Being Directed - part 1

Someone emailed me and asked me to talk about being directed. A good topic. I guess there are alot of things you could say about this. It always starts with clear communication. When you get a bunch of scenes given to you, you need to take good notes about what the director wants. What is the point of the scene, where is the potential entertainment value etc etc... Afer you get the shots, the next thing you need to do is present the director with clean shots. Clear blocking will close the gap quicker. The last thing you want to do is show bad blocking. The director will not know how to comment on the scenes. They may direct you in a totally different direction. If you show to much animation, you risk having to tear it up if you get big changes. I guess the key is to hit it somewhere in the middle. Every director has his or her own style. Some directors let the animator search for the idea and other directors know exactly what they want. You need to be able to accomodate both. Some problems may arise when either the director or the animator does not have a clear idea of what they want. Another problem is when the shot is directed by commitee. I can't really answer how to get past this because I have not experienced this for quite some time. All I can say, is try to really have a clear idea, before you get directed.

Hope that helps.


Andrew

part two - dealing with big changes...

5 sets of Eyes

Someone was asking me the other day about having people look at your work. I think for an animation Student it is very important to have people give their opinion about what you are doing. If you work in a box and dont show anything to anyone, your work will start to suffer. I know it seems obvious but its always important to get different opinions. The other day some guests were looking at a bunch of shots and they didnt laugh where I thought they would laugh. It makes me wonder about the shot and really try to figure out how to push the entertainment value. On a professional level I try to have 5 people to show my stuff too. When I first started, I just wanted to have good work. I would try to ask the star animators to look at a scene. Sometimes the changes they suggested were too difficult to pull off or not within my comprehension to understand. The cool thing about it was seeing how much better I could make it. As you get more experience you start to become more confident, but it is still imperitive to show other people your stuff. I do wonder if animators like Milt Kahl or Frank and Ollie asked people for comments. It seems that when you get to that level, people are afraid to comment on that animators work. I think this is wrong. Once you stop being a student, you start to wither.

-Andrew

ps - sorry for the lack of articles. It is very buzy here. hopefully I will get an interview up one of these days.