I’m back. Both here at the Roost, and home in Nashville. A lot has happened since my last post, but I’m not even sure I have time to recount that month – this past week has been crazy enough (crazy good, don’t worry). I’ve just come back from a lovely visit to Lightbox Expo, and I feel as though I’ve been hit with life experience whiplash. In short, it was a bit surreal to wake up in Central Time, see campus outside my window, and go eat in a cafeteria. My whole Lightbox trip felt very much like the journeys in The Lord of the Rings and The Wind in the Willows – a needed escape from the familiar and routine, which now at the end, are the things you’re most excited to return to. That’s the hobbit part of me, I guess. Yet as ready as I was to come back home and see familiar faces, the actual experience of it has taken some getting used to. I feel like Rat in The Wind in the Willows after his enchantment by the Sea Rat – dazed, tired, a little sad, and in dire need of a poetry-filled cure. And since I don’t write much poetry, I’m back here at the Roost.
However, this has also been a rather challenging blog post to write: I’ve been sitting on it for a day or so, trying to come up with funny quips or stellar observations - you know, typical fare here on the Roost ;) But I just don’t really know where to begin or what to say. I think it’s because I’ve had so many thoughts and experiences that they’ve all gotten tangled up in my mind - some kind of knotted yarn ball of animation bewilderment and fanboyish wonder. But if I’m not careful, that ball is going to roll away down a forgotten memory lane. I’m going to try to untangle some of it here, and capture some of what I saw and learned. This trip was too important to forget. (Also I need to ditch this yarn metaphor.)
FIRSTLY: There were a lot of
unknowns in this trip. I initially didn’t know if our animation department
would choose to go to CTN or Lightbox. This was Lightbox’s first year of existence
too, so no one knew what it would actually be like. Even once Professor
Tom did decide on Lightbox, we didn’t know where we would stay, if the trip
would wreck my schedule by being a class credit, or exactly how much it would
cost. While I don’t particularly like any amount of unknowns, you can’t dispute
that they’re a perquisite for a good adventure. And as reluctant as I am to
admit it, the unknown is where it’s often the easiest to find God. And good
gracious was He there on this trip. (Buckle up – I already know this is going
to be a long post).
Perhaps His first act of grace was
keeping me healthy and safe during the weeks prior to the trip. You guys have
no idea how much I worried about getting sick and being unable to go! I think I
made some kind of idol out of this experience. But despite the sleep lost due
to my excitement and anxious prepwork for the trip, I emerged ready to go
Wednesday morning at 5:30am. We had a very early flight.
Landing in the Burbank airport was
an especially memorable moment for me. Since this would be my first time in
California, I didn’t quite know what to expect. But when I arrived it felt like
I recognized it somewhat – probably due to my study of Louie Zong’s art. But
what a different world from Tennessee & NC! I was thankful for the hills
that surrounded the city – without rain or seasons, at least I would have some
mountains to look upon. They actually were quite beautiful at sunset, too. LA also
had more plants than I expected – I guess my East Coast brain assumed it was
some kind of wasteland with a few animators huddling in a cave – and was thankful
to find that there was still a lot of life. Talking about the weather became a
familiar happening during the trip, which was perhaps fitting, since it was so
different to me. Or perhaps it was because we were all awkward artists and didn’t
feel like talking about photoshop brushes anymore.
Wednesday was full of joyful occurrences.
I love happy reunions, and it had been a good while since I had seen my friends
Naomi and Clay, who had recently moved to the area. They picked our group up
from the airport and joined us for the rest of the trip. (MAJOR SHOUTOUT to
them, if they’re reading, for driving us around and using up their very
expensive LA gasoline). Following this reuniting, we all went straight to Disney.
The Disney. The Big Dog. The Biggest Mouse. The Mouse House. Our giddiness
of having just arrived in California was only amplified by the fact that we
were basically standing on animation holy ground. I think this picture captures
my friends and I in one of the happiest moments of the trip – grateful to be
standing there, not yet worn down by the business of the expo.
When we walked inside we just happened
to run into Mark Henn, Tom’s mentor (just one of many providential circumstances
that were a common feature of this trip). He then took us on a pre-tour tour, thwarting
the well-meaning plans of our guide, who had to find us when our tour actually began 30 minutes later. Having already signed our NDAs, Mark led us
deeper into the studio where we watched the employees line up for an afternoon
snack. I saw two people I thought were Paul Briggs and was pretty at least one
of them was him. It was a little bit of a revelation to learn that the people
at Disney were just real people, doing their job (and getting free ice cream).
I had always imagined them as animation demigods, perhaps slightly glowing with
talent, footsteps sizzling with drawing ability. But they were just human. The studio
had been recently renovated and looked very fresh. However, the renovation had
done some “spring cleaning” when it came to Disney’s hand-drawn features. Most
of the art was all from Disney’s recent decade of CG films – you actually had
to go to the bottom floor to find art displays from the older features.
Although I love Zootopia, I missed the Bambi and the Lion King. Call me a sentimentalist,
I guess.
Throughout the trip, Tom did a
great job of setting up meals with animation pros – I got to dine with Bobby
Chiu (creator of Lightbox; no idea how he had the time or sanity to meet us),
Mark Henn, Laura Price, and Pernille Orum (which I mostly missed due to waiting
in line for an expo badge). What an honor!
quick meeting with armand serrano
not actually from my instagram - credit: robert hughes
And on Friday, the Expo began.
A lot’s been said about the expo online already – and I agree with most of it. It was well organized, well
executed, and well attended. I think the main highlight was that unlike other
cons, this one was filled with not just fans, but fan-creators. There was a mutual
fan-ship – one where an artist would say “I love your work!” to which the other
artist would likely reply “I love your work too!” Even as a small artist (both
in stature and online following) I was surprised by how many of these
interactions I had. And to top it off everyone was very friendly.
For me, the expo was mostly about
meeting my heroes – the reason why I had gone was mainly due to the deluge of “I’m
coming to Lightbox” posts I had seen from nearly all of my inspirations. So I
didn’t end up going to many panels (just 2) or demos (just 1), because those took
me away from the show floor where most of the people were. Especially as a shy
person, I wanted to give myself every opportunity to meet as many people as
possible (which usually meant skipping lunch. I have since resumed luncheon-ing). Having just come from my second Heroes Con, I felt more ready to
engage and not let this opportunity pass me by. So during the hours of the con,
I went on a whirlwind tour of the artist tables I had marked on my must-see list
(yes, I made a list - analytical left-brain Daniel wanted to come to Lightbox too). I
also got to meet a few artists I knew on Instagram and had talked to before the
expo: notably Luis Huerta and Karla Circe. Luis is a friend from the Jellybots community,
and Karla is a fellow Bluey fan. I also got to meet Tristian Yuvienco (@trisketched), a pleasant surprise, since I didn't expect to be able to see him at the expo. And I got to (re)meet Erika Schnellert and Nicholas Kole too
– and they remembered my name!?
It was wild and amazing to be in
such great company for the weekend.
Lightbox was secondly about getting
portfolio reviews. And while I wasn’t able to get anyone to look at my story
portfolio (which was not as easy to flip through), I did get some constructive
advice on my visual development portfolio. The first review I received was more
cutting and negative, and while I agreed with the criticism, it made me very hesitant
to show the portfolio to more people. But the next day I received a fairly positive
review (some pieces were basically “90% industry level”). It was like filling a
bucket up with water, realizing it has dozens of holes, but then hearing
someone say “but it still holds water!” Biggest note: my recent pieces are my
best ones. That may seem obvious, but what I’ve been doing recently is prop
design. And a tiny, albeit cool, sword on a page wouldn’t seem to have the WOW
factor that a full environment painting would. But to my surprise, I found that
in both positive and negative reviews, it was the props that garnered the most
praise. And they were all at the back of my portfolio. I’ve done some
reshuffling since.
Nick drawing dragons on the big screen
I went to two panels – the first was
Nicholas Kole’s Spyro talk. It was filled with laughter, a defense of furries,
and excellent advice. The most immediately applicable tidbit was this common
mistake in an artist’s mindset:
Good/positive feedback = well-meaning,
but insincere lies
Harsh/negative/constructive
feedback = the real stuff
I found myself thinking back on
this a ton after my portfolio reviews, and it allowed me to see the truth in my
good review rather than dwelling too much on my negative one. This panel was
Nick his element, and likely had the best powerpoint of any of the panels at the expo. And
when the lights came up after the talk I saw that it was basically the Nick
fanclub/Jellybots patreon crew in attendance! So it was great to meet those
guys that I had previously only known online.
On Saturday I went to the SCOOB! panel
and got to meet Sara (@servalsketch) while doing so! We had a nice chat in line
and got to be excited about Scoobert together :) We also sat on the front row while
the panel members threw confetti and scooby snacks at us (it was a wild panel
at times). The guy who gave the talk is in this visdev portfolio advice video that I have watched a lot, so seeing him in real life and not
talking about “family friendly entertainment” was a little surreal.
But not everything was sunshine and
well-drawn roses. RUH ROH you say – Complaining zone. Wasn’t going to
Lightbox enough for you, Daniel? BE GRATEFUL, MY MAN. And to that I
say heck yes, I will. It was most definitely a great experience and I have few,
if any regrets. But all the other Lightbox posts I’ve read have been major
gush-fests of Lightbox love and I don’t want your FOMO to get so bad that you
invent a time machine or something and steal my spot in a panel line. I’m moreso doing this to have something to compare future Boxes with and to help Bobby Chiu make future events even better (if for some reason he is reading this). I’ll make it quick: Bullet Point Round!
- Unless a (well known) artist had a table, it was difficult to meet them. There were several people I wanted to meet but couldn’t cause there wasn’t any great way to approach them. It made the guest list a little deceptive, since anyone famous was listed (not just the tablers).
- Signs outside showed badge pickup times for exhibitors, not general public. Although this did lead to a nice conversation with a talented artist, that conversation happened during an hour long wait in line and I missed breakfast :(
- Saturday was packed! Most tables had a crowd and it was difficult to navigate down the aisles. I missed the relaxed, time-to-talk, space-to-walk attitude of Friday and Sunday. Also we had to leave early on Sunday to get back to class on Monday :( (not Bobby's fault)
And after every day I was totally
drained! Sustained 1-on-1 social engagement with people I don’t really know yet
really want to impress took a lot out of me each day. And I never fully got
over my jet lag, which didn’t help. There was one night when I hung out with
Clay and Naomi and I’m pretty sure that I could have fallen asleep instantly at
any time if I stopped thinking about being awake. But then I would also wake up
early (also due to jet lag)! And during that mini insomnia I animated this for a
Lighbox dance-off contest, presented to you here in all it’s screamy glory:
It made it on screen at the event, and
fellow Lipscomb friend Trea Bailey actually took home a prize!
Throughout the whole trip I felt
this weird push and pull relationship with LA and the future I imagine myself
having there. There were times when living in LA seemed so exciting, the prospect
of a job so close, and the community of animation artists so inviting. But
there would be other times when the thought of navigating traffic, moving to a
totally new place, and working in darkened offices filled me with
dread. I think I came away from the experience really wanting to work in LA, but not
really wanting to live there. Hopefully I’ll be able to reconcile this paradox
if God helps me get out to Burbank and make some cartoons.
But I do feel like LA is just “the
right place” – where it’s only a matter of waiting before the right time comes
along. I know Lightbox is an exaggerated example, but it just seemed so easy to
make connections and meet people in what could only be described as a
providential kind of coincidence. There was so much I couldn’t plan or anticipate
about this trip. But God was so faithful in putting me near the right people to
make it worthwhile. I wonder if living
in LA would be similar. Lightbox was definitely the right place for me to be
this past weekend – and I’m glad God provided so many right times.
Hope you find your place, but
thanks for choosing to be here, at the Roost, right now.
-dh
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