2023 Year in Review

 2023 is over, I won't miss it or look back on it fondly from a personal point of view.  The year started with my mother's death from dementia and ended with my aunt's death from the same with more of that in between. I was restricted from leaving even Montreal for 6 months as I waited for kidney surgery to be done, it was 2 years overdo already. I got Covid in November and am still coughing. Work did pick up as some clients needed more done as things picked up and a couple new clients showed up so that helped. I still don't make enough to live but maybe this year? 

Software

From a software perspective it was a mixed bag. The Serif Affinity Suite of graphic design apps has been upgrading and getting closer to having all I want on desktop and iPad. Procreate released an animation app that is missing a lot but also adding missing features as a good clip. The no render full live preview feature alone is revolutionary not just on iPad but would be on the desktop as well. Topaz has been updating it's Video and Photo AI apps almost weekly, sometimes more! They did discontinue their previous stand alone apps but having 2 instead of 5 apps is a better solution. Cinema 4D V19 stopped working in a practical sense for me. I am not ready as I still don't have even the basics of Blender under my belt. C4D sort of works, the icon buttons are unusable but the drop down menus still work so it's isn't all the way dead and it still works on my old laptop so I won't be selling that anytime soon. There were some really cool plugins for Final Cut and others but most were subscription based, something I can't afford and really can't reasonably support. 

Photography 

I managed to go on 2 photo excursions in 2023. Mont Sutton which came out much nicer than I thought and Provincetown at the Race Point lighthouse which was les than I hoped but its off the bucket list at least. 

Art

I finished over 40 drawings and illustrated over 60 pages of children's book for a client. I also finished one animation, Pulled towards the Sea which puts dementia into a gothic horror light. I made light progress on a few short stories. 

the past: 2019 - the future 2020

2019 was a hard year, lately they have all been pretty hard with less revenue coming in less people wanting to pay to get work done. I was productive in many ways, however.

Animation: 
I finished 3 Dog & Weasel shorts to go along with  my trend of cartoon animations. With them I experimented with a more cartoonish style especially in the backgrounds. At the very end of the year I got news that "The Raven" would be shown at the Sunrise Film Festival which was a HUGE help to my fragile ego.

Drawings:
I drew a lot more than I thought I did and started to branch out with different techniques and styles,


Writing:
After two years of work I finally published a book of short stories called "Indifference" which included updated and rewritten works from as far back as the 80s.

Tech:
The update to Mac OS Catalina broke a few things. I lost the pen to my Wacom tablet meaning I had to replace the tablet with a Huion version which was cheaper than replacing the pen. This worked out really well in the end. I also went head first into my dump Adobe plan after Serif released the first version of Publisher to replace Indesign. The only application I really need to replace now is After Effects and if I had the money for 300$ in plugins, Apple's Motion app would handle my current needs. Almost there.

Setbacks:
I had a few financial, let's say surprises this past year. My dishwasher exploded for one thing. It turned into a nightmare trying to get it replaced. I ended up having to uninstall and getting rid of the broken one and installing the new one myself despite paying to have that all done by "professionals".  A month later,  my iMac also exploded when I was updating it. Luckily I had recently started using the Mac backup option "Time machine" and it saved me from losing any work or software.

Some pushes forward:
I did get some new contracts, some animation and some design and some photo. The new work didn't translate into regular work, sadly, which is always the goal. One very small contract just didn't pay and won't respond to emails while another was a bear to get done and it was a constant struggle with someone who apparently thought 3D was magic and simply asking for unreasonable changes was enough to get them. It always amazes how many people will demand 6000$ of work for 600$.

2020 is an unknown of course. I am starting off in a decent place with some old work coming back and some new ideas I want to try out.

Animation: 
I have three projects in the works. "25 Years Later", a very personal film that is about 40% completed and really different from anything else I have done.  "28 Young Men", is a reading of the Walt Whitman poem by Michael Z.Keamy and is almost ready for animating. Finally "The Cask of Amontillado" will be my adaption of the Edgar Allen Poe tale and will fit in with my previous gothic horror shots.

Cinema 4D has become too expensive, is always slow to get out new features and has started a subscription model, so I will stick with version 19 and some plugins for the next couple years while I transition most likely to Blender  - a free software that has really made some giant steps forward in 2019.

Drawings:
I want to start drawing on paper more often, I even have a couple drawing pads ready. I would like to branch out more with this part of my work as well. I might do a graphic novel, but I don't think I am close to being able to accomplish that yet and might instead go with a story with key illustrations.

Writing:
With "Indifference" finally done, I actually already wrote 3 more short stories and will just keep doing that as the mood hits me and see if there is ever enough to do another book. A more intense project is called "Covenport" and will be a short novel or a series of short stories that all take place in the same location - a secluded town at the base of cliffs near Gloucester Massachusetts. That will be the one I likely illustrate.


Tech:
There are some big updates coming for Affinity Publisher that should make my work go easier and further my distance from Indesign. Serif is planning an iPad release of that software this year and I would be able to do all my graphic and illustration work ion an iPad... !  This is making me seriously consider not having a laptop after this current one dies and just replace it with an iPad pro, something I can not afford anytime soon but I could use for photo shoots on voyages and for work while away from the studio.

Year end review 2018

Another year has come and gone and while it was not financially profitable, I did get a lot accomplished. Normally I make two animated shorts per year, this year I made ten. Ten! Two were gothic horror, The Tell Tale Heart and Dagon. I also remade and updated In the Future with Nostrodumbass and made 5 Dramatic Readings with Charles Websters Billingsworth the 3rd shorts. If that wasn't enough, I made two very short Filthy Sheep animations. Tell Tale Heart premiered at the Another Hole in the Head festival in San Francisco. I drew a bunch, took some photos, and did some graphic design for new and old clients - but not enough to pay all the bills again this year. Finding decent, paying clients has become pretty impossible recently - which is discouraging. I have been thinking of doing a Patreon funding page... but I have no idea how to do or promote that in a way that will make it likely to pay off.

I have started 2 new projects already for next year. The Raven will be my longest animated short at 9 minutes. Narrated by Michael Z. Keamy and I hope it will bring all the stuff I have learned in such a productive year into a really top notch production. Dog & Weasel is the other project. It is a cartoon about a weasel (Jon Bellette) and a dog (Watson) who fight an alien robot invasion. The idea is sort of a Warner Brothers feel and I have plans for a couple more adventure where they meet other cryptids like Nessie and Bigfoot. Mike Luce is set to do the voice of the weasel and I think it will be pretty damn funny.

 

Misc things included reworking my web page and logos. I also updated my CV of course and my updated demo reel will go up in the next few weeks. I have some potential jobs lining up for next year but one thing I have learned the hard way is to not count my chickens before they've hatched.

On top of all this, I decided to, maybe, publish a book of short stories. In the 90s I wrote up some tales mostly based on real life things that happened to me mostly to entertain a friend who was terminally ill. Over the years I refined them and showed them to a very few other people, a couple of them thought I should collect and publish the stories. I guess I'm finally getting around to doing that. Maybe.  I did set up the book and design it in the beta of Affinity Publishers as test project so it would be a shame not to anything with it, I guess.

Bilan 2017

So I don't usually summarize the year at it's end but I've been thinking about doing it the last few months, so why not?

I think for many people, in general it was pretty stressful year to say the least. The American election to my south was shocking and continues to be. Politics aside, my year was personally full of ups and downs. I lost several friends, one was total gut punch and I did not take it well. I also had no substantial contracts and made less money than pretty much ever in working life. My home needed 20 000$ in renovations which worked out well, just not for my already too small retirement fund.

On the plus side, I was pretty busy with my own projects. Lots of drawings and I finished 5 animations which is a record, I think! 2 of those films were presented at the Another Hole in the Head film festival in San Fransisco and one was another education short for Christopher Labos at The Body of Evidence podcast.  2 more were huge challenge for me and I find them to be a success in furthering my character design and cartoon animation skills. I got to work with Mike Luce a lot more and with Michael Z Keamy - both who are nice enough to help me by lending their voices to my work. Keamy and I also made headway on a Walt Whitman project we have been talking about for YEARS. I was able to see quite a few people I haven't in a very long time when I spent a few days in Provincetown and my brother and I went to Colorado to take photos - which was another project we talked about for years and had not gotten around to. The TV show I worked on was in the running for a international Emmy - which somehow did not translate into a third season, at least not so far.

I made huge leaps in my work abilities. A lot of things came together in my head finally and I also found many ways to get things done faster and more efficiently. If I ever get hired again, I'll be able to accomplish more than ever before and much quicker

So here I am, hoping 2018 brings real, paying work. In the meantime I have 2-3 animations being planned out with Mr. Luce and a new Lovecraft film in production. So while I might keep being poor, I won't be bored. I will need to find part time work somewhere, somehow... the only posts readily viable see to be working at sauna (sex clubs) and that is not very appealing. As my mom always says, Beggars can't be choosers!

2018 is the year of the dog, and I have one and have been called one on occasion so maybe that's a good sign for the coming 365 days.