Which of these two careers do you think is the easiest in which to gain recognition? I have a friend I grew up with who says all the time he's a film maker. I haven't seen him for over 40 years and haven't seen anything he claims as his work. I'm working toward drastically increasing my stealth as a Computer Graphics (CG) illustrator and animator The above is some of my first landscape work in Blender. To do it further justice I really need a better computer, which I'm working on. This is freehand rework in Twisted Brush. A bunch of mouse dribble. I suppose, for me personally, I'm wondering about the worth of my own skills as much as anyone else does theirs. From the general aspect, though, what type of work do you think is the easiest route to becoming published successfully? The trend for visual artists these days, from what I understand, is to self-publish illustrated stories. Is one wiser to spend the time making a serious animated film and launching clips on You Tube or just to muddle through writing, editing and doing one's best to adequately publish?
You can write a novel for nothing other than the cost of your time, buy a stock image for $1 and self-publish as an e-book and paperback, or you can send it off to agents and publishers for the trade route. May not sell, but at least it hasn't cost you a lot. Films usually require finding a whole bunch of people willing to work on your movie, expensive equipment, food, and locations where you can shoot, or lots of CGI if you do everything in front of a green screen. Most of the low-budget indie movies I worked on were either made over months to years as the director scrounged all the equipment and locations they needed for free, or cost $20,000+ if they actually had to pay for things. Few of them got anywhere other than film festivals, though two of my acquaintances did go on to make Blair Witch and Shaun Of The Dead, so it's possible if you're good and/or lucky.
Interesting take. At this point I'm curious. This forum is the first place I encountered the term "indie." How did that term evolve? I had my day of organizing bands and sitting in as lead guitar for those in need. The expense of A/V can add up, still MIDI has made it easier to be a one man show where creating a decent piece of art is concerned. Personally, I don't even need to spend the $1 on stock images unless I was going to use it as a background for an A/V work. I imagine my starting the discussion is to get some opinions from those doing it all and especially from the perspective of anime. Is the market kinder to writing or animation?
'indie' to those in the film industry refers to films that do not come out of the major studios... in the literary world, it used to refer to small publishing houses that are 'independent' of the big conglomerates that encompass numerous imprints... but nowadays, i'm seeing it used by writers who self-publish, though i'm not quite sure what they mean by it... as for your friend, a 'filmmaker' is generally considered to be someone who actually makes a film... that is, they acquire a script and then sign on a director, and acquire the funding it takes to go ahead and shoot it... however, during the many years in which i've been mentoring aspiring screenwriters, i've come across some beginners who like to call themselves filmmakers, though they don't do anything but try to write scripts... so i don't know what your friend may be referring to by calling himself one... as to which career [novels or filmmaking] is easiest to gain recognition in, i'd first need to know if by the latter you mean writing screenplays, or being a director or producer... if you mean screenwriting, it's probably as hard to succeed in as being a novelist... if you mean becoming a 'known' director or producer' it's probably harder, since it depends on being extremely good at a lot more than 'just' writing... btw, what do you mean by ' increasing my stealth as a Computer Graphics (CG) illustrator and animator'? is that a typo, or are you being sneaky about practicing your craft?
Stealth is used as "prowess." One has to sort through a mish-mash of opinions and software possibilities to arrive at what is useful for them and their budget as well. It's painful for someone wearing bifocals to do serious work on a laptop sized screen or even a 19" CRT for that matter. The online forums where one may turn for answers are often driven by advertisers in those fields, so the less expensive alternatives are "a discouraging word" on some comms. I've hooked a 32" LED Emerson to my laptop as a test, finding even at 1300 x 900 res, it's a God send for being able to pick parts of the surface to work on. Stealth is needed to worm an answer out of those who frown on discussing a cheap alternative to a $1800 32" monitor with no better resolution. You may have noticed already, I'm hardly covert about much of anything. That's interesting about indie meaning independent. Makes sense. It's the meaning of independent that seems to be widening its spectrum.
@DrWhozit Novels are easier. Making a film can hardly ever be done on your own, particularly with animation. Yes, technically you can make a movie on your own with animation but that takes so much time and skill that you could easily be an accomplished novelist by the time you finish your debut animation. Animation requires an artistic skillset, a technical skillset, a cinematographic skillset, a basic understanding of skeletons and inverse kinematics, a understanding of modelling and, to top it all off, a understanding of storytelling. Whilst writing a novel requires a good grasp of grammar, punctuation and style, it is much less demanding on the technical aspects and probably easier to really finish too.
Mamma, what do you tell aspiring screenwriter who feel they have an IP they believe will succeed as a living franchise and want to retain the rights to the IP?
It depends how much time to put in on the task you like. Film makers can become popular based on how good their films are. And authors become popular based on how addictive their books become. Plus if they can help the studio or publishing companies earn enough movie off their work, their status will grow.
I have everything I need including a couple years to devote. After my morning coffee I'm off to get my other half a 42" HDTV on sale for $298, then her 32" will retire to become my graphics monitor. (Works sweetly.) Next will be a new computer and w7 OS. That machine will be destined to become a slave renderer. About this time next year, I'll build a new machine around I-7 technology, thus quad core @3.47 Ghz, 64GbRAM a SSDHD for the worker and a couple 3TbHD's for the storage disks. Knowing computer technology (and how to get the most bang for one's budget) is one of the most important aspects of CG. If your system is choking on a ram/cpu hungry program, you can become disenchanted very quickly. Still, just for doing a really great cover illustration, CG rules. Art sells writing. Yes. When I'm not tinkering with a plasma and a magnetic field, I'm writing or producing computer based artwork. I have the time to do my work and even squeeze in some covers for others who can't do that.
Why stop at one-man movie making? With that kind of commitment and talent, one should go Orbis Tertius...
what are you referring to as the 'IP'?... a script? and what do you mean by 'a living franchise'? if you mean a script, it's automatically copyrighted as soon as it's completed and exists in reproducible form... that protects your rights to what you've written... if you mean a character, characters can't be copyrighted, though, like batmand and superman, et al., they can be trademark protected... if you'll be more specific, i can give you more relevant answers... in what language, drw?
An IP, like Star Wars. Isn't that owned by Lucas? Or perhaps Disney now, but Lucas owned the rights to that story/storyline. Let's try a different approach. When a studio buys a script, what exactly are they buying? Are they buying rights to the story, IP, characters, races, etc.
The talent pool in the film industry is ridiculous—it's not a one man show. People expect everything to look amazing, and they don't even understand how hard it is to achieve that level of aesthetic quality in CG. I've dabbled in 3D art myself, it was originally my career choice. I wanted to be a digital sculptor but I lost interest in it. It did open my eyes to the sheer amount of effort that goes into making a proper film, 3D animation, or a video game though. To think you can create an animated show or film by yourself because you've had a bash on blender is beyond ignorant. Even looking at the image from blender, you barely have a grasp on UV texturing and lighting—and they're faaaaar easier than animating. Animation is an true art. It takes years to be able to master the subtle art of key frame animation, considering that you're going to attempt this by yourself you likely won't be able to make use of motion capture. Even before you attempt to think about the art of animating, you'll still need to wrap your head around the technicalities. The process of rigging up a human head to achieve all the intricate facial expressions is hard enough itself. I don't think you've thought this through. At least that's impression you give from those images you've posted. I'm not being mean. This is coming from someone who was involved in the digital sculpture communities for a few years. The quality of even the smallest film and animation companies these days are still high. You just simply can't pick up some software and make a film by yourself.
In overleaf of a metaphor, English. One's superior ability might be furtive. The stealth is to walk between the metaphorical raindrops, still, were you selecting unnecessary vertices, edges and faces to delete or otherwise manipulate them, ones prowess must be stealthy. I expect that seasoned writers are keen to recognizing a metaphor. Perhaps if you simply spelled out the meaning of IP nobody would confuse it with internet Protocol. To think there aren't people out there who are one man shows is not only beyond ignorant, it gives new meaning to narcissism. Not everyone who fails at CG themselves is so arrogant as to assume nobody can succeed on their own. I've seen some very nice work in more than Blender. I simply like it because it has particle systems and dynamic hair. Not everyone uses UV mapping. Except for the dodepod, the rest of this is WIP. If I have the education concerning the need for a system that is built to handle the demands of CG and have already discussed that issue, I'd think someone who was anything beyond an utter failure at Blender or other CG software would gain a better opinion. Calling someone ignorant is moreover a reflection of their own because they aren't even able to grasp the meaning conveyed by their target of disparagement. I'm surprised you weren't nitpicking on my inattention to lighting. Most people give up before they even model draperies. If you can't show something better...
You can, it's just not going to look like three dozen professionals worked on it If you set your standards appropriately (not low, just appropriately), I believe you can do quite a lot. There is a HUGE indie scene in animation out there. Not to mention the art scene in general. There are hundreds of festivals too. And Youtube, vimeo etc are great for promotional purposes. Of course, one needs to be a complete moron to think he can earn big money and create a commercial blockbuster on his own (in a few years)...
I was giving you a reality check. I wasn't even being rude like you are to me with your butt hurt reply riddled with insults. Also, I didn't fail either. I chose not to sculpt, because I didn't enjoy it any more. I'll even show you one of my old sculptures to prove that I did pursue CG art to a substantial amount: Plant Beast Sculpt You're the one who is being ignorant and the one who is being obnoxious. I wasn't even harsh about your work—and you still blew up at me like a child. If you couldn't even take my somewhat polite criticism, I don't even know what you'll do when you receive the type of harsh comments in the actual industry. Seems you're a stubborn old man, so I'll put this bluntly. Do you really think anyone would be interested in watching those pieces of work your posted move? No. Not even for free. It's a waste of time though. Sure, one man maybe could make one of the most awful attempts at piece of animated entertainment. If he wasn't oblivious, and was serious about getting involved in CG. He'd be thinking about taking on one specific role regarding CG, and getting involved in a project with a team. But no. He think's he can hit the big bucks by doing everything. It's ridiculous.
@Laze oh, I really wasn't talking about DrWhatafac... He's a special case But, you should really check out some indie animations online. A lot of beautiful work. It's not all about entertainment, and it certainly isn't all about money...
There are some gorgeous indie productions out there—but even indie isn't solely one man. Indie just means it isn't a team of pros. It's still a team. A group effort. There simply is no way to handle it all by yourself and for it look remotely decent. The level of skill required in each role to make an animation or a film good is simply that high these days. I have the utmost respect for those who make today's visual entertainment, they are very talented people.
@Laze for example: thechaseshortfilm.com/ kaleblechowski.tumblr.com/ www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYBDOpv1tAI&app=desktop&persist_app=1&client=mv-google&guid=&gl=US&hl=en one-man projects...
Funny. Everything you stated seemed blandly disparaging. IMO you wouldn't know reality if it came up and bit you on the nose. When you come to battle of wits, bring more than a cheerleading chorus of twits. I'm not going to spar with you.
We're sparring? This is just a conversation to me. It was disparaging because you needed it. You speak of me not having a grip on reality, yet you're the one on a writing forum explaining to people how you're going to make an entire 3D animated film series and post it on YouTube—all by yourself. That my friend, is the definition of a contradiction. Like I said, I'm not doing this to be mean. I'm just being honest.
So much for a 42" at that price. Thanksgiving night only. Not the end of the world. A second 32" then in Spring or summer I'll have dual 32" monitors and a 50" for watching it all... Regardless of what some want others to believe, only you truly know your skills. I've actually seen some pretty nice 30 minute productions from other one-man-shows. You Tube has quite a few of shorter duration. Some are excellent. Some need more work. As I mentioned, much of the problems most run into is machine capabilities. Animation is known to eat through CPU's. Yes. Writing is simpler, still, in my opinion, illustrated work does make a writer, or written work, considerably more outstanding. Such is the query here for opinions. Does illustrated work increase the odds of being noticed by the readers that are out there?
