Fund My Short

What a Mug

Apparently hot beverages have never tasted better!

Thanks Shelley for the plug.

Animators are Patient People! - Rubbish

Patience is the ability to endure waiting, delay, or provocation without becoming annoyed or upset, or to persevere calmly when faced with difficulties.

"You must have the patience of a saint"  That's a phrase you hear a lot as animator, well I hate to burst the bubble, but it isn't true.  We are just as impatient as anyone else.  The fact is that animation can be an incredibility frustrating job, especially when its not going well. 
You know that feeling that wells up inside you when you sit in a utterly pointless traffic jam, and there is somewhere you need to be - an hour ago!  Well that's the feeling you have animating some days.
It effects different animators in different ways, some cope better than others, but every animator goes through it. 

What helps you get though these moments/days/shots, is not patience, but rather, discipline and focus.

Patience is what producers need, as they wait for the animators to do their job.

synopsis:

Materialistic Martha is fed up of the frugal life.  So Henry, her hen-pecked husband is forced to abandon his beloved seaside puppet show, for the shackles of a "real" job in the cold city.  But  Henry quickly realizes he must find a way to escape, before his artistic soul is sucked dry by corporate drudgery.

Can you Help?

We sure hope you can.

At Fund My Short we love the internet, it is a place where like-minded individuals can meet up, no matter where they are in the world, and make things happen.  Like making the first internet funded animated short for instance!  We have a great script, and a stellar crew,  now we just need you!

This site is all about participation.  How can you help?

Well you can help right now, right this minute, by emailing, texting, or instant messaging two of your friends and telling them all about us. Here is our URL http://fundmyshort.com

There you go you have helped already.  Welcome to the team.  Now sign up for our newsletter Let us know who you are, and we will add your name to our growing list of supporters.

Want to help further?  How about donating some money,  or maybe you know of a company or small business that would like to become a Sponsor!

You get the Message.

My new T Shirt arrived today from cafepress.   You like?

3D Thinking - Or why it is I have trouble posting!

I received an email the other day from a mother, inquiring on behalf of her young teenage son about what he should do when he leaves school. She informed me he is very interested in animation and that  he would like to pursue it as a career, what would I suggest he do.  Almost in passing she also mentioned that her son was dyslexic. So I replied, and told her not to worry about the dyslexia, that her son would be in good company, as myself, and many other animators I know suffer with dyslexia to some dagree.   In fact, having thought about it for a while, I would argue that being dyslexic may even be an advantage for an animator. 

You see, dyslexics are visual, three-dimensional thinkers.  This spatial aspect of  thinking seems to make us good at solving problems that require innovative solutions.  We  tend to be highly creative people, who excel at hands-on learning and work.  To put it simply, we think in pictures.  Which is pretty useful for an animator.

Unfortunately, there is a downside, and when it comes to understanding letters, numbers, and symbols we struggle.  We are not the best people to stop and ask directions from either, and as for this word-dominated blogosphere, I can confirm, it is not our natural habitat. (I wont even tell you how long it has taken me just to write this entry)  I won't let dyslexia stop me blogging, but try as I might, spelling, and grammatical mistakes will creep through into my post.  So now your warned.

Corpse Bride Talk

Slightly of topic I know, but it is my blog!
Have been asked to give a talk on the making of Corpse Bride as part of the Science Museum's Talk Animation series.  It runs along side their Pixar: 20 years of animation exhibit.

Check out their website for dates and details of the speakers.
http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/exhibitions/pixar/specialevents.asp

Mini Martians

Mini Martians for BMW is good example of  big budget commercial work.  Dread to think what they spent each day, but you can be sure it would make our budget seem very small indeed.  This was one of a campaign of commercials Directed by Chris Palmer.

I was animation director on the sixty second spot.

Fifty Thousand is a whole heap of dosh!

Well, it is, and it isn't.  There is no denying that we are aiming to raise quite a bit of money to make this film.  Henry & Martha is an ambitious project, and as such will take money to be realised properly.  If it was the sort of project that could be made cheaply there would be no need for all the time and effort that has already been poured into this website.

Ask anyone who knows about the true cost of filmmaking and they will tell you that our budgets is a very modest one.  Just to put things into perspective, an average small budget animated commercial (30 seconds) can cost £100,000 plus to produce, and I have worked on million pound commercials! 
FundMyShort is not a profit making exercise, all the money we receive will be plowed into making the film be the very best it can. 

As we gear up to launching this site,  £50,000 seems like a mountain to climb.  But I keep thinking of the end film.  I close my eyes and I can see it.  If only you could see it too, I really think you'd enjoy it.

A Question of Time.

I have consulted with a few people now, including my lovely producer Liz, and everyone really wants to see this project work, but they all queried the time frame I had set of five months.  Now considering that I've never done this before, who am I to tell them they are wrong!  So a little change is planned. I am still keen to put a time limit on the fund-raising, for a number of reasons.  One is that it will focus our efforts on making this site a success and finding sponsors.  There is nothing like a deadline to keep you on your toes. Secondly, it will encourage sponsors to come on board before it is to late.  There are also other reasons relating to the availability of crew as well.

Anyway, the tag line will now be: Fifty Grand - 5,000 Hours to Raise it!

Seem like less time?  Well the mathematicians among you will be able to work out how long that gives us.  But if your like me, you might need a calculator.