#not my first time using csp animation tools but certainly my first time making something that looks so presentable

[jichanxo]

oh god, i miss you (song/tl)

[sakarrie-creates]

Heyo!!! I know I’m a bit far into the new year, but with this being my first year of digital art, I really wanted to make sure I got this so I can start my build up to compare future years to! This also includes a fair few pieces of art I haven’t posted so take that as reward for actually looking haha. You can find the blank template here!

A few end of year questions cause I love self-reflection way too much!

What was your biggest challenge this year?

Man it really depends on the project! In the beginning, it definitely was anatomy and perspective. I had so much stuff that I wanted to draw but just didn’t feel like I had the ability or knowledge to pull it off. That being said, after I found position references and 3D models, that was way less of a stress, and positioning the individual joints I feel taught me a lot on it’s own just about how different body positions look. After that, it moved into the steep learning curves of animation and lighting. I have an animatic project that I want to see come to life so bad, but I’ve had had to realise it’s going to take a lot of practice with other random animatics/animations to feel like I can full that off. I also have just had a consistent fear of backgrounds and lighting, neither of which I’ve done anymore than dip my toes in still. 

If I had to pick one single challenge for the year though, I’d say it was just the mere vastness of tools and styles at my fingers tips. I had so much I wanted to do and so many tools I wanted to use, but they all took (and are taking) a very long time to get used to. Just as I start to feel comfortable with my toolset, I realise there’s a better way of doing something and start back at the “beginner��� stage. All being considered, though, that definitely isn’t too bad of a challenge to have haha.

What was something you were surprised by?

Other than the absolute bottomless pit that is CSP’s features? Okay, but for real. That thing is crAZY. Hmmmm I think maybe how much my style varied? I feel like even through I draw Player and Carmen all the time, they still look different in 80% of my pictures. Other than that... maybe how okay I am with my shading? Like, on basically all of these that I even attempted shading on, I thought it was absolutely terrible and obviously incorrect. Looking back through in putting this together, though. I was definitely surprised to find that I’m actually kinda proud of most of them. I’ve got a lot of work ahead of me in that department, but I don’t think I need to be as intimidated as I’ve felt. 

Where do you think you most improved? 

Definitely in my sketches. Once I had a basic comfort with anatomy, it really was freeing. They’re messy at best, but not having to look up what an arm looks like from a certain angle every time made it way more of a relaxed environment. 90% of my art this year is in quick sketches, and I find that I actually am okay with them even after the first time or two. The repetition has really given me a lot more confidence and I’m way faster. Now I just gotta work on getting PAST the sketch part lol.

What are you most proud of? 

Probably my Whumptober trap door animatic. It took me absolutely forever and it’s not consistent in style at all, but it spanned several minutes, included only one character that I’d drawn before, had some pretty dynamic scenes, and there was even a bit of background work! It’s certainly some of my cleanest lineart I’ve made and, considering how vivid the scene was in my head, it’s not actually crazy different. It proved to myself I could pull it off and  gives me a lot of hope for my other animatic aspirations. 

Speaking of which, 2022 Goals!!

As you know if you happened to have looked through my writing reflection, this is going to be a pretty heavy year in school so I’m trying to keep actual commitments low. That being said I have lots of things I want to try out more this year stylistically:

-Brushes: There’s so many and I’ve got no idea how or when or why to use them, but I want to try!

-Shading and Lighting: I left a lot of things uncolored because I was scared the shading would ruin them, but I’m not going to improve if I don’t let myself fail a bit first.

-More Dynamic Scenes and Positions: Same as above. They’re terrifying, but I want to be able to do them better

-Experiment With 3D Sets!!!: This last month I’ve discovered that in the same way I can use 3D models, I can use 3D sets as well! I’m once again at the very bottom of the learning curve, but I’m so excited for the potential this could bring to the ambitiousness of my scenes.

-Post More: I’m honestly kind of terrified of posting art for some reason, but I have tons to share. I don’t know if it’s cause tumblr is more intimidating, or cause art is stolen more often than fics, or cause it’s way easier for a small mistake to ruin an overall art piece, or cause it feels less common to be a mostly h/c artist than to be an h/c author. There’s tons of worries and insecurities that probably play into it, but I think it would be nice to feel more comfortable because those of you who do interact with my stuff are really nice and deserve the extra Player content.

Overall, how’d the year go?

Pretty good! I really explored a ton of stuff with my tablet and I’m just beginning to feel like I’m moving out of the experimentation stage and into the doing stage (for some things haha). There’s still so much to learn, but I’m getting to the point where I enjoy my art more often than not and in my opinion, appreciating your work where you’re at, despite the flaws, is a huge step towards becoming a better and more confident artist.

[jichanxo]

and now i can ask about the difference between animation and writing for you :D aside the obvious things, and since it's a sequence of events/actions/a story and going back to senseific: are there any parts there that you feel you'd have an easier time drawing/animating vs expressing it with words? and is there anything particular you were/are tempted to visualise in an artform (but haven't)?

more long answers below!

animation is certainly a special medium because you not only have way more control over how your audience experiences it (audio, pacing, etc) but you have to pay the cost of it being way more time and effort. so the most distinctive part of making my last project was that i had to stretch my resources as hard as i could. in other words, you can do a lot more! (/pos) but oh god, you HAVE TO DO A LOT MORE (/neg).

you kind of have to compromise somewhere -- your time, the quality of your work, your vision, your motivation. i know i'm inexperienced and that my motivation would give out, so my plan had to be practical. 30 seconds is a long span of time to fill.

i used colour to set the mood -- quick and low effort i used only lines, didn't colour anything in -- saving me time the movement is minimal -- i knew i couldn't do a lot at once, so i had to focus my efforts --

the shot of the eyes moving and of the kiss have the most movement, but are also the most sparse shots, allowing me to focus on getting the movement of this one thing right, without distraction

i create interest in other sections through contrasting shots, rather than using movement -- kuwana and yagami in bed together, then him alone -- the meaning is conveyed through the sequence, rather than any movement, and the music helps make the progression feel natural. following the beat, yknow

i also had to accept that the quality of my work was going to vary, and some of the illustrations would look good and others would just have to be serviceable, or it would never get done

and of course, my own experience -- i know the basics of csp's animation tools, but i don't know enough to make my life easy, you know? i was fighting the program, doing things inefficiently.

i had to think about how i was organising my layers/folders, i had to grab the audio and trim it and make sure it sounded right and... blah blah blah. you see what i mean, right? the format itself has so much potential, being able to create meaning through movement and contrasting shots and audio is great, but it's so strenuous (and i am not used to it) (not to gloat about how wow i did this and it was soooooo hard, nah, but this is what it was like for me at the novice level so like. for more involved work, just imagine... just imagine...) (or better yet, imagine with an example. you'd probably get more interesting answers about animation from @/phantasy14 than me)

by contrast, one of the best things about writing is that, at its core, you can just... open a document and type. not to downplay the effort that writers take, and yeah part of it is that my fanfic writing is Not That Complicated, but in the end... words are free, you know? i don't have to worry about straining my wrist, or if this would look better with an extra frame here or over here, what function i should be using in my program... i can kind of just get to the heart of the matter. i guess i kind of said something similar in the last post as well -- that writing makes it easier to dig into details and context, and the same applies here. since Words Are Free, you can really dig into the meat as much as you'd like. in a process like animation, any decision could add hours or days to your workload, so you have to be absolutely certain that the decision is worth it. this conflict between the artist's idea and the effort is a very defining difference in the mediums, i think.

so, aside from Fighting The Art Process, i suppose i should talk about why this idea ended up being an animatic instead of say, writing. first of all, the song, ofc -- it was the whole inspo, and it's nice to work with it directly. secondly, i think, is because i was trying to convey an emotion more than anything. this is where that ambiguity/detail difference between mediums comes in. i'm portraying yagami missing kuwana, and just that alone. i'm not trying to explain what he's thinking specifically, or why, or even the exact nature of their relationship before all this. what i'm conveying is i miss you. and the most direct, most blunt way to express this is to contrast being together with being apart. to fixate on the features of the other person so to depict a yearning for them. the ending contrasts a remembered(/imagined? you decide) smiling kuwana against kuwana walking away, of him leaving.

you were here (smiling, with me) + you left = i miss you

it just makes sense. writing this would have necessitated detail, would have necessitated more context, and muddied the feeling which is conveyed so concisely through the video instead. look at how i've written yagami missing kuwana so many goddamn times. it takes so many more words, it forces you to hold onto something more concrete like thoughts and events in order to convey the emotion, instead of depicting it on its own. so yeah, the ambiguity of illustration combined with the contrast achieved via sequence, these were necessary to convey this feeling as directly as possible. i also just think it feels more elegant. there's room for the audience to breathe and really feel the difference between kuwana being there and kuwana being gone. the imagery is blunt but the feeling itself surprisingly isn't... at least imo. it just wouldn't feel the same written, would it? i hope that answers your question.

anyway onto the next part... senseific <3

it's good that you named that as a specific example because i never thought about it, but now that you mention it there are absolutely some parts i would probably have an easier time drawing than writing

your honour..... (with a massive sigh) THE FIRST KISS SCENE. HAS BEEN BOTHERING ME. FOR MONTHSSSSSS. it's. sigh. well where do i start with this one... the thing that makes this difficult for me is that it's very much a "wow this is a bad idea but we're doing it anyway" kind of kiss, right? and like. because they shouldn't be doing it, it's been troubling me all this time if their trains of thoughts even make sense. i don't want to force it, but it's difficult to direct things into that direction when i know that they know they probably shouldn't be doing it... i have revised it and i think it reads kind of alright now? but i'm still worried about it...

and this. would be great. for illustration. i wouldn't have to explain shit, i just have to make sure i convey an atmosphere that lends itself for them to make this dumb decision. that's not to say that i wouldn't care if it didn't make sense, of course not, but if it was a visual format, i could just let the atmosphere speak for itself, you know... they're alone together, they'd both been drinking a few hours ago, kitakata comes close, and though yagami sees it coming he doesn't seem to stop him... and it just. there it is. it's happened. no need to say anything, just let the atmosphere and the audience's imagination do the work. the lack of detail in the medium would work in my favour. no issue.

the other one that comes to mind is a scene where kitakata and yagami smoke on the roof together. it's a similar situation where ambiguity would play better for the scene. there comes a point where the conversation stops between them and it just kind of sits. it feels really clumsy having to explain in words that this is one of the first few peaceful moments between them, that yagami doesn't mind being around him for once. this would be better expressed with just visual space. letting the audience feel that peace, that quiet moment between them. i'd draw them apart, so you can see the visual distance between them, and yet they're together, and they're quiet and maybe just maybe they could become closer, could choose to spend time around each other without getting on each other's nerves... or at least that would be the implication. it's much cleaner than having to spell it out in writing.

oh! and i remember i was tempted to draw kitakata's messy desk at some point. that one's easier depicted with words but i just think it could be fun.

AND IF I MAY BE SELF INDULGENT AND BRING UP "are you seeing anyone?" AGAIN..... that gag. just that gag and nothing else around it. i mean. now that i think about it, it's kind of joke-comic-y.... but the joke itself relies on a bunch of stuff beforehand... perhaps not...

a group photo would be nice too... a club photo perhaps... get everyone in there. just some mundane snapshots of everyone in their daily lives... hell, i could even throw sawa in there! i definitely should do that!

and something sexy... i should draw something sexy with kitakata and yagami...

i ought to add some of these to my mental list of things to draw...