Panic

I've been nearing my stress limit here in Montreal for the last few weeks. Not overwhelmed, but nearing it. For anyone who is concerned by what I just wrote: don't be. I put myself into all of these classes. I intend to do all of the work. It is a test of myself and it is only going to help me in the future.

But in this state, a few times I have realized that I was just about having panic attacks. Generally I am known for being stoically cool under pressure. This is of course just an outward appearance, and just like everyone else, I get nervous and tense.

But I noticed these panics attacks. A part in my stop motion puppets armature had broken and I could feel the panic building in my body. It felt nearly physical. I couldn't think straight. Thankfully, part of my mind kept itself separate from the rest and continued to analyze what was going on. It saw that something was going on that needed to be rectified. There was an unnatural lapse in my mind that was causing a loop of negative feelings that was getting disastrously powerful in my brain.

So I managed to do a little research on the topic, and recognized what was occurring. And the recognition has allowed me to feel a lot better.

I was negatively predicting the situations. I was thinking of the broken armature, and then thinking about all the possibilities in the future that were also broken and wrong. I was thinking through all of the results of the single broken part and creating a web of horrible possibilities for myself. And this overwhelmed me.

This web of negative predictions only produced a larger web of negative questions and more negative predictions. It was a self fueling fire that was only getting worse.

But by recognizing the pattern, it is easy to throw a wrench in it. All I had to do was think of the solution to the initial problem and the whole web of failure disintegrated.

Even if I couldn't come up with a solution at the time, simply recognizing the panic as a result of outrageous negative predictions, everything started to feel better.

There is a purpose to being really busy, of getting yourself in over your head: it is one of the only ways you will ever learn what your real limits are.

Kyler

The Car Matador

For my puppet animation class I built the character of the Car Matador. He will use his matador skills and cape to cross the street.

This has been, undoubtedly one of the most complicated processes which I have ever gone through. There were just so many little steps that needed to be followed to get it finished. But it is also the fact that it was so many small steps that made it possible. Anything big must be done in small steps, and now I have a much larger arsenal.

As I posted earlier the ball and socket metal work was quite interesting. Workshops as some of my favorite places to be.

This is an image of my armature. It broke and had to be fixed. The issue was with the solder. There are a few problems with the solder. The first is that I didn't solder hot enough some of the time. It would melt, but it really needs to liquefy. The next issue with the solder was that I was putting 1/8 inch rod into holes that were 9/64th inch. This small gap made the solders weaker. I would have stronger solders with 1/8 rod in 1/8 holes. My final suspicion is that I used silver solder whose melting point was too low. Mine was 450 degree Fahrenheit melting point, while there do exist silvers solders with 700 degree melting points that might be stronger.

All will also file down all of the corners of all of the joints. They aren't really sharp as I did file them, but they do stick out when the puppet is manipulated in some positions.

I would also spend a lot more time developing a more robust hand system. The one I created will wear out and is not particularly flexible.




I then proceeded to sculpt the puppet. I used high quality plasticine that is quite rigid some compared to other types. I found sculpting on top of a nice armature very enjoyable.















I was particularly happy with the plasticine sculpt of my character. I was concerned that the armature would be obvious inside of him, but through some design choices I think he looks pretty distinctive and organic. The next time I will hopefully have more time. I actually did the whole sculpt inside of eight hours in near a continuous working session.



It was then time for a two part mold. Due to limit supplies, I had to really stretch all of my materials for the mold. While this didn't really hinder my work, it definitely made my mold distinctive to the rest of the class.











After the mold had dried, it was time to take him out. The molding process generally with wreck the plasticine version, which is just fine because I have to get the armature out anyways.



There is always a lot of struggling opening molds and getting things out of them. This is another thing that takes a lot of finesse yet sometimes a good chunk of force as well.









It was then time for the foam latex. This involves mixing chemicals, very quickly putting those chemicals along with the armature into the mold. The whole thing than goes in the oven for a few hours. This was the part of the process that could have failed the worst. I only had a single batch of foam latex so there were no second tries.



The armature needed to be very carefully position in the mold as to not have any of it touch the sides. I sort of just fudged this. There was simply no way the armature could touch any sides. I have extremely thin foam in some areas.











The moment of truth occurred a few hours later. He emerged.







The foam latex didn't work out perfectly, but it was usable. There was some loss of chin and bubbles. But after such a long process, it still managed to work pretty well. Paint is pretty much all that follows.









And that is the creation of the Car Matador. My first foam latex puppet with ball and socket armature. Now it is time to sleep.


Kyler

A Delicate Touch

As the prior post said, I went to a Halloween party last weekend. From the party a video was posted to Facebook. If you are a friend of mine on Facebook you can find that I have one video associated with my profile. In that video I come to the rescue by opening a wine bottle that had two corkscrews broken in it.

Two corkscrews were broken, not just one, in an attempt to open the wine. Now I am not making any attempt to blame anyone, but I think it is a very important to take notice of something. It is unlikely that two defective corkscrews were used one after another. I also don't believe that it was some sort of super strong bottle of wine. I suspect the common factor of broken corkscrews was in fact the person using them.

Again, I am not trying to pick on someone, but am trying to reveal something that was suggested by the "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance". Whoever might have broken the corkscrews was not paying attention to their actions. They were probably distracted and in a hurry. And because of it, they broke their tool. They were probably likely to blame their tool.

I bring this up because in class this week we were to bring in our foam latex puppets for animation. Some people had major problems with their foam latex, others had success. While I can not say for sure, I suspect the root problem of most people who had difficulty with their foam latex were the people themselves. It required a lot of careful examination, patients, thought and determination to make work.

The moral of the story is be patient, thoughtful and caring when you are faced with problem. I struggled with the wine bottle for a moment, tried a tool at hand. I then thought for quite a while. I then opened the draw in front of me. Found some scissors and used the space between the handles and the pivot as a pair of pliers and very carefully persuaded the cork out of the bottle.

That is actually the second time in my life that I have come up with an ingenious way to open a bottle of wine. I think the first used a nail and a hammer, but I can't remember exactly.

Kyler

A Different Kind of Halloween Costume

I don't know exactly what it is, but I dislike the idea of dressing up in costume. Wearing hats and makeup makes me nervous. The only explanation I can really give is by opposition. I enjoy blending in and being anonymous in public by default, and only leaving that position by choice.

So Halloween is always a bit of a conundrum. I like participating in Halloween, and would hate to arrive at a Halloween party without a costume, yet I also don't want to where a costume.

So this year I found a very interesting solution. Instead of actually wearing a physical costume I went the route of Relational Art, and interacted with people in an interesting way. I had been given a set of string magic tricks for my birthday, so for Halloween, I learned magic.

Now with this idea, it was actually important that I didn't wear a costume. At the party I went to people would ask what my costume was, and I had a perfect opening for the magic.

The whole thing went astonishing well. People were really interested by the tricks. Sometimes I did them right, other times I messed up, but every time there was some real attention and interaction between people.

It also changed how I was at the party. I was more attentive because I was remembering what tricks I had shown who, so I could come back with more later. I was also being more attentive to the other people at the party. To do magic you really have to pay attention to your audience.

Also, as the party progresses, the influence of alcohol takes hold and people are more easily fooled, only contributing further to the fun.

Happy Halloween

Kyler

Math Notes

From my perspective, my most distinctive class is actually a math course I am taking: Vectors and Matrices.

I decided to take it first because it is a prerequisite for a computer programming course I am taking next semester. But it is actually the perfect math class for me. It is the basic math that is fundamental to all of computer graphics, and actually most of computer math. It is an incredibly powerful way of doing math that allows it to more easily work with computers.

It is really quite weird to go back into that type of class room environment where everybody sits quietly as the teacher talks about things written down in the textbook. I don't really know anyones name, and I don't have to comment on there work, and there actual test that I have to right and I actually get marks back that mean something.

I have to say, I really like my animation courses. We watch movie, have discussions. Sit around and talk. And then we get to serious work, that we personally care about and show it to everybody else. I sort of wish that type of thing could happen in math. I would feel personally invested in it and would actually make something cool out of it.

Instead we are committed to learning things that are written in a book, it just feels so monotonous.

I suspect that I have some of the more interesting notes in the class. For one I keep them in a giant sketch book, and for the other, I sometimes start sketching. Nothing really good because I do actually have to pay attention.








Kyler

Line Animation

Here is my first character animation from this year. We were given the music and a total of four lines to work with to represent two characters.


This is quite delayed from I finished it. I've been a little bit hesitant to put up short pieces of work without polishing them up together into something a little more substantial.

Kyler

When A Lesson Physically Manifests Itself

I'm currently enrolled in a puppet animation course, otherwise known as stop-motion animation. It is taught by Erik Goulet, the most distinctive teacher I will ever meet. He will also be the teacher who I will think back to if I ever become a teacher.

The reason for this is likely quite simple: he is unyielding passionate about the subject. His enthusiasm is so strong that even as a night course, taught between the hours of 6:00 pm and 10:00 pm, no one is ever tired. But it goes further than that. There are consistent obvious examples of his attempting to make the class succeed.

There is also another very important aspect of his class. The fact that is it "his" class. He developed the curriculum, the handouts, the assignments. He is in complete and utter control of the class. And his character come through into the class. Thinking back on prior courses, I suspect that some of my favorites have been my favorites for this same reason. When a course is actually a teacher's course, and not simply the curriculum that has been handed down from a higher level, or passed on from a previous teacher, there is something new, fresh and entirely ire-producible that exists. The examples I can think of of hand are "Theory of Knowledge" with Mr. Kelly in high school, my "3d Modeling for Rapid Prototyping" at ACAD and my "Animation I" course at ACAD. Maybe I will remember more later.

To top it off there was even cake tonight. But moving on to the actual topic of discussion.

I am building a metal ball and socket stop motion animation armature. It is the thing inside the puppets in films such as the Nightmare Before Christmas. It is the gold standard when it comes to what you put inside puppets. It doesn't wear out easily. It is really sturdy. It is smooth.

The main downside is that they are fairly complicated and difficult to build. For that reason I was the only one in the class to actually decide to build one. Once the opportunity arose there would have been simply no deterring me. I was going to go to the metal shop and build that armature.

So here we are are twenty hours of metal shop time later. I have my puppet built, after lots of trials and tribulations. The thing is holding together. Except I have doubts. Some of the solders that I have been doing have been breaking. Not that they are really weak, but they need to be really strong for their job.

But this project needs to get done, and I get it done, ready to show my class. Here is the armature before I go to my class.

All looks good. People are seeing it, and they are excited that I got this thing going.

But the fact is after class it looked like this.

This is because I had left my doubts about my armature unchecked. I had coddled it through the last few steps so that I wouldn't fail, instead of testing it is harshly as I should have.

It wasn't as though the teacher ripped this thing apart though. First one arm fell off halfway through class when I was messing with it. And then, at the end of class, I went over the armature one-on-one with the teacher. It felt like at that point I had been given permission to really test the armature. It is hard to describe, but once I had opened up about my doubts about the project, and the teacher was completely understanding, I could finally do was needed to be done and really try to tear the thing apart.

And then it really broke.

The thing is, after talking more, we discovered that it is likely a simple error I was making during the soldering process that was leading to all these weak joints. So tomorrow I will be able to fix it.

It is however, very interesting how visually and conceptually well this experience represents the greater world of creation (by which I mean art, design and pretty much anything). You need to have a very strong base structure to build everything else upon. You need to spend lots of time building it, and then actually test it. In this case a teacher provided a great means catalyzing this testing process.

It is incredibly important that I found and accepted the weakness of my armature now, instead of when it was too late, when the whole thing is covered in layers foam latex and it would actually, without exaggeration, ruin everything.

Whatever you are making, don't be scared to test it, because if you are scared to test it, it is all the more likely that it will break.

Kyler

Sketching as scales

In the past few months I've started something new with my drawing process. When I am just warming up I've started using the same thought process behind piano scales. You need to practice the techniques that you are going to use in the actual art. In piano, this means chords, note progressions and all sorts of other things. In drawing, this means connecting lines, drawing shapes, making even lines, making progressions of shapes, making straight lines, joining curves. It can mean all sorts of things. So now when I start, I generally make up drawing activities to get myself into it even if I have nothing to sketch really.

Some of the following sketches are the result of that warm up. Others are preparation for animation I was working on.


















Kyler

Thanks Giving

Well Happy Belated Thanksgiving.

My family came to Montreal to celebrate. It was great to be able to have them at the apartment. They have this great ability to just make a place better than it was before. Things get fixed, cleaned and added as though by magic when they showed up.










While my apartment may be a little bit bare, it really is feeling like home.

Kyler

Art Science Business Religion

Art is my business.

Science is my religion.

Somethings are more authoritative

when you don't try to back them up.

Kyler