Galneda 2009-02-11 20:19:03

Thanks very much, and I'm glad you liked ZOA! I'll keep ya posted.

Galneda 2009-02-13 13:01:39

<3 Catch

Galneda 2009-02-15 19:02:56 (Updated 2009-02-16 00:44:21)

I'm really, really incredibly flattered that you love ZOA to that extent, but it's a project that serves as a bridge to me.

I needed something to serve as a bridge between my shitty flash test and the projects that I had in mind for the future. Some kind of practice ground that didn't have a high demand of animation skill, and sort-of a wall to practice graffiti on.

The success that ZOA raked in, I cannot emphasize enough, was completely, totally unexpected. I had the goal in mind (And such lack of faith in the flash itself, I half-expected to fail) to simply get a higher score than my flash test. Daily 3rd award? Blew my mind. Frontpage? Shat my pants. Working on the thing months ago, I would've never seen that coming.

But I can't be proud of it. I'm proud with the fact that I finished it, and I'm very proud that it's scored so well, it's received such great feedback, and even won an award...but the flash itself? I can't be proud of it. A little bit of that is because I'm still kind-of kicking myself for making it an "Awesome parody" instead of my own parody on ZOE. Another bit is because I sacrificed demonstrating my potential by making cuts after cuts after cuts after CUTS trying to reach the deadline before college started. It instilled a good habit to MEET deadlines if I'm to do this professionally, but it also planted a bad habit to essentially justify laziness.

I watch it with friends and I cringe every time I see it. Every mistake, every dip in pace and quality...sometimes I find myself apologizing for it while they watch. There are two or three people I know personally who have ever even heard of ZOE. The one's that have loved it, and I hoped they would because they'd get the jokes. But everybody else? They stare placidly, chuckle at a few parts, and say "Ehhhh, it's pretty good. Keep it up."

I need to make something amazing. Laughing until they cry funny, or eye-popping epic. Something that when I walk around Dallas and I meet a big mover and shaker, I can proudly hand them a card and tell them to watch my flash.

As frustrating as the learning process is, and as difficult as animation has turned out to be, this is something that I love doing to the extent that I want to get paid to do it. I would love to make this my job. But in order to audition against the other guys out there who have been doing it for years? I gotta rise above and beyond them with something new.

I can't do that with video game parodies. I can't do that if I'm doing something everybody else has been doing for years. So far it's established, on this profile, that I can make a choppy pink mannequin rip his own head off, and I can make an obscure parody of someone else's obscure parody on an even more obscure video game...obscurely.

Once again, I'm flabberghasted and honored that you love ZOA; it's stuff like that which keeps me going, because it tells me that I'm apparently doing something right.

But I gotta move forward. Y'know, "tread new grounds." (lol)

Galneda 2009-02-16 15:29:44

Y'know, one was enough, but okay!