Holy crap. It’s been a year since the last post! What can I say? It’s been a long and challenging year in all. One completed production. Caught in another that went belly up. Nice long 6 week holiday to London, Malaysia and Singapore. 3rd placing in the local bouldering gym social comp (intermediate). New bike. New job on Dogstar series II. That pretty much sums up the crazy year of 2009.

Dogstar II goes on till October next year and I have till then to work on a 3D reel, which hopefully will get my foot in the slightly scary world of 3D animation. Should I do a course? I have been thinking about that, but decided against it. I think I just have to learn the software and workflow and I don’t think I need a course to do that.

I am going to be doing another course though. Planning to branch out into Photography and the Photography Institute, run by George Seper has caught my eye. Hopefully, I’ll be able to bring my hobby to another level. I just want something on the side so that I might have something to fall back onto during the dry seasons of the animation industry. I feel sorry for some of my colleagues who have not found another job in animation since the fracas at my old workplace.  I’m feeling a bit scared after the whole thing, and although I am lucky to land myself a new job a week after, I felt that expanding my net will prepare me for any future uncertainties.

Half a year of study by correspondence! I have now made a new category in this blog to house my progress posts. Check back and wish me luck!

I think I’ve hit the jackpot today.

43 degrees celcius heat + fever + looming deadline + insomnia – air conditioned bedroom = something that feels really fucked up

The freaking weather isn’t forecasted to ease up for another 4 days… I really wish I was somewhere else right now.

Life has been crazy the last few months. Work life especially. I hate the fact that it has affected all my other lives as well. Social life is down in the dumps, climbing life is wallowing in the shits. Oh and did I mention that I didn’t get time off from the office during the two week break over Christmas and New Year? I think I am definitely a very different person right now. I feel like I’m endlessly shovelling an enormous pile of shit which never seems to end. It certainly feels very frustrating to meet one crazy deadline and stare down the face of another impossible one straight after.

Living life with crazy amounts of information in my head is definitely not a nice thing. It’s like noise. Static noise, that is. Climbing used to sort that bit out, temporarily at least. Even that’s not working now because the fucking stress is affecting my climbing so much it’s not even funny. Grades have dropped, strength has dropped. Did a climb today and Bob (read previous posts) felt like he was going to break again…

Fuck this shit. I’m going to bed early tonight and starting early tomorrow when my head is a little more clear.

Aahh… I’m having so much fun with my new toy it’s not even funny. Having signed up to the australian photography forum and having feedback from other like minded souls is just my cup of tea. Here’s a cool one I whipped out tonight in a digital darkroom frenzy. Inspired by the old Diana camera which cost 1 dollar in the 1960s.

More HDRI fun with my new toy. Learn something new every fucking day I always say…

Melbourne Exhibition Building

Ho Hum… Another Melbourne Cup day. At least it’s a day off. Stupid body clock just didn’t get it and decided to wake up at 630 am. My brain was having none of that and went back to sleep until 930am. Had brunch at the Mule and decided to take a walk around the city with my new baby. Oh, if you’ve read my previous post, you would have known that I was shopping around for a DSLR camera and I thought I would get the Nikon D60. However, after going through the specs in detail, I realised that it didn’t have some of the functions that I wanted and so decided to get a mid-range one and voila! This is my new baby!

Absolute beuty!

Lots more buttons, lots more features, more useful kit lens. God knows how I’ve survived this long with a stupid point  & shoot. This baby here has got the intelligence to automatically make your images look good for when you’re on the run OR the flexibility to let you run the show for when creativity is needed. Mind you, I’m still finding stuff out with this camera so don’t quote me. I’ve also been reading up and dabbling with some HDRI stuff and this is what I’ve got today in the city.

GPO building interior

GPO building exterior

Been going through lots of climbing photographs and photographs in general. Used to do quite a bit of photography during my college days but the process of developing photos and having only a handful of good shots in a 36 exposure roll wasn’t really fun at all. Now that the entire thing has gone digital, I’ve decided to pick it up and ease myself into it again. Was shopping around for the baby Nikon D60 dSLR over the weekend and got a few competitive prices. Will lock down the purchase next week. Am not an OVERLY enthusiastic photographer and therefore i cannot justify a higher range camera. I’m pretty sure my experience in Photoshop can make up for it though…

What better way to test out the prowess of this new gear than to bring it with me to Mt. Arapiles in Dec? I seriously can’t wait to get clamber on some rocks and take some shots of the Aussie outback. Well, with a digital camera, I can at least remove the crappy shots before anyone sees them… I THINK my shot composition and framing would be pretty alright considering my experience in animated tv series… Just got to develop an eye to ‘pick up’ interesting subjects when they occur which is not THAT instinctive yet due to the fact that I’ve always had a storyboard to work off… My fav subjects of photography? Sprawling landscapes, portrait work & of course, climbing… Let see how well I fare…

Nikon D60: Soon to be mine

Took a detour to JB Hifi on the way home from work today and saw this!

Finally! The dvd has hit the shelves! Yes, it’s only volume 1 but I’m definitely going to get the rest. For the uninitiated, I worked on this series at Animation Works for the whole of 2006. It was my second tv series experience and one heck of an experience it was. Also feels good to be a part of Saturday morning cartoons. For more information, here’s the Dogstar & Mediaworld Pictures websites. Anyway, I’m just so freaking busy these days and have absolutely no time to blog. Will try to get back to posting consistently soon. Hopefully…

Ever felt like you were a tiny knob of butter on an insanely huge slice of bread? My head feels like it’s going to explode from all this work and not having the time to climb this week is driving me mad! Weekends are treasures to seize and I’ve been seizing the opportunity to sleep throughout my Saturdays koz I fucking need them! I do still go for spin classes on Saturday mornings and those sessions are usually invigorating. Not to mention it puts me into a good sleep in the arvo. Walked past ‘Foot Locker’ yesterday and these caught my eye. Tried on the black pair but they made my feet look fucking small. Weird. Decided to get the white pair instead. Can’t wait to go climbing in a couple of hours!

Adidas Superstar II

Woot! Had another 2 hour session with my tattoo artist and he’s done with the koi on my calf! This piece is finished anyway. It still feels a little empty. I’ll be going back to him in the future to discuss possible extensions to the existing design. Am thinking probably some cherry blossoms and a lotus flower. Perhaps even another to keep this one company? Did it hurt? Not particularly, until he started the shading on the head. THAT hurt like a mofo! Very nice job though…