Boy and Bot

Thought up a story a week or so ago involving a boy genius and the robot he makes to fend off the bullies that tease him at school.  Decided to design the two.  Someday I'd like to illustrate the whole story, it's got some nice plot twists to it.

The Boy Who -Called- Wolf

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Story

I love story.

 I've been making up stories ever since I was a kid.  Over the years, I've written countless short stories, screenplays, short films, half-finished novels, comic books and graphic novels. 

However, just because I wrote a lot, doesn't mean I was any good at it.

 I mean, I think I was decent.  I think I've always had an inherent understanding of story.  When you’re passionate about something and you do it enough, you’re bound to get better at it.  But I think you need at least a basic understanding of the fundamentals in order to gain any true competence with something.

I've read a bunch of books on writing fiction over the years; too many to list off here.  It wasn't until last year, however, that I decided to focus specifically on gaining a better understanding of storytelling and story structure.  And boy, there was a lot I didn't know.

The books...

 Invisible Ink

Save the Cat

Save the Cat Strikes Back

My Story Can Beat Up Your Story

Dramatica

Each was helpful, some more than others.  After reading these books, what encouraged me most of all though, was that there really was a method for effective storytelling; and that it could be learned.  I've often heard it said that structure in fiction results in cookie-cutter stories that are predictable.  Well, my thought is that TOO much structure can be a bad thing.  However, I feel that structure is actually a good thing.

If you know what you're trying to say with your story, I mean really pin it down, then this in and of itself suddenly limits the choices you can make creatively.  To effectively support the position that your theme makes, certain things must happen in the story, and other things that do not support this position must be dropped.  These non-essential scenes or ideas become narrative tangents that muddy up the clarity of the theme.  So, if you're trying to tell a story that is actually ABOUT something, then yes, structure is a good thing.  It is your guide.  The creativity comes from the choices made within that structure. 

With that said, in future posts I'll be talking more about these books, along with other storytelling helps I've found over this past year!  

A New Direction

I’m finally feeling like I’m gaining some momentum. For those that don’t know, I worked for about eight years in the field of animation, doing mostly 3D animation in Maya and Softimage.  

Now, I'd been drawing since I was a kid, but in the early 2000′s I became enamored by filmmaking and 3D animation.  Being idealistic in my early twenties, I thought that I would try making my own films with 3D animated creatures and effects.  I went about learning filmmaking and 3D.  I learned a LOT, but as the years went by, I began to see the difficulty and frustration of doing something on that scale.  I also realized how many people and how much money and time it took to do anything worthy of merit in filmmaking.  And most importantly, I realized that I didn't love doing it nearly as much as I loved to DRAW.

With the closing of the animation studio I was working at in 2009, I decided to switch gears completely, and pursue drawing once again, full force.  It was a pretty pivotal moment in my life.

This brings things to the present.  I still feel like I have a lot of catching up to do from all of the lost time spent doing 3D animation and filmmaking.  But my drawing skills are beginning to feel a lot stronger now than they did in 2009.  With this website, I'm hoping to take things to the next level, and really push myself to grow as both an artist and storyteller.