A Newie

So this is it, the finished 4th year film, in its two minute 44 second entirety. Really I probably spent maybe the last three or four months of the eight we had working on this, the first semester being spent juggling with different ideas of which none seemed right. I never did come up with something that I stuck with that first semester. Instead I decided to go the route of building the film more or less scene by scene, doing rough thumbnail boards and taking out scenes and adding new ones in all throughout the process. I even managed to squeeze in a few changes after my scene timings were locked for the music and the clean animation was done.
Did this work? Maybe, sort of...in a way. In other words... I don't really know, it resulted in a different sort of film than what would have come out if I had a solid board that I stuck to from the start. This way of working was more satisfying to myself, I could see the film unfold and new things come out as I was making it. There wasn't any issues with looking at the same idea for too long and loosing sight of the focus because the idea would change in whichever way I would decide that day. It was definately a more interesting way for the creator but how was it for the viewer... maybe not as interesting. It's kind of the equivalent of animating straight ahead vs. keyframed and planned. One is more fun to do for the animator but usually results in incosistencies, the character becomes half the size and completely off model by the end of the scene. On the other hand, planning and keyframing is kind of boring, you know exactly what's going to happen before you draw the bulk of the drawings but the animation is more likely to look whole and consistent, it is more likely to convey the meaning it originally intented to with greater precision.
Maybe the last year of school was the wrong time to experiment, it seems like the smart move to take all the knowledge you gained and do something tried and tested. That seems like a good idea, but when does that stop? How do you stop yourself from repeatedly doing the things you already know you can do? A failed attempt is better than no attempt at all, that's all it really comes down to.

Film is up at youtube here