Kind of late topic to post about, but here goes.
Projects
Last year, I completed two projects: the Carboniferous book and the Creatures of the Deep poster. Unfortunately / fortunately, I got more graphic design jobs, which translated to less free time to work on personal stuff. This year, the big priority is to finish up my Paleozoic series. I should have the whole thing finished by beginning of May. I’ve got two other “gimmicky” silkscreened book ideas I’d like to do, but they’re still at the concept stages. All I can tell you is that I’ve been drawing a lot of Minotaurs as preparation.
There are two other types of books I’ve been wanting to do for ages: flipbooks and comics. On the flipbook front, I seem to be lacking the brain cells necessary to do animation. However I think I figured out a way to cheat animation skills: using iStopmotion and action figures. On the comics front, I’m working on one and I hope to have it done by March.I’m doing the comic as an exercise and not as something I actually want to publish.
Festivals
Last year, I took it easy with the festivals: I just did two. This year, I will attempt to ramp it up but still be selective about the festivals I’ll do, because festivals are stressful and expensive . I’ve been accepted to the Toronto Comic Arts Festival 2016, and I’m waiting to hear back on Chicago Alternative Komic Expo. I’m waiting on a few other festivals to open up their applications. I can tell you that I’ll apply to SPX and will once again lose their freaking lottery. Anywoo, the goal is to do 5 festivals..whether I get accepted to four more festivals is another story.
Skills
Last year, I endeavored to learn After Effects. It turns out, it’s a lot more complicated than I thought it would be. I’ve been doing tutorials online, and progress has been slow. I’m a bit overwhelmed by the amount of stuff you can do with After Effects, and right now it feels like all the info goes in one ear and out the other. I’m giving myself one more month with the tutorials (because it’s a paid subscription, and I kind of want to save money now), but after that, I have to put theory into practice. I’ve still got the script and rough storyboard I did last year for this video idea I had. I’d like to get a video done this year, but this project is not a priority.
Other subscription I’m paying include New Masters Academy, and Schoolism. Those are just to improve my artistic / drawing skills. The problem is that I find many of these online tutorials boring to sit through, but persevere I must because I do not like wasting money.
A new skill I’d like to learn this year is Risograph. It’s the hottest trend in self-publishing and it’s less work-intensive than Silkscreen. They’re offering a class at SVA about Riso! But making that work financially is going to take some thought.
Marketing
I’m terrible at marketing myself, especially with social media. Part of my problem is that I don’t like to post pictures of stuff as I’m working on it. Also, marketing takes time away from actually producing stuff. I’ve found that creating fanart and posting it on Tumblr gets me a lot of followers, so obviously that’s something I need to keep on doing…though my tastes in pop culture are EXTREMELY limited and very niche. My only resolution this year is to post more often in my blog. But other than that, I’ve got to reassess how I’m using Instagram, Twitter and Facebook….Honestly, I’m not even sure why anyone would want to follow me. To know me is to hate me is what I say. 😛
Miscellaneous
Last year, I wanted to learn to do a split and invert hanging from the silks. I’ve failed on both counts. My lack of splits is my fault: I stopped stretching because that stuff hurts. The inverting though, I really tried but my body refuses to cooperate.I’m currently debating whether I need to perserve or find another approach to reach these two goals which, while useless, mean a lot to me for some reason.
Musically speaking, I learned to play Chopin’s Prelude #16 last year. I don’t play it super well, but I can play it. I’d like to play a piece by Liszt this year…Liszt is basically my tormentor at the piano. Even his “simple” pieces are difficult…God i hate Liszt. What a show off!
Summary
I want to complete at least five books this year: the Permian book, two other silkscreen book, one flipbook and one comic. I hope to have three books done by May, and two by October to coincide with festivals. Really, the big thing is that I want this year to be the last year I do handmade books. My endurance for cutting, gluing, scoring has just about run out, and I need to let machines take over that work for me. This year might also be the last year I do festivals, at least for a while, so I want to go out with a bang.
The plan is that next year I’ll shift towards comic books, videos and promoting online. All I got to do is actually adhere to a production schedule instead of letting client work take up all my time.
Another thing I need to do is update my website. I’m somewhat afraid about uploading a new theme, which is why I’ve been procrastinating, but I definitely need to get it done soon.