So I am now elbow deep into the Aardman masterclass. I am enjoying myself a ton. It is rough, but I am learning a lot. The whole point is to stretch myself and learn how to be a better animator. That is not comfortable. Growth is rarely comfortable. :) I am still figuring out how to fit in full time work, taking care of a sick doggo, personal stuff and the class. Because I live in a townhouse with no yard and only a small portable washing machine, this has been hard. Cleaning takes forever. Trying to get doggo to where he can go outside when he is having a digestive emergency is hard. It frequently has resulted in the need for deep cleaning. Unfortunately. I am guilty of tossing an area rug instead of trying to clean it. Just cause I was already taking hours to wash bedding (mine) multiple times, clothes, towels, etc. At least I have the portable washer, and don't have to haul it all to a laundromat. I love my doggo. Really I do. This just emphasizes how much I need to find a house with a yard. If there was a yard I could just open the back door for him to run through, instead of trying to attach a leash to an already distressed doggo in time to open the front door and get to the pet area. Add to that servers going down at work necessitating long working hours, and there is not a ton of time, energy or brainpower left to apply to class. I am hoping I can regroup and get on top of everything this week. Doggo seems to have calmed a bit. Servers are running. I still haven't caught up on sleep, but things are loosening up a bit so I can figure out a schedule that will allow me to do everything I need and want to do.

Anyway...

As I don't really have much right now, and I do want to try to be better at keeping up this blog, I thought I would do a deeper dive into my experiments with Cosclay.



Cosclay is a rubberized polymer clay, similar to Sculpy. The biggest difference being that after it has been baked, it is pliable though no longer sculptable.



I first heard about it when the YouTuber Ace of Clay used it on one of his sculptures. He uses it when he has a lot of thin bits that stick out and are in danger of breaking if he uses the regular Sculpy. He demonstrated how much the pieces can bend after baking. He also was successful painting it after baking it.

So it got me thinking...I wonder how hard it would be to use in animation puppets. I did some googling, and really no one has any opinions on it. No one really had a searchable post on them testing it for this purpose. Someone asked in a stop motion forum about it, and was shot down by a lot of people who haven't tried it. that just seemed...inaccurate at best.

But Cosclay, though worth the expense if it works, is kind of spendy to just buy as an experiment. I was waffling about whether or not I should try it...whether it was worth it to me to have clay I may not be able to use.

Then another YouTuber tried it for sculpting. And he loved it. And when he decided to do a set of art boxes, he decided to include a small batch of it in the sculpture box. There were other things included in the sculpture box I wanted, so I decided to get that and if the Cosclay worked I would buy more to use for animation puppets.

This was just a rought hand, to see how well it animated. It is not in proportion to anything. I used 18 gague aluminum wire to rough out fingers and palm, then sculpted the clay over it. Not too difficult. Then I played with animating it. It was really not bad for animating. Here is my test sequence...

So then THAT got me thinking. Can I make a character puppet completely out of Cosclay? I was and am pretty sure a full 12 inch puppet would not work very well. Not a whole Wallace from Wallace and Grommet...though maybe, if the clay is layered on thin. So I decided to start with something simple...an earthworm.

The first iteration turned out being way too thick. While it is bendable, it does not easily stay where I put it. I just bent an 18 gage wire in half, twisted it with my hand crank drill and covered it with cosclay. This one also baked just fine in the toaster oven. Also took paint really well.

So back to the drawingboard. I redesigned the worm to be thinner and longer. And a little bit more realistic, though still cartoonish. The thinner worm worked great! Fully articulated. Stays in the pose I place it in. I even textured it a bit by putting a thread on my handy helper and rolling the worm over it down the length of the worm. That worked way better than I expected as well.

So...conclusion? I LOVE LOVE LOVE this stuff! In my opinion it works great for stop motion animation puppets, with the caveate that you need to be choosy about where you use it and how thick you build up the clay.

Also...I am currently making replacement hands out of Cosclay for my Wade puppet. My plan is to play around with him and see how well it goes. Have several more twisted wire humanoid puppets in process, and if I can figure out how to make it work well with Wade I will use the same technique with them.

Well.

This has been a dark and crazy year. I have lost people. I have gained people. Things went from bad to worse, while also wierdly getting better at the same time. My job is going well. I now have an income that sustains me. Covid in my state has increased sharply, enough our governer has closed down the state again for at least 2 weeks. As a person in the at risk catergory, this is kind of scary.

Amidst this scary time, I sat back an evaluated my life and where I am. Who am I? Where have I come from? Do I like who I am? When I am on my deathbed (whether it be next month, next year, 10 years from now or 30 years from now), will I be able to feel satisfied. Or will I feel regret.

I came to the conclusion I want to be able to look back and see 3 things. I did more good than harm. I loved more than I hated. And I broke away from my fear and did what made me joyful.

I realized I really do love stop motion animation. A lot. It makes me happy while I am struggling to mold it to what I want. It makes me laugh when I watch a clip back and see my little jokes in action. Even if I am the only one who thinks they are funny, it tickles me to death. I wrote and animated the damn thing, and I still laugh when I watch the Dalek one and see him put the sign on the Daleks back. :D Honestly, it also warms my heart to remember showing that at the 50 year Doctor Who do here in Portland, and listening to the ENTIRE AUDIENCE laugh spontaneously where I do. And later in the day, hearing a kid walking past with a presumed parent retelling the story of the Dalek knocking over Stonehenge in my video, having issues because they were laughing so hard they couldn't finish a sentance. I want others to enjoy what I do too. Not think it is good, or give me accolades....just...enjoy it for what it is.

Of course, I want to be better. I want to learn more. I am now in a financial place where I can up my game technically. So as an addition to that, I applied for the Stop Motion 1 program put on by Aardman, the people who do Wallace and Grommet, etc. I have always wanted to do a program with them, but they were all on prem in Bristol UK, which along with the tuition fees and time required to be in the country, has always put it out of reach for me. I don't even have a passport. But one good thing this horrid pandemic has done is brought that program online, and the class fees lower to a point I can afford it.

I got an email yesterday that they have accepted me. Now, I don't know if this means they are taking everyone, or if they looked at my YouTubes and video pages and decided I desperately need the help. Or if they see potential. And I felt something I did not expect. After the elation, I immediately started in to trepidation. My brain first said they aren't really serious about teaching people, they are just trying to get money and will take everyone who will pay money. As a consequence you will get no instruction, or if you have issues instead of getting help you will be chastised for not being able to figure it out yourself. Yup...I went to college for IT training with a bunch of guys, some teachers, who didn't feel I belonged there. I talked myself out of that, then immediately my brain fell back on the good old "you aren't really good enough. Why are you going to put yourself out there, and putting yourself in debt to do it?"

I am still calming my brain down from that one. But seriously.....All the reasons I outlined earlier in this post.....

Life is too short to hide from what brings you joy.

Not everything you expend money on needs to bring a financial return.

Once more for the people in the back

Not everything you expend money on needs to bring a financial return.


If I do actually get better, get some good pointers, etc GREAT. It will help me do better, express my weirdness better, help entertain people better. And bring me even more joy.

But even if I don't....I can go to my grave (whenever that is) knowing I pursued what made me happy. I am helping people I know with bills. I am buying from small businesses to help them keep afloat during this hard time. I am paying for online comedy shows and concerts, even if I can't make them, to help those who need it. I am contributing to go fund me's. I am throwing bits at Twitch streamers. I am complimenting people genuinely every chance I get.

And I am pursuing my happiness.

End of story.

Hello again.

Once again, I have gone a month without an update. Sigh. It has been busy. I have not gotten much done this month. I got my stuff from the Pod, so I needed to get it all organized. Which is still happening. I need money for organizing furniture. A friend got a job up here and needed a place to live while he waits for the first few paychecks, so he is currently crashing in my bedroom. I am crashing in my craft room. Which means I have no room in which to do anything. This makes me sad. It also means I can't get to anything, because it is all crammed together. Whatever is in the closet or in boxes is unreachable at the moment. I hate this, but I really don't have a choice for now. My friend has no where else to go. This arrangement will be temporary, so eventually I will get to go back to creative pursuits.

For now I am planning and doing other stuff. There is a Krampus themed animation short film festival I have decided to make a video for. I think it would be cool. Anything creepy or Krampus themed. At the moment I am working on sketching out the storyline, and deciding on the different scenes. We shall see how that turns out.

Last few days I was sick, and I haven't figured out how to get some animating done yet, and I need practice, so I pulled out my Apple pencil and iPad and tried to play around with drawn animation. I cannot draw worth a damn. I know it. But by doing that I can practice timing, and movement. I have done 2 so far. I will embed them below. Next I think I will try to do some rudimentary lip syncing to practice that.