layout done on Hick!

why do old ladies always want to touch pregnant bellies?

Creating an animated short film isn't easy, especially when you're as easily distracted and yet ridiculously over-ambitious as I am.  Not only does it take hours and hours of creating, imagining and then setting up the characters, files and situations, but then you have to animate easy and every shot, frame by frame (even if it does seem 'easier' than the olden-days of hand-drawn animation).  I'm lucky enough o have been able to work with some fantastic new artists on my own short-film project and it takes a bit of the edge off but it's still a molassesly-slow process.

I'm thrilled to announce however that we have reached a milestone this week with Hick!! Both Scene1 and Scene2 (there are only two scenes thank goodness) are out of the 'storyboard' phase in production and we have completed layout for all 94 shots.  In other words, we'll soon be ready to push through an intensive animation-only phase of the project.

I'm in the midst of finishing up some work on the 'new' rigs and when that's done will start recruiting new animators for the workload, as well as taking on a lot of the shots myself. It's a huge relief to watch the animatic without any more storyboard illustrations as well, even if they were beautifully done.

Baby steps my friends, baby steps. Working on Hick! one frame at a time.

For more info about Hick! or to sign up to be part of the team visit http://hick-film.ning.com  We're looking for maya animators, riggers, texture artists, sfx specialists, premier editiors and technical fx specialists.