The all Great and Powerful Oz!!!

Well...

...week 3 is under way and I must say, to quote a killer Depeche Mode tune, I JUST CAN'T GET ENOUGH!!!

There's sooo much to it in fact, that I'm seriously lacking in the sleep department. I'm lucky if I'm getting 4 hours a night. Had to rearrange my workout schedule too. I have my Live Q&A (lecture) on Tuesdays which is when I used to work out...I try to get to the gym 4 days a week, was Tues, Thurs, Sat and Sun...Tues is now Wed, so 2 days on, 1 off, 2 on, 2 off....we'll see how well I can keep that up.

So last night there was a Q&A with Shawn Kelly - one of the founders of Animation Mentor, that dood is high energy all the time! I was having a hard time keeping up! I did get a chance to chat with him for a few minutes, and had a freeking incredible time. It was OUTSTANDING!!! I was sooooo amped up afterwards that I was up again until midnight, and when you get up at 4:30 in the a.m. that makes for one tired Oz at the end of the work day. OIY!

This week we're set to do some more posing, last week we did our first pose with STU, I'll rerender my pose and post it up...got some great feedback/critiques from my Mentor. This week we've got another pose assignment - EXCITEMENT! - no no no, that's what the pose should show, but yea it's pretty exciting as well. We also have our first animation...the almighty 'Ball Bounce'. This thing is to obviously teach the basics of timing and spacing...we'll see just how badly I can eff that one up. :p

So that means this week, I've got some post sketching to do (already rolling through that), a ball bounce timing sheet to do, and the actual ball bouce, plus an EXCITEMENT pose for ole STU. I've also got a few video's I wanna watch too...refreshers and stuff, plus I need to watch a few of the Maya software tuts...so I know which buttons to push. ;)

All in all though, it's been one helluva week! Gotta meet and talk to Shawn Kelly (that in and of itself made the week!), I met some new guys and gals in the Q&A and am rolling smoothly forward into this beast known as Animation Mentor.

I've also been handed a new moniker/nickname that I'm diggin. For once in my life, someone called me something other than 'D'. My classmate Long-Hai Pham (check his blog, it's over there ---->) dubbed me 'Oz'. So I'll stick with that for at least another 18 months...and possibly beyond!

Oh and for the record, Chuck Norris...can't handle AM!

Til next time - live an animated life!

Oz