Too busy and tired to write much else other than...
Bearpuncher is RELEASED! To y'all! Check it out here:
Thank you for joining me on this journey - for caring and for watching and for making this moment special. Now that we've reached the summit, why don't we sit a while, and watch some cartoons?
best,
dh
Things are happening, people.
On Wednesday I officially announced Bearpuncher's premiere date, which is... TOMORROW. After a couple of relatively relaxed weeks supervising sound design and compositing, everything is now a blur again as we approach the finish line for this two-year-plus project. If making art is like having a baby, we're in the FRANTIC DRIVE TO THE HOSPITAL stage, people. Everything is happening all at once. I'm planning a premiere watch party, in a classroom on campus that could very well be occupied on the day of the event. (This is the downside of no budget and a small apartment.) The merch just arrived, and needs to be photographed for my Gumroad (shameless plug shameless plug). I'm back to caring about social media again, planning posts and checking numbers. In short, I'm spending all of my free time on the project again, trying to get all the details into place in a way that would honor the hundreds of hours of work I must have spent on this thing.
When I get a moment to sit back and consider all this fanfare I'm building up I still can't decide if I'm spending my energy in the right direction. On one hand, this is a five minute cartoon that's only a little more than a student film. I see much more talented artists like Worthikids and Emily Xu drop their shorts online with only a single, simple post to get the word out. I envy their ability (through follower account or just temperament) to not break a sweat as they carry their films to their audience.
But on the other hand, this is two years worth of my artistic work, and I'd like people to take a look. And I want look at it with them - animation is incredibly isolating, but I've finally reached the tiny moment when it can become incredibly communal. And I made Bearpuncher for the community. For you. Not for the faceless internet user or the number of views, but for the people I talk with each week. And it's worth the extra effort to gather them together online and in person, and you know, watch the thing.
I'm thankful for your effort in sharing and anticipating the film. Scrolling through Instagram and seeing the way our little community has rallied around the film is like energy drink for the soul - I almost feel jittery! After tending to this film for so long it's finally time to let it go off into the world. And I can't think of better people to entrust it to.
So tomorrow! Bearpuncher! Right here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XcR9zv3_Gg
See you then :)
-dh
My houseplants are in a horrible state. The ginger has grown far beyond my wildest dreams and put up dozens of stalks and flowers, all of which are in some stage of browning. A pot which used to hold thyme sits empty like a memorial to the plant it bore last summer. I've even come close to dehydrating my succulents. Plants, surprisingly, won't sit still like they do on my interior design Pinterest board. They shed leaves, twist upward, get moldy, and do all sorts of other things which require your care and attention. Care and attention that I'm much more tempted to spend on making art (or hanging out with friends, if we're being totally honest.)
Because of this, I've learned that I'm not much of a gardener.
Which is kinda ironic, since for the past few months I've viewed my artistic work as another sort of "garden." In my morning drawing sessions I snip a few branches, pull a few weeds, pour on the water. I "tend" to the story, checking back in on it, encouraging it this way and that, watching the slow accumulation of time and effort grow it into something bigger. Bearpuncher has been the first time I've invested major time into one project, and it's surprised me that as you sit with a project for longer, it becomes more of it's own... thing. Like a plant, it wants to move a certain way, budding outward from the choices you made earlier in the process. For example, Bearpuncher purposely ends in an ambiguous, happy/sad kind of way, but it always begged for some note of hope at the end. I'd heard this from friends, and as I watched the final cut I could feel its absence. At the storyboarding phase, I was confused on how to add hope back to the ending, but now with the film more mature it was easy to see how to do it. So I created one additional painting (now one of my favorites in the short), and the film grew in an organic and beautiful way.
Speaking of Bearpuncher, and this extended gardening metaphor, it seems like the harvest is around the bend. Me and my friend Clay have 99.9% finished the final visuals, the actual artwork/animation has been done for weeks now, and the audio is currently being designed and placed. The merch(!) has been designed, and sent off for production. Last year's poster has been dusted off and greatly improved:
Ever made wary by this project's tendency to take 3 times longer than expected, I'm still bracing myself for delays, emergencies, etc. But I'm ALSO bracing myself for things to go ok and for this film to go out into the world SOON. For it to be seen by you! For the fruits of the labor (the lumpy, well-loved, Appalachian fruits) to actually be enjoyed by real people. It's Going To Be Cool.
But what comes after the comes after the harvest? For the smart farmer, the soil is left fallow - to rest, not growing anything, just recovering its strength. I'm wondering if I should let myself be fallow. When I was deep into making Bearpuncher, I dreamed about the post-Bearpuncher future when I would take few months off from drawing, travel some, and engage all the other hobbies I had de-prioritized. But after two years of doing this, I'm reluctant to put down the shovel. I like doing this. I like the fruits that come of being busy. I like seeing quantifiable progress, and an identifiable purpose for structuring my days. I'm good at doing, not so much at being. It's hard to stop without feeling a little bit guilty; it breaks my heart to say "not yet" to my next project. With a pivotal career moment approaching, shreds of art-school hopes and dreams still in limbo, and the state of the animation industry only getting worse, it seems riskier than ever to just REST.
Or maybe, riskier than ever to trust. To trust that God sends rain on the busy and the un-busy. To trust that I can find success without kneeling to the idol of productivity. To trust that a life spent exploring, dabbling, and aimlessly wandering is a well spent one. I want to reinvent my artistic process, to care for my health, and to not answer "busy" when asked how I'm doing. But ultimately what I need most is to prune back the Miyazaki tendency to only feel purposeful and satisfied when putting effort into an artistic task. Our God loves the things we create, but he loves us more.
I still think about Mako Fujimura's guiding question, "what do you want to make today?" But maybe in a fallow time I can realize again the dazzling breadth of possible answers. I think I'll try making apple cider bread, more time for prayer, and maybe start sowing the seeds of my next project. I don't think I'll be sowing any actual seeds though, since my East-facing apartment windows seem unsuitable for sustaining much plant life.
Hope this piece finds you well and settling into autumnal coziness. I'm already feeling very nostalgic for old stop-motion movies and memories of past Novembers... and Bluey's gonna be in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade this year!??! So excited.
Also I'm going to be at Lightbox again, like tomorrow??! My last experience at Lightbox was a high-excitement, high-stress time, but I'm hoping that this one can be more relaxing and fun. If you're there, let's do a big high five (and I'll slip you some Bearpuncher stuff ehehehehhehe)
see ya!
-dh
PS:
A song about the simple things, one of my recent favorites
The lovely art of Jestenia Southerland, for lineless art inspiration
