Having picked up/dusted myself off following the confidence shit-kicking that can be submithub.com (18 declines out of 21 submissions for Fat Controller) I sifted down through the comments and whittled the constructive feedback down to: the track being too dark, minimal or repetitive and needing a stronger hook line with the possible addition of a vocal or acoustic element. All of which is definitely something I can try to incorporate into the next track.

On the plus side the majority of the comments mentioned that they liked the video. Speaking of the next track (which will be based the Gallutep title/poster) I used a snippet of a cello Bartók pizzicato line, taken from a section on the Start Talers composition I’m working on, as a starting point. It’s great when I can upcycle part of a melody or arrangement from one track into another (satisfies my obsession with efficiency in the studio). As I’ve been working on the track I’ve also started mulling over themes and concepts for its corresponding music video which I’m looking forward to sketching out into a shooting script soon enough. As it’s another independent release thou, and going by the workload of the last video, it’ll probably be six to ten months till I get it finished.

“It’s great when I can upcycle part of a melody or arrangement from one track into another.”
On the study front I’ve adjusted my daily anatomy study (figure drawing from the imagination based on the Loomis method) to include a random costume from this excellent resource. It’s been fun to build up a character from the initial manikin sketch into a fully formed figure decked out in one of the more unusual historical costumes thou I still need alot of practice to get my head the different types of cloth folds/thicknesses (not to mention form shading). I’ve kept up with the daily half hour screenshot speed paintings I started last year too with Tuesday and Thursday mornings now assigned to quick environment paintings using the excellent free random concept generator at conceptstart.net. Looking back through the last twelve months of work its easy enough to spot the areas I’ve been struggling with namely: cars/vehicles, birds and eclipses in perspective. Hopefully I can make a point of targeting these in future possibly by including more animal anatomy and geometric shape studies in the daily practicals. I also started taking notes on David Landou’s Lighting for Cinematography which I hope along with one of these will improve the lighting in future music videos.

Commission wise it’s been about even between graphic and web design projects the last twelve months. I should get around to updating the online portfolio sometime in the next few weeks. I have some catching up to do with regards the latest WordPress updates aswell as getting my head around (or at least getting a basic understanding of) the new CSS grid layout system. Although I’ve cut back on alot of the subjects I’m trying to study it has given me the time to start going back over the heap of notes I made over the last seven or so years and to reduce the key points down into more easy-to-use A4 reference sheets.