your inbox and it looks something like this:

• Check your weight
• Raise the right arm higher
• There’s a pop on frame 42 in the torso
• Feet could use a little work
• Add some eye blinks after the word “Boingo”
• Fix the lipsync
• open the jaw more in the start, but it’s kinda flappy at the end
• Don’t forget the overlap in the fingers
• Tighten up the timing around frames 173
• Exaggerate the eyes
• Soften the third wink.

First of all, good for you on writing all these notes down.  That’s the first step!  But now, instead of going through the list and DOING the notes, let’s process them into various contexts.  We can break them up any number of ways.. off the top of my head I’m thinking @body, @face, @lipsync, @finesse but you can really do whatever you want.  Maybe break it into sections of the shot, maybe into characters, do whatever works for your shot.  Anyway, let’s process this:

• Check your weight @body
• Raise the right arm higher @body
• There’s a pop on frame 42 in the torso @body
• Feet could use a little work @finesse
• Add some eye blinks after the word “Boingo” @face
• Fix the lipsync @lipsync
• open the jaw more in the start, but it’s kinda flappy at the end @lipsync
• Don’t forget the overlap in the fingers @finesse
• Tighten up the timing around frames 173 @body
• Exaggerate the eyes @face
• Soften the third wink. @finesse

Once you’ve done this, you can now figure out the order of approach for handling these contexts.  Obviously, anything relating to the body is going to be very important, because it affects everything else.  So I’d re-order my tasks based on the context.

• Check your weight @body
• Raise the right arm higher @body
• There’s a pop on frame 42 in the torso @body
• Tighten up the timing around frames 173 @body

• Add some eye blinks after the word “Boingo” @face
• Exaggerate the eyes @face

How fun!  Recently there was an image posted on AICN from the project I’ve been working on for a while.  It was announced last week as Oobermind, a film to be released on Nov 5, 2010.

Unfortunately I can’t comment much on the film, the image, or anything else really at this point except that it’s a blast to work on and I’m really enjoying my role as Head of Character Animation on the project.  We’ve got some great people on it, and Tom McGrath (the director) is hilarious and awesome to work with.  His enthusiasm for animation as an art form is very inspiring for me.

Anyway, I’ll periodically post what I can as we keep going on the project.. in this case, here’s a link that I found where people are discussing the plot and the show.  Like I said, I can’t say anything.. but love reading what people think.

io9 – Nothing Can Stop The Ultimate Victory Of Oobermind Except Oobermind Himself – Oobermind.

Wow.. my old office is now a museum!  Crazy!!

If anyone goes, I’d love to see photos.. I’m curious if my old desk is still there & if they have maniquins representing the animators “working at their desks”.  Is the ping pong table still there?

You can see the repost here:
http://www.11secondclub.com/helpful_hints/the_fear_of_moving_past_blocking/

I thought it was a great idea. I hadn’t actually re-read my post in a while, but was very happy to hear that it had a great influence on him & other animators he spoke with. I just read through it now & realized how much relevance it actually has on my latest “obsession”.. trying to better manage my time & prepare for production.

See the show I’m currently Head of Character Animation on starts animation production pretty soon & I’m in the last stages of making sure everything is ready for our crew so we can just kick butt the moment we get our first sequence. There are a lot of little loose ends to tie up, threads to follow, and loops to close and if you take a 40,000 foot look at everything it can become pretty daunting.

Just like trying to move from blocking to spline animation can appear daunting at times.

So I’ve been investigating various task management theories.. the one that’s sticking with me the most is the Getting Things Done methodology that was started by David Allen.  It’s all about creating a process for handling all the various forms of “input” that you get, and then managing that stuff systematically.

What I love about it is that you can take a seemingly daunting task.. say, getting your email inbox to zero, and approach it a step at a time until it’s done.

The other thing I really like about it and this method of moving from blocking to first pass of animation I wrote about is that once you fully commit yourself to this method of working, it totally relieves all your stress about the task you’re working on.  Now that I have this method of animating that I completely adhere to, the only stress I have about my shots is whether or not the animation and ideas are any damn good to begin with.  Not whether or not I have the chops to take them from blocking to first pass, which is where most of my stress was before.

So with this method of handling my inbox, as long as I completely follow it and stick to it religiously, I won’t have any stress about there being any loose ends I’ve dropped, or balls I’ve left untied.  Instead I can focus on the pure excitement of a deadline coming up that we can’t change & the knowledge that my team and I are getting ready as best we can.

For someone who likes to react to things emotionally and intuitively, this systematic stuff is actually pretty cool.

*note:  in case you’re wondering what that picture is.. It’s Alex Wong from the group “The Animators”.  He and I went to elementary school together & is an awesome musician who also likes to draw.

So I did.

Yes, that’s right.. I got my gmail (10,000+ messages) and my work email (3,000+) down to zero. They’re not ALWAYS at zero, but by the end of the day, they’re zero zero zero zero zero.

I still have things to do.. projects to work on.. etc.. but those items are put in folders that I check regularly & keep up to date. So if I have 10 minutes, I can sit down and go through my “to do” folder. Or I can check my “waiting for” folder.

It’s kind of a GTD (getting things done) technique.. but here’s how I did it.

• Create a folder called “to review”
• Create another folder called “archives”
• Create another folder called “do now”
• Create another folder called “waiting for”
• Start as far back in your email as you can, and start going through email by email and ask yourself these questsions:
• Is there any action I need to take? Can I delete it?
• Can I delegate it?
• Can I do it in under 2 minutes?
• Can I defer it?

If there’s no action you need to take and you can delete it, just delete it. And then search your email for anything by that person/place/etc that you can also delete. I get a lot of “mailing list” messages that I never delete.. so I find all those and BAM, 120 messages gone.
If you can’t “delete” it, but you can’t take an action on it, shove it into the archives folder. You can create sub-folders in there if you want for projects, friends, etc. But get it out of your inbox.
If there is an action that needs to be taken, first ask.. can you give that action to someone else? If so, do that. Then delete or archive the email. Or shove it into a folder called “waiting for” so you can go back later and see if the person did what you asked them to.
If you can’t give it to someone else.. ask, can you do it in under 2 minutes? If you can.. put it in the “do now” folder.
If you can’t do it in under 2 minutes, put it in the “to review” folder. If you want, you can categorize that folder as well.. “jira tickets”, “personal”, “blah blah”.. or just throw them in for later review.

Now, go through each email doing this. Be harsh. If you don’t need it, really get rid of it. And go fast. Try not to spend more than 10 seconds on any particular email. Do groups if you can. The goal is to get everything OUT of your inbox and into the two folders “do now” and “to review”.

Once your inbox is empty, give yourself 10, 20 minutes to do the “do now” items. Just start from the top and do them. If they’re “done” and you’re waiting for a response.. put the email in the “waiting for” folder. If you want to store the email for reference, throw it in the archives. Or delete it if you don’t need it.

Now go through your “to review” folder and for each item think to yourself “what is the outcome I want from this item?” Either it’s “a room booked with all the leads” or “a sweet jacket” or “bob’s party planned” or whatever. Then, write down what the next action is that will help you get there. Make it an active action. “Get the beer” isn’t an action.. “Call beer store and order beer” is a good action. It’s specific. Then create a folder, or todo list, or something that allows you to associate those “next actions” with the item you’re reading. Then go on to the next, and the next. Process everything in your “to review” folder BEFORE doing any actions.

Then, you can look at that list and see all your “next actions” and you can figure out what’s the most important step to take.

Whee!

It’s our first offical 3d project.. animated from the beginning in 3d, aware of stereo the whole darn time.  I was lucky enough to be on the pre-production team for the show.  I got to work closely with the Uber Head of Character Animation David Burgess, and the incredibly talented Supervising Animator Line Andersen for a good couple of months.

Most of the time I focused on B.O.B.. (rigged by the AMAZING Terran Boylan) helping figure out how his controls should work, doing animation tests, etc.. but I also did some pre-production animation of Susan, Dr. Cockroach, Link, the President, and a really fun generic man test.  Oh yeah, and the cable car.

It was a ton of fun working with the crew in LA.  The character tds were great (lead by the dynamic Duo.. Kevin Ochs and Kevin Rogers.)  I really wanted to make t-shirts for them that said “I’m with Kevin” and had arrows pointing to each other, but never got around to it.  D’oh!  I hope I get a chance to work with them again sometime.. good times all around!

Seen the movie twice now and it’s a good fun flick.  The stereo is really cool, and I think is done in a way that pulls you into the picture and lets you really experience it nicely.  There are a couple of sequences that just blew my friggin mind when I saw them come together.. huge props to everyone in FX & lighting for those.. you know who you are.. well done, your kung-fu is mighty!

Go check it out.. worth the price of admission, in my opinion!

Please go check it out ‘cuz it’s totally awesome!

I found it so inspiring and exciting to watch people in their everyday activities.. Noticing how huge crowds are like fluid noise.. If you stare at any one person you see how unique and individual they are, but if you pull back and blur your eyes it’s as if everyone swims along with each others current.

It reminded me that every character has a unique story that leads them to the moment you are observing or animating them. Someone walks in front of you.. Where are they headed? Where did they just come from? What are they doing that night? Whom are they in love with? When was the last time they had a good talk with their best friend? Where are they from? How long are they in town?

So many questions.. So many opportunities.. So many possibilities.. Its really quite exciting!

So today we went to the zoo with the kids.. I was hoping to get a bit more reference shot, but instead spent the time playing and laughing with the kids. In the end.. It was more inspiring and exciting than video reference could ever be.

coffee!

I came to Dreamworks for a few reasons. One was because I had been in New Zealand for over four years and missed my family. Another was my desire to continue my animation education surrounded by some of the best character animators in the world. I had a great desire to focus exclusively on animation and not do any technical (rigging) work, and I knew that since Dreamworks was a propeiatary platform there wouldn’t be any way I could get sucked into that side of things again.

I came to learn, to absorb, to grow, and to become the best animator I could be.

Over the course of the past five years I have animated, supervised, worked closely with the rigging and development teams, spoken at events, given interviews, travelled, taught classes, brainstormed for the future of animation, and now I am heading up the character animation department for a new show. I have also bought and sold houses, performed major renovations, had two amazing children, and daily get the best hugs and cuddles ever invented.

Life is really quite wonderful and I can’t wait to see what comes in the next five years!

Thanks to my lovely family, my great friends, and to the people at Dreamworks for giving me opportunities and support beyond what I had ever dreamed.

11 for 11 I believe!

Congrats all!!!!!

Animation Tips & Tricks.

My good buddy Kevan Shorey posted some great content on the http://animatinotipsandtricks.com website today.  It’s about using contrast in animation.

For me, contrast is best used when trying to heighten an emotional beat.  For example.. if I’m trying to animate someone being “sad”, what do I do?  How sad do I go?  Does “this” pose represent sad?  What about “this” one?  It isn’t until I show a change from one pose to another that the real emotion comes out.  Sad is only sad when it’s compared to a previous pose.. or contrasted against another emotion all together.

I mean honestly.. if you look at droopy dog, one of the gags is his depressed saying “you know what?  I’m happy..”  Well, maybe to him.. that IS happy.. imagine if he were depressed!

Oh wow.. talk about a great book that every animator should get.

Amazon.com: Drawn to Life: 20 Golden Years of Disney Master Classes, Volume 1: The Walt Stanchfield Lectures: Walt Stanchfield, Don Hahn: Books.

As a 3d animator, I’ve had many people ask me what software they should learn, or what school they should go to, or what skills are necessary to be a “3d animator”.  I respond time and time again that the biggest thing they can learn is to observe others, and translate that observation.  Whether it’s acting it out, drawing it, or speaking about it we must be able to create a picture that represents the idea or emotion we are trying to represent.

Sketching is one of the fastest and most effective ways to communicate an idea.  I don’t sketch as often or as well as I should, but I can’t tell you how helpful it’s been to be able to draw to communicate over the years.  Even though I don’t draw my animation, I do use sketches and thumbnails to think about it.  I also will draw a quick eye pose to try and get across an idea to an animator when I’m giving them notes.

Even if you “can’t draw”, you should try and learn some of the tricks and tips that Walt Stanchfield talks about in his notes.  They’ll really help you communicate your ideas!

Someone at work found this video from Autodesk (previously Alias) on YouTube about weta’s use of Maya..

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMM_-rYc1T8

I remember the time of this shoot… it was right after we had finished Lord of the Rings, Return of the King.  I had finished my contract at Weta and was on a two month holiday.. probably the longest vacation I’ve had since I was about 14 years old.  It was amazing.. every day I’d get up.. go for a run with the dogs along the Eastern Walkway, come back and just hang out.

About three weeks into the holiday I was sitting back on the porch in our house, drinking a gin & tonic , and listening to a Loop cd.  The sun was beating down, but there was a slight breeze, making it possible to sit out and not get immediately drenched with sweat.  The secadas were a lovely backdrop to the rhythmic beats coming from the stereo, and for the first time in nearly 15 years I realized that I was completely and utterly relaxed.

I had nothing to “get ready” for.

There was no work on monday, no “how am I going to solve this problem” thoughs running through my head.

I wasn’t stressed about what Peter was going to say about my next shot, or whether or not I’d actually be able to complete the shot in the time provided.

There were no Mel scripts to fix.

No renders to check.

No shots that could use just a little more love.

The only thing I had to do, at that moment, was scratch a tiny itch that I had on my right shoulder.

But I let it sit there for a few minutes.. just slowly itching away.. because I was enjoying doing–and thinking about–absolutely nothing.

Just the sun, a drum beat, a cold glass in my hands, and a spider slowly crawling across my shoulder that would scare the crap out of me in about 47 more seconds.

I hate spiders.

This friday I’m going to be speaking at the Digital Media Arts College graduation ceremony.  I’ve spent the past few weeks trying to write a speech about owning your career & working towards a goal.  It’s been quite fun driving around, pretending to give the speech, realizing that I have WAY too many stories that are WAY too long to fit into a 15 minute talk.

Next week I’ll post the finished speech here for people to read, but in the meantime I thought I’d include one of the stories I had to cut.  This isn’t a “funny” story, but it’s meant to illustrate a point:  that it’s possible to achieve a goal if you understand how to work towards it.

When I graduated from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 1996, I was working for a 3d animation software company called Alias|Wavefront.  You may have heard of them, they created the software Maya – one of the most popular 3d animation software’s around.   I had been interning at Alias|Wavefront for 6 months, learning the ins and outs of Maya and was on the track to become the key tech support person for the product.  This is because every other tech support person was focused on supporting the legacy products: Power Animator, Wavefront, Kinemation, Dynamation, TDI, etc.  I was new, so instead of training me up on their older products, I spent my time learning Maya.

At the time, Maya was in Alpha stage, meaning it was so brand new it didn’t even have a file->save option.  Seriously.  You couldn’t save a file.  Since Maya was not even out the door, there wasn’t much to support so I spent most of my time testing the code & making little demos.  At one point I was in a video conference meeting with some developers in Toronto when I heard about this guy Bubba who was making a short film in Maya.

My ears immediately perked up.

Short Film?  Here?  Somebody is making a short film?

I didn’t even know that a job like that was POSSIBLE at Alias|Wavefront, let alone that someone was doing it.  I immediately thought “man, that guy is so LUCKY!  I want that job!”

I knew that my career at A|W wasn’t heading in that direction, I was headed to become the guy explaining to the customers that the drink holder on the computer wasn’t too small to hold their coke, the can didn’t fit because it was a CD drive.

So I set about figuring out a way to switch departments.  I didn’t want to just leave the current job for a number of reasons.  First, burning bridges is bad.  It’s the worst thing you can do.  There’s a saying, it’s not what you know but who you know, right?  There’s a third part to the saying..  It’s not what you know, but who you know and how you treat them.  So I didn’t want to piss off my boss.  Second, I didn’t know if Bubba needed anyone else on his team.  Third, even if he wanted another person, there was no way he’d know about me.

I realized that the first thing I had to do was solve the problem of my boss being upset if I left.  Since I was one of the people in the support department with the most knowledge about Maya, it stood to reason that I was going to be the main support person once Maya got released.  If I wasn’t there, then the team would have to scramble until everyone else got up to speed.  So I spent the next few weeks writing up a course explaining everything I knew about Maya and how it worked.  It was designed to help people who already knew other 3d software understand how Maya worked so they could get up to speed quickly.

Then I went to my boss and told her that I’d like to teach the class to the support crew in Toronto.  Kind of spread the knowledge around so we wouldn’t be hit too hard once Maya went out to beta customers.  She thought it was a great idea & sent me to Toronto the next week to meet with the team up there.

While there I introduced myself to Bubba.  I told him that I heard he was working on a short film & said that if he needed any help I’d be happy to help out.  We talked for a bit & I showed him a few things in Maya that I had picked up over the past few months.  He invited me out to sushi with the other two members of the team (Corban and Adrian) so they could tell me about it.  We talked, and ate, and drank sake, and beer, and had more sake and more beer, and more beer, and more sake, and at the end of it they said that they’d be happy to have me help out.

They were also happy to stick me with the $300 bill, but I was so happy I didn’t even care.

6 months later I moved onto that team full time & stayed there for 3 years, creating demos, short films, and generally getting to travel around the world & talk about Maya.

This experience demonstrated to me that just wanting something isn’t enough.  You have to actively go out and seek it.  To work for it.  And most importantly, do it in a way that doesn’t piss anybody off.

So after finishing recording of the videos, I decided to record myself creating a walk-cycle with the AFR rig.

Enjoy!

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1zrObqm4Fm0

Some of you may remember a website called 10 second club which has been around for a few years as a great testing-ground for animators. The concept was brilliant.. every month post a sound file and then let animators try and do their best to come up with the most unique and entertaining animation for that audio.

Unfortunately, 10secondclub is no more.. but fortunately, some excellent friends have opened up 11 second club (it’s one better!) which is basically the same thing, except this time it’s hosted by AnimationMentor.com!

Animation Mentor has provided a completely rad prize for the winner each month.. an official eCritique from a real animation mentor!  That’s right.. it’s a chance for the winner to get a critique just like the ones that we give students at the school.. but not only that, everyone can see the critique and learn from it!

What I love about this is that it gives the animator a great tool to improve themselves, and it also gives everyone a chance to see what an eCritique actually looks like.

The first critique was done by the famous Victor Navone, a hugely awesome person and animator who is just so talented it almost hurts.

The second critique was done by yours truly.. a very fun experience & I hope that Kevin (the november winner) finds it useful & informative!

Anyway, go check out 11secondclub.com and enjoy the experience!

I’m not sure how long the page will stay up with me on it, so I’ll quote the interview here:

Who is your favorite character that you’ve animated and why?
Most definitely Julian the Lemur King from Madagascar ( and now Madagascar 2: the Crate Escape). He’s just so much fun to animate! He’s a bit over the top and dramatic. And totally unafraid to do something completely asinine. So it’s just a ton of fun to figure out ways to make him act that are completely outrageous.

If you could do one thing differently on your journey to becoming an animator, what would it be?
I probably would have gone to an actual animation training program, I feel like a lot of my learning about actual animation technique was self-taught through many, many hours of making mistakes and trying again. I didn’t really start learning until I was actually working with animators every day.

How has the Animation Mentor experience been for you so far?
It’s been incredible. The amount of joy that I get from watching the talent just explode from the students is amazing. I absolutely love it when the students learn something over the course of a semester, and can’t wait to work alongside some of them at a studio! The joy and love of animation is totally palpable from Animation Mentor, not just from students but from everyone in the organization.

What inspired you to become an animator?
Actually, I think it all dates back to something that happened to me when I was about three years old. I was having these horrible nightmares about spiders, and would wake up screaming, crying, and totally terrified. My parents were trying everything in their power to get the nightmares to stop, but couldn’t do anything about them. Finally, after one horrendous episode, my mom took out a box of crayons and some paper and told me to draw the spider. So I did. Then she said “now draw yourself killing it.” So I drew myself killing the spider, making sure it would never come back to hurt me. What she was doing was teaching me to have power over my fear so I wouldn’t be affected by it. But what I think was actually happening was that I was learning to tell stories through art. And that’s what’s stuck, throughout the rest of my life I’ve absolutely loved listening to and telling stories whether through art, spoken word, film, cartoons, etc. The idea that it’s possible to think up an idea, a thought, or an emotion and transmit those feelings to others simply by “telling” them about it is just amazing to me.

Hmmm. Okay, I guess that doesn’t really answer the question completely. It explains why I love telling stories, but as to what inspired me to use animation to do this? Probably it’s watching cartoons and just falling in love with the medium. For me it’s like this thing…I don’t know…like when I watch something move and it just moves beautifully it just feels right. It hits me right in the heart, you know? That’s probably why I like animating. I love the idea that we can tell any story and get any mood across. I can play both characters in a serious drama, or be a crazy lemur that makes children laugh until they pee themselves. There aren’t too many jobs where you can have that sort of variety! “Honey! I’m home! 37 children between the ages of 5 and 7 wet themselves when they saw my shot of the guy jumping up and down in the tree! Let’s go out and celebrate!”

What was your first animation job?
The first animation job I ever got paid for was when I was in my senior year at the University of California in Santa Barbara. I was a teaching assistant for the animation course in the Art Department. It wasn’t much of an animation course, it was more like a “here’s access to the software, we don’t know how to use it, but try and figure it out by creating a short film, oh and by the way we only have 2 machines that run this software, but the engineering department has some machines, so maybe you can go over there and use them” course. Anyway, back at my apartment I was playing with this cheap 2d animation software I had picked up at a computer event somewhere called Disney Animation Studio. I used to play around a bit, creating really short crappy 2d animations not worth much of anything. One day there was a notice up from a local illustrator who was in need of a student to help her produce some 2d animation for a children’s educational CD-ROM called Kid Phonics. I gave her a call and she came out to my apartment to check out some of my work. I showed her a few drawings and the animations I had done and she hired me to produce the work for this CD-ROM. So that was my first gig, about six months of creating little animated characters that would move when children clicked on them. I had a blast doing it, and proceeded to work with Karen (the woman who hired me) on a number of other projects over the next few years, including designing a puppet for Jonathan Winters!

Who would you consider your mentor to be in animation?
I’ve got two definite mentors. The first is Randy Cook, my first animation director. He really is the one that I give all the credit to for allowing me to move from rigging to animation. Without him I wouldn’t have gotten the opportunity and I probably wouldn’t be where I am today.

The second is my current animation director, Rex Grignon. Rex is one of those guys who really puts his heart out there to try and make the environment the best it can be for his animators. He’s also got the magic ability to notice when someone’s doing a good job and instead of pushing them down out of fear for his own job, he builds them up and helps them achieve their goals. I appreciate the opportunities he’s given me every single day, and am constantly watching him for inspiration.

What is your favorite Animation Mentor tool?
I love everything about it, but also can’t wait for the next releases of the eCrit tool and the live Q&A. It seems to keep getting better and better each term! Go team dynamite!

I always love it when an Animation Mentor student does well.. and I love it even more when they land a gig at Dreamworks Animation!

We’re making the most rediculous video of all time.. it’ll either be great, or.. well.. stupid.

Edit:  I finished shooting the video & editing it together.  It’s available on youtube.. and if you purchased the Animator Friendly Rigging DVD series, you’ve seen it.   Enjoy!

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zvHG0OkCWJ4

Ah, I love it when articles come out touting the awesomeness of new technology and get the facts so wonky that it makes it seem like anything would be possible, if it weren’t for those darn pesky artists!

The New York Times has a new article about Image Metrics, a software company that has figured out a way to make facial motion capture a thing of the past.. they’ve got some crazy 2d image mapping technology which actually captures the SOUL of the actor, not just points on the face.

You can read the article here .

Now I’ve never seen the software work, so I can’t give a “yay” or “nay” either for nor against it.. but I can look at quotes like this:

In a C.G.I. film, he said, “every time someone would say something, banks of people would have to figure out how the lips move, how the eyes move — and it’s not even that good.”

“Now we don’t have to spend three years having people meticulously hand-animate Charlie Sheen’s lines,” he added. “He says, ‘Food fight!’ in real time, live action, and it’s applied, via Image Metrics technology, to the character.”

So whereas a film like “Cars” cost $120 million and took dozens of animators five years to make, Mr. Kasanoff says that “Foodfight!,” which has not yet begun production, will be finished by February.

.. and immediately assume that either the author of the article mis-quoted Kasanoff, or that he really doesn’t understand what it takes to actually create an animated motion picture film.

First of all.. I’m not even going to dignify comments like “banks of people would have to figure out how the lips move, how the eyes move — and it’s not even that good.” with a statement other than “if you hired people who WERE good, then it WOULD be good.”

If you want quality, hire quality.  You’re not going to hire jim-bob-jimmy-hossenfifer to have a major role in a feature film if he can’t act.. why hire crappy animators who can’t act and then be suprised when the work is sub-par?

Second, facial animation is NOT the most time-consuming part of an animated film.  What about art? story?  Layout? Modeling? Rigging? Texturing? Lighting? Rendering?  Effects? Compositing?  Sound? Editing??

Or can we blame the cost of CG movies and the time it takes soley on the animators?

I highly doubt that a film like “Foodfight!” will finish by Feb if it hasn’t begun production yet.

And if it does.. I highly doubt that it will make the money back that it claims it saved by getting rid of a few animators.

BESIDES the fact that you’re immediately going to run into problems when the director decides they want a different “take” on the line than what the actor performed.. which they inevitably do.  What happens then?  Do you get someone else in to act it out?  What if their performance isn’t right?  What if the actor isn’t available?

Sigh.

EDIT: This post was originally written in 2006. It’s now 2009.. I heard that the movie was completed in 2008.. looking forward to seeing it!

So this weekend my lovely wife, gorgeous baby girl, and my homely self headed over to Florida so I could speak at the Digital Media Arts College 2007 graduation, and receive an honorary doctorate of animation.

It was a really great time.. the college put us up in this swanky resort (the Boca Raton.. WOW!), & treated us really well.  The size of our bungalo sweet was actually larger than the main living area in our house.. AJ loved it.  So much space for her to crawl around & play.  It was really nice.

On Friday, we met the ever-helpful LaRee who took us to the graduation site where we met Scott, Cynthia, Tony, Andres, Lesley, and a number of other really helpful and nice administrators & teachers.    I donned my cap and gown (and cape), and got ready to give my speech.  Waiting outside, I met a couple of the students, including one incredibly talented masters graduate, Carlos, who was kind enough to give Shrek 3 a plug during his speech.

The graduation started & I was quickly introduced by Cynthia (the president of the college).  I was a bit nervous before speaking.. it’s been a while since I’ve given a talk w/out any visual aides.  But it went well.. there were lots of laughs, and I had a great time giving it.

What follows is the speech I wrote.. it’s a bit different from what I delivered, due to the nature of how I give talks.. kind of off the cuff, rambling, full of random assides & ad-libs.. but you get the general idea from it.

Digital Media Arts College graduating class of 2007, thank you very much for the opportunity to speak with you here today!

I’d like to offer my sincere congratulations to every graduate.  You’ve worked incredibly hard to come this far, and it’s a feat of which you should all be proud!  You deserve to celebrate today. You’ve stayed up late, worked crazy hours, learned the joys and hardships of “crunch time”.  You did your homework, forgoed parties, and drinking.  You flossed daily, ate three well-rounded meals per day.  And probably developed an unnatural addiction to coffee.   Mmmm… coffee..

You can officially add the title “Artist” to your business card.  It’s a powerful addition!  Imagine introducing yourself at the next party.. “Hi, I’m Joe.  Artist.  Good to meet you.  If you need anything.. you know.. ‘artistic’, just give me a call.  Artist here, happy to help”.

It works great as a pickup line, too.  “My gosh, you have beautiful eyes.. what are they, green?  Yeah, I can tell.. I’m an artist.  I’m good with pigments.

You’ve started your career off on the right path, by following your passion.  You’ve graduated, you’re now an artist, and you’re ready for the next step:

becoming a successful artist.

Success can be many things.  To some it’s having the ability to create whatever art they want.  To others, it’s being able to financially support their families.  And to some it’s a combination of those and other reasons.  Each of us has a unique definition of success.  But I’ve found there are at least two things that every successful person has in common.

First, they know what it is they want.  Whether it’s being a photographer, animator, set decorator, photoshop-ier (it’s a word).. whatever it is, they recognize that there’s a goal they want to achieve.

Second, they work their butts off to get there.  They look for opportunities.  If they can’t find an opportunity, they make an opportunity, and they work like crazy until they achieve their goal.  Whether it’s an hour, 10 weeks, or 15 years, they work until they get there.  It may be a straight path, it may be kind of a meandering path, but eventually they will get there.

In short, they take personal ownership of their careers.

It sounds surprisingly simple, but not many people actually do it.  What tends to happen is that we all work hard to get into a good school.  Then we work all throughout school, doing our homework, skipping parties, studying until all hours of the night.. eating a well rounded healthy breakfast, staying away from drugs and alcohol..

Then we go out and find a job.  Maybe it’s the dream job, maybe not, but we work hard, get hired, and then proceed to do whatever the boss tells us.

So far so good, right?

But then what?  Most people settle in and work to prove themselves to those around them, to show that they’ve got “it”, they’re passionate, talented, and are a valuable asset to the team.  Fantastic!  That’s exactly what people should do when they get a job.

But then as time goes by,  they sit and wonder why they aren’t being considered for the “Johnson account”, or why they keep getting pigeon-holed into the same style of work over and over.

They’re waiting for someone to notice all their hard work and give them that promotion, the raise, the chance to really shine.

They’re letting someone else own their careers.

I remember when I was 14 years old I used to have this dream that I would be the best car window washer in the world.  No, seriously.  Whenever we would pull up to a gas station, I’d jump out of the car and wash the windows.  I would scrub and wipe and flick and scrub.. all the while daydreaming that somebody would notice and go “hey, that kids a great window washer!  Hey!  Kid, do you want a job?  You’re hired!”

Of course nobody ever offered me the job.. I never asked for a job.  I just washed windows assuming that someone would eventually notice and offer a job.  That’s not taking personal ownership of my “career” or goal.  It’s just being hopeful, which isn’t a bad thing, but it’s certainly no guarantee that I’ll get what I’m after.

Let me give you an example a bit more relevant to my current career.

When I graduated from university in 1996, I got a job as an intern for a 3d animation software company called Alias|Wavefront.  You may have heard of them, they created the software Maya – one of the most popular 3d animation software’s around.   I worked there for a number of years, working my way up from an intern that had to share a desk and computer with someone else, to a Product Specialist – an in-house animator that got to travel around the world, demonstrate Maya, and create mini in-house productions.

After working at Alias|Wavefront for three and a half years I realized that I was doing what I wanted.. I was making shorts, doing internal production work, having a lot of fun travelling, but I felt like I was lacking in actual film production experience.  Some friends were talking about a company that was going to be making a movie out of a series of books called “The Lord of the Rings”.   I had heard of the books, but never read them.  But I wanted some more production experience, so I filled out the online application form stating my experience with Maya, and then promptly forgot about it.

A month or so later I got a call from the recruiter.  They were looking for people with extensive Maya experience & were wondering if I’d be interested in coming down to LA for an interview.  I was in the middle of crunch preparing for a trade show called NAB, National Association of Broadcasters.  It’s an event that’s held every April in Vegas.  I had been working 7 days a week for the past month in preparation for it, and was really swamped trying to get ready.

I declined the invitation, saying that I was just too busy to come down.  They insisted, I declined again.  They said “come on.. it’s just a half hour on a Saturday.  Just drive down & see what we’re doing.”  So I said “Oh, okay…” (thinking back now I almost want to smack myself for being so blase about it).

I went down and had a half hour interview with the visual effects producer & the digital effects supervisor.  They showed me some amazing video of sculptures they were working on.  We talked a bit about the project & about my experience.  At the end of the interview they said they’d be in touch and I drove back up to Santa Barbara ready to work like crazy for the next month and a half to get ready for NAB.

At NAB, I was doing a “back room demo”.. it’s not as salacious as it sounds.  It’s simply a demo for “key customers”.. i.e. those spending a lot of money.  I was on my second day of demos when I noticed John, the digital effects supervisor, sitting in the front row.  I immediately started acting “casually brilliant”, trying to impress him.  After the demo, he came up to me & gave me his card saying “meet me at my hotel tomorrow morning at 8am”.

The next morning I showed up to his hotel room & knocked on the door.  He opened it, wearing his bathrobe.

My first thought was, “how badly do I want this job?”

He invited me in & proceeded to show me a tape of more work they were doing on Lord of the Rings.  Then he made an offer.  A really nice offer.  One that involved moving out to New Zealand in August.

I left Vegas very unsure of what to do.  On one hand I really wanted production experience.  On the other hand, I loved my job & where I lived.  But the Lord of the Rings opportunity seemed like it could be good, but then I didn’t know if the movies would be successful (remember, this is before the movies even started filming.  Yes, there was a time when we thought people might hate them.)

I was totally conflicted, so my friends and I decided to drive around in the desert a bit on our way back from Vegas.  On the way we saw a huge sand dune & decided to climb it.  Nothing like exercise and sand to clear one’s head, right?  So a bunch of us start climbing up the dunes and when we reach the top there’s a guy sitting there on a carpet drinking a glass of red whine.  I thought “huh?” and just looked at him oddly.  Then I noticed his friend, sitting next to him eating an apple.

I thought they were suitably odd, so whom better than to ask about my future?  So i told them the entire story & the guy with the wine (I’ll call him Jim), said “well, why not?”

Why not?

PAUSE

He was right!

Why not take a chance?  See what happens?  Here I was being offered a chance to have what I so desparately wanted.. and I was balking at it.

After all, worst comes to worst, I’d have an amazing experience that I could talk about at parties..  “yeah, I went to go work on that ‘rings’ movie.. but it’s so difficult to make a movie when the electricity is generated by hamsters”

We should always be open to taking chances.  We’re artists, right?  By definition we should try and stretch ourselves, reach for what we think we can’t achieve, push ourselves beyond previous experiences.

That’s my message to you today.  Know yourself.  Know what you want.  Work towards it.  And enjoy the journey.

You will make mistakes, learn from them.

You may fail, you may loose your footing, you might be publicly humiliated.

You may even have to crawl backwards a few steps.

It may take years to get where you want.

But in the end, as long as you’re working towards a goal, you can’t ever really loose.   The simple act of taking your career, your life, your passion into your own hands.. actively working to achieve your dreams is one of the most satisfying and rewarding things you can ever do.

Finally, I’d like to leave you with a few words of wisdom from someone who’s been around the block a few times.

Always treat everyone around you with respect and compassion.  The intern fetching your coffee this week may be your producer in two years.

Be  generous with your praise.  If someone does a good job, tell them!

Be honest.  If you make a mistake, own up to it.

And please, wear deodorant.  Smelling good is always appreciated.

Thanks very much graduating class of 2007, congratulations!!!

After the ceremony we got a chance to chat with the students, & I met a number of really nice and wonderful students that I hope can take their talents & passion & start spreading them through the industry.

Angry Jew.. dave.. please send me your stuff!

Carlos, your work is awesome.  Thank you for the books!  Don’t forget to check out http://www.otherthings.com/grafarc/

Paul, thanks for coming up and speaking with me!  I know it wasn’t easy, and I really appreciate it!  I have your card & I look forward to seeing more work from you!
Alex, definitely get a reel together & send it to me.  You guys did some astounding work & I can’t wait to see it again!
Everyone who came up to talk to me, I really appreciate it!  And if I gave you my email, please send me a note & give me your latest works.. I look forward to seeing them!

Thanks again Cynthia, Scott, LaRee, Andres, and everyone else who made the weekend so memorable!

A lot has been posted over the past few weeks about Beowulf and whether or not it should be considered “animation”.  I do know a few incredibly talented individuals who worked on it, and am sure they poured their hearts and souls into the film, delivering whatever was asked of them in a timely and professional manner.  They don’t deserve the lambasting and flaming that they’re receiving from the animation community.

You can read various arguments for and against Beowulf’s animation credibility at all sorts of sites, including Cartoon Brew,  Mark Mayersen’s site, etc.  I won’t rehash those arguments here.. I haven’t seen the movie yet, so I can’t comment on it as a film.  Nor, do I want to argue over semantics about wether or not it’s animated, as I’m sure MUCH more keyframe animation was done on the movie than is being publicized.  Most likely it’s the same sort of PR that was done for Gollum.. you know, the blitz that says it’s all mocapped instead of being keyframed.  For some reason the media seems to get a hard-on over the idea that our beloved actors can simply show up somewhere, act for a few hours, and then a bank of computers can magically turn that into the performance we see.

I don’t get why the idea of animators working hard to create a performance isn’t sexy to them.. but, whatever.  It is what it is.

Anyway, I DID want to post my thoughts about what films like Beowulf mean to the animation industry as a whole.. so I’ve included my comment from Cartoon Brew here, so you can see what I think is likely to come in the future.

——————————————–
Quoted from comments of Cartoon Brew:

You know.. I haven’t seen B-wolf yet (but I plan on seeing it sometime this week), so I can’t really say anything about the film.

However, as an animator.. I DO have to say that I’m not really all that threatened by b-wolf. I worked on LOTR & on Gollum and was able to directly see what worked & what didn’t, and I know there were incredibly talented artists both tweaking the mocap data & creating animation from scratch.. all of it working towards Peter’s vision. That’s what made gollum so good.. peter, fran, andy, and randy cook pushing us towards creating the best performance possible.

As for whether or not performance capture will replace animation.. I think the live action people have more to “fear” than those of us creating stylized animated films. See, in live action you’re completely constrained by location, time of day, the physicalness of what was shot WHEN it was shot. What props are available, what costumes can get created by the time it’s shot, etc etc etc. Then, once the scene is shot it’s SHOT. You’ve got the coverage you have, from the angles you’ve got. Any kind of “tweaking” or anything you have to rely on 2d techniques, or clever editing. You can’t easily change the camera angles.. lighting.. costumes.. anything. I say “easily” because you CAN do quite a bit with compositing & other techniques.. but currently that’s expensive & time consuming.

Let’s pretend that in 10 years the “performance capture” technique has improved to the point where it actually DOES capture everything we’re saying it’s missing today.. meaning, it’s so damn good that you really can’t tell the difference between a live action actor and their digital counterpart. Well, you CAN tell the difference.. but only if you suddenly change the angle, adjust the lighting, give them different clothing, etc etc. See, the director/art director/dp/etc will all have the ability to tweak what was shot until it meets their “ultimate vision”.

But what if they want acting changes? Well, not only will they capture the physical acting of the actors, but they’ll be analyzing that data.. capture the actor long enough & they’ll be able to build a fuzzy logic brain to go along with the actor. Soon enough we’ll have enough data about keanu in order to recreate almost any reaction to any given situation. So while you’d still have to get the actual performance for any of the important beats.. much of what happens can be figured out by the fuzzy logic system.. think “massive” (the crowd simulation program written for LOTR, now used all over the place) but a bit more advanced with a LOT more data running through it. Of course, we’ll still have frame-by-frame control like we do now, so even if the performance isn’t 100%, we can still go in and tweak things to make it perfect.

Directors will have ultimate freedom to create “their movie”. THIS is where the technology is going.. it’s going to affect live action films way more than our cartoony stylized ones.

I’m not saying this is a “good” or “bad” outcome.. I’m just saying that this is where it’s headed. And for some directors, it’s already there.

So for me, I’m not concerned about mocap. As long as there’s still an audience for funny, stylized characters that do things that people can’t do.. animators jobs are safe. No matter how talented any performer is, he’s never going to be able to have the ability to get from point A to point B in as many ways that I can dream up in my head.

My answer, of course, is “you think my acting ideas are good? aww, shucks!”

Actually, coming up with ideas is one of my favorite parts of the animation process. It’s something I think a lot of animators don’t spend enough time focusing on in the beginning of the shot-making process. They’ll usually spend a few minutes thumbnailing ideas, maybe acting things out in video reference, but they won’t really explore the multitude of possibilities. This is especially the case in production where you usually have a very limited amount of time to work on your shots.

What I recommend is trying to set aside some specific time to think about all the various things your characters can do before you even start thumbnailing or shooting video reference.  One way to do this that I heard about from legendary animator Simon Otto is to play the game of “What If”.

What is this magic game, you ask?  Simple.  It’s a technique used to help you free your mind (woah) and think of all the potential possibilities of any situation.  Let’s say, for example, you have a shot where your character has to tie their shoe.  You can either animate the character bending over to tie the shoe and be done with it.. or you can make it really special.

Here’s one way it could go.

What if the character were really old?  What if when they bent down to tie their shoe, their back went out?  What if they were then frozen halfway between standing up and sitting down?  What if just at that moment, a really beautiful woman walked by?  What if they tried to stand up, but only hurt themselves further?  What if they fell over?  What if they didn’t fall over, but fell on the beautiful woman?  What if instead of a beautiful woman coming by, their bus came?  What if A bus came, but they couldn’t tell what bus number it was?  What if they were trying to read the bus number?  What if the bus door closed, just as they realized it was their bus?  What if they were trying to run after the bus, but then tripped on their shoelase?

See how it goes?  Your mind just starts going crazy!  The cool thing is that many of the ideas won’t really be useful, but the exploration, the exercise of opening your mind most definitely will be.

So along with exploring the idea of playing “what if”, I’ve also been looking at using various mind mapping tools to do it.  If you’ve never used a mind mapping tool, they’re pretty cool.  Basicaly a mind map is a diagram representing a series of ideas or thoughts.  Check out more about them on wikipedia.  I’ve been looking into using them to play “what if”.  It’s actually really fun!

As a test, I spent 5 minutes on http://bubbl.us coming up with a quick mindmap for an example where someone drinks a cup of coffee.

As you can see, some paths I explored more than others.  It’s a pretty rediculous situation, but it does a really nice job of letting your mind kind of explore all options.  The cool thing is that you can really adjust the granularity to whatever makes the most sense for your situation.  For example, with the bending down to tie the shoe exercise, you can simply do:

See?  Some much more simple options.

In the end, you may end up making the exact same choices you would have made without this exercise, but at least if you do, you will know that you explored other options and really came up with the best solution.

Ah, and as an added bonus.. here’s a really cool blog conveniently titled.. “what if”.  It’s got some fun ideas, I recommend checking it out!

a number have people have suggested that I repost something I wrote way back in november of 2005..

so here it is..

The fear of moving past blocking..

November 16th, 2005

The more you know, the more fear you have.

Seems to be a rule true of many things.. tree climbing for example. Before you know about gravity and how much breaking an arm can hurt, you really don’t worry that much about falling out of the tree, you just sorta climb on up there and monkey around. It isn’t until you see your friend slip and fall and break her arm when you think “ohh.. wait.. this can be painful…” and you start to worry.

The same is true about animation.

When many animators first start animating they just move things around willy nilly, making things go this way.. that way.. etc. They have no fears, they just move things.

Granted, their animations may looks like ass squished up against a large pile of roadkill, but at least they have no fear.

Once an animator learns about the various stages that professional animators use to work through their shots.. i.e. blocking, first pass, second pass, and polishing.. that’s when fear starts to set in.

It’s a pretty frightening prospect to spend a lot of time getting a blocked animation to look right.. make it feel perfect, get the timing all snappy, the poses to sing, and the intention to come across.. and then convert everything to spline and suddenly it feels like total poop.

So many animators have a really hard time making the transition from clean blocking to clean first pass animation.. it’s easy to become overwhelmed and just start throwing keys in randomly to try and make things look good, but they have no plan.. no process.. they know the stages, but they don’t know how to use the stages to their best advantage.

What I like to do is think about animating like painting a room. You want to be creative, but it’s important to be creative within the confines of what the client wants.. and give them the right information at the right time.

For example, if the client says they want a warm room with an accent wall that really brings out some dramatic intensity, a painter wouldn’t run to the room, grab a few buckets of paint, and start mixing them on the wall right away to try and get the right look. If they did that, they wouldn’t be able to guarantee the right color, the right walls that the colors would be on, they’d get paint all over the fixtures in the room, and the client might be pissed off.

No, they’d block things out first.. they’d find the right colors for the walls and show color swatches to the client in the environment they’re looking at. Then once the colors were approved, they’d tape off the fixtures and floors so they don’t have to worry about getting paint on them. Then they’d prep the walls, then paint one coat, then a second coat, then remove all the taping.

They would work in stages, so at the stage they’re currently at.. say painting the first coat of paint.. they’re not worrying about things they should have focused on earlier.. whether or not the paint is the right color, or if they’re getting paint on the floor, or if the walls were prepped. They work systematically.

Animation works the same way.

When we block our shots, what we’re doing is telling the director “This is my intention. I want the character to be here.. thinking this idea.. at around this time. Then they’re going to be over here.” Some shots require more blocking and explanation than others.. but in the end, the whole idea is to let the director know what’s in your head, and make sure that what’s in your head matches what’s in the director’s head.

When you move from blocking to the first pass of animation.. this is where a real systematic approach comes in handy. It’s what allows you to animate quickly and with consistent results that will help the director trust you.

What I like to do is first break my shot up into distinct beats. This doesn’t mean that the shot will stay in this pose-to-pose style.. what it means is that I’m simply breaking my shot down in to easily discernable chunks. All I want to do at this point is move from a step-curved blocking method to a clean, easy-to read first pass. So my shot is of a character sitting who then reaches over to pick up a glass & takes a drink, I’d break up the shot into three sections. Maybe frames 1 to 20 are of the character sitting. Frames 21 to 28 are of him reaching forward to get the glass. 29 to 35 are the character bringing the glass back up to his lips, and 36-45 of the character taking a sip. Now in the final animation, a lot of this motion will be blended together to feel like one solid action, but at this point my desire is to make these general sections feel right.. I want the change in direction to work, and the arcs to work, and I don’t want to be distracted by trying to animate the whole shot the whole time.

So I’ll shorten my timeline from 1 to 45, down to 1 to 20. Then I’ll look at what’s driving the motion. Usually this will be the torso… so my first step is to clean up the torso’s motion and make sure it’s nice and clean.

So I hide the arms and legs. I know that in the end I’ll need them to work correctly, but because what the body is doing affects them, it’s really easy to become distracted by their motion when I really should just be focusing on what the body itself is doing and making that clean.

Then I’ll convert the body curves to “clamped” or “spline”, whatever I feel is going to work best for this motion. I’ll analyze what it is I want the body to do & make notes before starting to move keys around. This way I have a plan. Then I’ll go through curve by curve, adjusting them as necessary to get the feel of the body moving forward to work correctly just for the lean forward. I can’t stress this enough. While I know the whole animation consists of a lot more than just moving forward, that’s all I’m focusing on at the moment.

I’m breaking down the motion into easily digestible chunks.

Once the body is working correctly for that section, then I’ll show the arm which is reaching forward and work with the animation of just that arm for those first 20 frames.

Now this may or may not be the final animation that I’ll be keeping.. all I’m doing is making sure that this section is clean and easy to work with.

Next I would move on to the next section of animation.. say frames 21 through 28 when the character leans back with the glass. So I’d change my frame range to start at 20 and end at 28. Then again, I’d hide the arms and legs and just get the body moving correctly. Then I’d show that main arm and get that working correctly just for the section.

Once those sections are working, I’d move onto the next one.. and continue until I have the animation clean for each individual section. Then I’d playblast the entire thing and watch the whole animation, making notes of what changes I’d need to make for the transitions between sections to clean them up. Maybe it involves delaying the arm, or adding more overlap into the body, or changing a pose, or adding or removing some time.. but at this point it’s easy to make these changes because we’ve gone about the whole thing systematically.

So if you can learn a technique like this.. or come up with something that works for you.. you can start to reduce the fear of going from blocking to first pass animation.. and begin thinking more about acting and the art of animating, instead of sweating the technical details.

What was really impressive is that he did all the effects in Photoshop frame by frame. Nice stuff!

Friends with an animator?  Married to one?  Want to be an animator?  Confused about what to get yourself or your loved ones for the holidays?

AnimationMentor.Com (one of the best animation schools in the world by far) has a great list of products available for your loved ones!

Normally I wouldn’t be all “oh!  you GOTTA get this cool shirt from this school..”, but AnimationMentor is something different.  They’re more like a family than a school.

Seriously.

They’re an awesome group of animators, enthusiasts, and just friggin talented and wonderful people.

Be proud.. wear your AnimationMentor.com gear!

AnimationMentor.com: Home: Zazzle.com Gallery.

Laika lays off 65, shelves CG film – Business – Oregonlive.com.

I just heard about Laika the animation studio in Oregon laying off 65 employees.. don’t know much else about it, but it’s a real shame when something like this happens.

Does anyone know any details other than “Jack and Ben” being shelved?

My heart goes out to those affected.

Oh yeah, and happy holidays!

If you don’t know, GTD is short for “Getting Things Done”.  It’s a technique that David Allen developed to .. well.. get things done.  Many “todo” applications use this method to organize data.  I haven’t spent that much time reading into it, but I keep thinking I should.

Anyway, David’s got a new book out about being a good self-manager.  Could be worth a look!

David Allen: What Kind of Self-Manager Are You? | BNET.

Some really beautiful hand poses available here from Flip.. gorgeous stuff.  Just look and enjoy!

Flip: Hands.

As you can see, there were times when I wasn’t able to record what I was doing, especially wednesday.. a tough day.  But in general I got about 8 or 9 hours recorded.

You can also see that this was a very productive week for me.. over 15 hours of directly productive work.  That includes animating, giving reviews, etc.

Strategic mettings went well too, 11 hours of strategy.. planning for the future and making sure that I have stuff ready for.. you guessed it.. production!

Admin time is nice and small.. about 3 hours over the course of the week.  That includes email, time sheets, working on spreadsheets, etc.  You want to keep that admin stuff as small as possible, otherwise you’re wasting time!

And the thing I’m happiest about is the ME time.. 7 hours i was able to devote to bettering myself.. 5+ of that being gym specific time.  Some of it having lunch, or going for a walk.. VERY important to have that time when you can get it!

I’m going to continue the experiment next week and see how it goes!

Go visit it at http://rigging101.com/forum !

I was making a bottle for toby this morning while simultaneously holding him and trying to clean his nose and I realized that ever since I became a father I had picked up a new skill.. Doing complicated actions with one hand.

It’s true.. I can now hold a squirming child with my right arm and with my left I can pour a hot coffee, mix in milk and sugar, put on a lid, and drink away all without dropping the child or spilling my hot tasty beverage.

IF one of the kids does a massive crap (if… I mean WHEN), I can somehow hold them down, distract them with a toy, take off their pants and diaper, keep their feet and shoes OUT of the crap-filled bundle of fun, grab another nappy, shove it under them, hold a doll in front of their face to distract them and keep them from rolling over, grab some wipes, clean up the poo, fold up the old nappy and poo and wipes, put on a new nappy, and redress the child all with far too few hands.

It’s a new skill!

So what does this have to do with animation?

Well, now that I recognize this skill, if I were to be animating a parent, I would know that parents can do more with one hand than non-parents.. So if given the opportunity, I should use that as an actin choice to make the character more believable.

It’s all about making the right acting choices for each individual character.. And the only way you can find out what those acting choices should be is to either live it, talk to someone who lives it, observe someone doing it, or really think about it.

Another thing I can’t wait to try and add to a shot of a parent… The daddy/mommy sway. If you’re a parent, you know exactly what I mean.

When I first made the move I tried to do everything.. animate, supervise, fix problems, etc.  It was driving me crazy, and the quality of my work and of my supervision suffered.

I had to learn to delegate.  As difficult as it is to let things go, in order to survive you really need to learn to delegate anything that you don’t need to handle.  There are a couple of reasons (as always).

1)  you don’t have time

stop deluding yourself.  Yes, you want to do everything, but there aren’t enough hours in the day and you can’t change that.

2) the more you take on, the more you have to take on.

You know the old adage, give a man a fish and he can eat today, teach a man to fish and he can eat forever?  It’s totally true.  I know that it feels like as a supervisor your job is to solve every problem that your animators have.  That’s not exactly true.  Your job is to remove roadblocks and things that inhibit them from getting things done.  If you can help them solve their own problems by providing the correct resources, then in the future they’ll be able to help themselves and others.  If you always solve it, you’ll always have to solve it.  Does that mean that you should always pass the buck?  No, sometimes you do need to step in and fix it yourself.  But you should use that as an opportunity to teach.

Anyway, back to time management.

So it feels like you’ve got more work than there are hours, and there’s just no way to really get a handle on it.  I totally know how you feel.  I’m like that constantly.  It’s a real “problem” in that I always feel behind.  But I know there are probably at least 3 or 4 hours per week that I’m wasting and not taking advantage of.. so here’s what I’m going to do to try and tackle it.. try it yourself and see if it helps!

1)  I’m going to get a real sense of where my time is spent.

2) I’m going to look at where I need to spend my time to get my job done.

3) I’m going to try and make the changes necessary to adjust to a new schedule that actually works.

So how am I getting a sense of where my time is spent?  Simple!  I’m tracking it!

There are a number of cool online tracking tools you can use that will allow you to track hours, minutes, etc.. The one

I’m trying right now is called Toggl.  It’s in beta, but it’s really easy to track your time on various projects..

I’ve broken mine up into a series of sections:

Strategic – things I’m doing that will allow for future production – like setting up shots, character planning, meetings, etc

Production – things that lead directly to produced work (animation, reviews, etc)

admin – things that are administrative.. time sheets, spreadsheets, email, etc

Self – things for myself.. lunch,  gym, blogging, etc.

Then as I work, I can just pick which category I’m working in and make a note of what I’m doing.  At the end of the week I’ll be able to see where I’m spending my time & how I can manipulate it to better manage my time.

We’ll see how it goes..

One of the things I’m working on in my position as Head of Character Animation is learning how to straddle the roles of being a “Coach” and a “Player”. You see, as an animator, my role was to be the best animator I possibly could be. To learn, to grow, to develop as an artist. Sure I would try and help out others as they needed, but mostly I was judged on one thing – my shots. The better I did as an animator, the better I was seen at work. This is pretty common in pretty much every job.. you do your job well, you succeed.

When I got promoted to being a supervisor, I understood that my role had changed, that now I was being judged not just on how I was doing as an animator (since I still had to animate), but also on how my team was performing. If I was kicking-ass and doing great shots but my team was struggling, then I wasn’t doing my job well. I had to learn how to manage and develop my team, help them grow as artists, and help them achieve the results the studio required of them. This meant developing more management skills. An incredibly helpful man told me that a manager’s job is to basically identify and remove the roadblocks and problems that are inhibiting your team from getting their jobs done.

This is the roal of the “coach”. The one on the sidelines doing everything in their power to help their team be the best they can possibly be.

The problem here is of course that it’s difficult for artists to make this transition. When you’ve worked your entire life to become a skilled artist, to feel success when you create a meaningful performance it can be hard to suddenly change your view of success to be that of your team creating great work. It doesn’t sound difficult.. it sounds like what you would expect any manager to do. But it is difficult.. subconsciously you will look at their work and even though you can be proud and satisfied when they do well, there’s a tiny part of you that goes “oh man, I wish I could have done that shot..”.

You won’t be thinking this because you think you could do it better, or because the person didn’t do a good job. You’re thinking it because you miss animating. You miss being able to put 100% of yourself into a shot and get mired in the gritty details.

I’ve seen people respond to this in a number of ways. One way is to completely stop animating and just become a manager. To focus only on supporting your team. To just be a coach.

Some people try and animate through their team. They will give note after note that reflects not necessarily what their animators are trying to achieve, but what they want.

I have found that both of these solutions cause problems. If you’re just a coach, you’re not really supervising and leading your team. Part of being a good supervisor is understanding what it takes to get a shot to a certain level. You have to stay in the game to do this, you need to be animating to keep up your skills. You must be able to give a detailed note of “this finger needs to be delayed by 2 frames, and push the arm here to get this silhouette.”

If you try and animate through your team, you’ve got another big problem.. you’re not letting your animators bring anything to the table. You’re treating them all like assistants. This can work for a little while, but it’s important to remember that your animators are artists. Your goal as their supervisor is two-fold. One, to make the best possible movie ever, and two, to help them grow and achieve their dreams as animators. If you’re just pushing your ideas through they will grow weary, loose interest, and never learn to develop ideas on their own.

The best solution is to be both a “coach” and a “player”. You need to be a “player” (animator) so you can keep up your chops. You need to be able to create animation yourself to be personally artistically satisfied. You also need to be a “coach” (manager) and help your team deliver top quality animation that makes them satisfied. They need to feel supported by you, that you’re helping them achieve their goals and reach their vision. You need to talk to them about what they want to achieve, and then work with them on a long-term plan to reach that goal.

You also must be able to take pride in the work that they achieve that has nothing to do with you. I don’t mean you should take ownership, I mean that you should be satisfied and happy when people on your team perform well. I can’t tell you how wonderful it is to be able to present the work of a member of your team to your director and say (for example) “Here’s a shot that Bryce has been working on. He and Carlos were talking about how the character would react in this situation, and they came up with this idea. I think they’ve got something exciting going here, what do you think?” and have the director say “That’s GREAT!”.

You may have had nothing to do with this specific shot that bryce and carlos are working on, but by being a supportive and collaborative supervisor, you’ve given them the space to be the best possible artists they can be.

And THAT is something you can definitely be proud of.

Oh, and as for the book listed at the top of the post.. this has been one of the best books I’ve ever read and has really helped me develop as a supervisor and manager. I highly recommend it to anybody who works with other people.

Check this out if you own a chicken!

I think the first movie was a lot of fun, but I feel that this one is way better.. The look is stunning and the animation is really amazing in many spots.

I love makunga.. The team really did a great job with him and I wish I had an opportunity to animate him!

Congrats to all who worked on it!!

Have you ever been in a situation where you want something, so you act in a way to get the thing you want, but the result is that you cause more trouble than you thought?

I will give a specific example.. We all know the story of “the boy who cried wolf” right? Kid keeps calling wolf when there isn’t one there, pissing off the villiagers until one day a wolf shows up, he calls “wolf” and nobody appears to help him.

Why do you think he kept crying wolf? Was it to get eaten? No, probably not.. It was probably to try and get some attention. He was bored, lonely, and pobably never expected that people wouldn’t actually come if a real wolf was there. So his intention–have some fun, get some attention, etc–caused some unintended consequences.. It caused the villiagers to think he was a git who didn’t deserve their attention. Thus, he got munched. Oops.

What does this have to do with animation? Well, every day we work with a number of people.. Animators, coordinators, directors, producers, etc. Everything you do, say, act, etc has some sort of consequence. For example, let’s say you are showing your shot in dailies an the director asks for a change. You think “huh.. Okay.. That goes against what I was thinking.. But.. Whatever..”. So it’s not a big deal, but it’s a bit of a tweak. I means the shot will take an extra 3 hours to complete. You let out a little sigh, make your note, and say “okay.”. Then you get up, and walk out of the room.

What do you suppose your intention is here? Probably to just go back to your desk, make the fix, and be done.

How do you think you are perceived by the producer who just heard the sigh?

Right.. Probably not like someone who has to just make a little tweak, but more like someone who is a little bit frustrated.. Maybe a little stressed. Maybe the change is a bigger deal than they thought? Maybe you are overworked? Maybe this shot will push past it’s scheduled date? Maybe they should pull the shot and give it to someone else if you can’t handle it? Man, maybe you can’t handle these types of shots at all.. You seem like the kind of animator that need serious care and hand holding.. Not going to be their go-to guy, that’s for sure..

See what I mean? Your action caused a totally unintended and inaccurate response.

This kind of thing happens all the time.. We do it to others, they do it to us, it’s amazing how easy it can happen.

You can break down the cycle this way:

Intent -> action -> result

You have an intention or desire. You perform an act to try and achieve a result.

Now here is the tricky thing.. You are aware of your intent.. It’s yours, you know what you intend to do. You pick the action and perform it.. You are aware of that aspect of the equation.

But here is the kicker. The response is whatever it is. You don’t have direct control over it. You may see some of the response.. But there may be some hidden part you are unaware of.

Quick example. You are at work and you need to fax something quickly. You go to the macine and see that there is a 10 page outbound fax in front of you and the person faxing it isn’t there. You make a note of the number, cancel the fax, fax your document which takes 5 minutes, and then resubmit the other persons fax. No harm no foul, right? You had a desire-to fax, you performed an act-canceling the other fax, and the result was that you got your fax done first.

So what do you think some unintended conseques might be?

Well, the first thing to do is put yourself in the shoes of the person who put the fax there in the first place. Why do you think they were faxing something from work? Why would they start it and then leave it to finish? What reason could there be to such a large fax? There are probably hundreds of answers to these questions, but none of them came up when you cancelled their fax and sent your own.

What if they were running late for a meeting and had to send off this time sensitive fax to secure a loan for their house, and by postponing it for ten minutes they missed their application window and now won’t get their dream house?

Maybe that is a little far fetched, but it’s a possibility, and you get the idea.. That was an unintended consequence of your action.

So, again with the diagram:

Intent-> action -> result

You control an influence the intent and the action, but can’t control or even sometimes see the result.

So here’s the big question.. How do you stop getting unintended results?

If you can’t control the result, you have to change something you CAN control.. Your intent or your action. Obviously changing the intent isn’t what we want to do.. After all, you are trying to achieve something specific. You have to change the ACTION. You must change the thing you do to achieve the intent.

But how do you know how to change your actions to get the result you want?

The answers is so simple it’ll kill you. Seriously.. I wish I had thought of it. Here is the magic formula… You ready?

You ask.

Yep, that’s it. You ask the person if your action was the right way to get the result you desire.

I know. Crazy, right? But it works! Just ask! You will learn quickly if your actions are correct, or if you are headed down the wrong path.

It’s called feedback.. And we can all use it to make sure our desired intentions are realized.

So… Here goes! I am posting all this stuff for two reasons.. One is because it helps me learn it. Two is that I feel like it can help other animators learn these things we don’t often get a chance to learn.

Is it working? Are you finding these posts useful, or am I coming across like a giant gassbag?