Today is March 31st, 2013. My birthday. 24 years
ago, I was born in a German hospital nearby an American military base and
subsequently christened with a quasi-German name.
Last night, Double Rainboom was released onto the Internet. Double Rainboom is one of the first fan-made episodes of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, and it was made entirely by students at the Savannah College of Art & Design and numerous other schools, as well as plenty of supportive bronies around the globe. It was produced at a bullet-train’s pace for over a year by more than a hundred vector artists, character designers, storyboard artists, professional sound designers and composers, voice actors and actresses, and Flash animators like myself. I watched the film as it was being edited, composited, and rendered mere hours before it was broadcast live on a fan-site for over 5,000 people to watch. And for the rest of the year and beyond, our entire crew will experience the aftermath of having worked on this immense project and the consequences, good and bad, of sharing it with the world.
I guess my story starts when I first sat down and watched the show that we paid tribute to, which is coincidentally when I really got to know our director, Zachary Rich. It was the summer of 2011, and I volunteered to spend what would have been a three-month vacation back at SCAD for another quarter, so that I could graduate the next spring. I had planned to start pre-production on my senior film, for which I had already formulated a plot in my mind since my first year of college. Attendance that summer was scarce, except for a few friends and acquaintances that I was already familiar with, but that meant I could work at the animation building virtually undisturbed during the week, something that almost never happens during the regular year. One of these friends was Zachary Rich, a very eccentric fellow, but one of the nicest guys I had ever met. He was also toiling away on his own project, but it wasn’t his senior film. It was “Present Prank,” a short fan-animation of My Little Pony that he built his own character puppet for in Adobe Flash, with little prior knowledge of how to do so. I would be drawing and photographing my pencil-on-paper animations for our shared Character Animation course, and I would walk over, look over his shoulder, and watch him agonize over this funny little video. Not just because he was good at what he does, but because of my personal feelings about the source material.
Last night, Double Rainboom was released onto the Internet. Double Rainboom is one of the first fan-made episodes of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, and it was made entirely by students at the Savannah College of Art & Design and numerous other schools, as well as plenty of supportive bronies around the globe. It was produced at a bullet-train’s pace for over a year by more than a hundred vector artists, character designers, storyboard artists, professional sound designers and composers, voice actors and actresses, and Flash animators like myself. I watched the film as it was being edited, composited, and rendered mere hours before it was broadcast live on a fan-site for over 5,000 people to watch. And for the rest of the year and beyond, our entire crew will experience the aftermath of having worked on this immense project and the consequences, good and bad, of sharing it with the world.
I guess my story starts when I first sat down and watched the show that we paid tribute to, which is coincidentally when I really got to know our director, Zachary Rich. It was the summer of 2011, and I volunteered to spend what would have been a three-month vacation back at SCAD for another quarter, so that I could graduate the next spring. I had planned to start pre-production on my senior film, for which I had already formulated a plot in my mind since my first year of college. Attendance that summer was scarce, except for a few friends and acquaintances that I was already familiar with, but that meant I could work at the animation building virtually undisturbed during the week, something that almost never happens during the regular year. One of these friends was Zachary Rich, a very eccentric fellow, but one of the nicest guys I had ever met. He was also toiling away on his own project, but it wasn’t his senior film. It was “Present Prank,” a short fan-animation of My Little Pony that he built his own character puppet for in Adobe Flash, with little prior knowledge of how to do so. I would be drawing and photographing my pencil-on-paper animations for our shared Character Animation course, and I would walk over, look over his shoulder, and watch him agonize over this funny little video. Not just because he was good at what he does, but because of my personal feelings about the source material.
I’m going to be blunt: I HATED the reboot of My Little Pony.
Normally, I would have cared as much about it as I did the original series, but
its rise in popularity spawned a peculiar phenomenon: Bronies. Trekkie-like
fanatics who sang the praises of Lauren Faust’s re-imagining of the series, but
were on the complete opposite end of the spectrum that was the target audience,
considering that most of them were adult males. Nothing infuriated me to no end
between the years 2010 and 2011, than to watch people in my age group rave
about what I thought was mindless drivel, and to act so shamelessly immature on
the forums that I frequented by spamming screenshots of the show. By the time
it reached my classmates that Spring, I sat and fumed, but kept my feelings to
myself, knowing I would lose my new-found friends in the process. But watching
Zach spend countless hours perfecting that goofy little animation, my curiosity
was piqued. Could it really be that good, if one man does all this work for it?
Halfway through the summer, I finally said “Oh, what the hell” and streamed the first two episodes on YouTube. Aside from cringing at the songs, I thought they were okay. I still didn’t understand why there was an entire legion of fans for it, organizing their own conventions dedicated to it. But it grew in the back of my mind like a communicable disease, and by the next week I had finished the entire season, discussed it openly with my classmates, and eagerly awaited the next season. If there was one noteworthy effect that it had on me, I had become far less angry than I normally would be. I was tired of being an animator who hated cartoons without watching them, and I was tired of being a cynical pessimist who only related to anonymous strangers online. For the first time in my life, I wanted to be happy, and share that happiness with others. For the next few months, My Little Pony brightened up my life.
In the spring of 2011, my senior film was nearly complete, and graduation was upon me. I reveled in my achievement, believing with a close-minded view that I had succeeded in mastering Flash and directing a short film. It was also around this time that I first noticed the official promotional posters for Double Rainboom that were being hung on the walls at Montgomery Hall. I was in a good mood, a friend of Zach’s and a new fan of the show, so again I said “Oh, what the hell,” and sat in on the first recruitment meeting for his film. I was a cautiously optimistic at the premise, but I sat there with about a dozen of my future team-mates and watched the pre-composed animatic and storyboards on a projection screen. I was absolutely blown away at the scope of his plan, and the contents of which can be found in the link above, to avoid spoilers. I immediately signed his Non-Disclosure Agreement, and committed myself to a production that I thought would only last a few months.
And then I attended Zach’s weekly Flash animation tutorials, which were hosted every Saturday evening. He taught me and handful of others artists not only how to make vector art in Flash, but how to make fully-rigged characters for animation in the process. I was dumbfounded. I realized quickly how I fell short of being a “successful” animator. How many corners I cut in order to finish my own film, at the sacrifice of quality and learning basic Flash skills. How easily another film I had worked on could have been done, if we had employed Zach’s time-saving techniques. I became very self-conscious by the end of that quarter, and it didn’t help that graduation, the end of this enlightening college experience, was looming. I acknowledged my senior film to be a failure, but a necessary one. I now knew the choices that I would never repeat in a professional production, and I knew that if I were to ever improve in my field, I would have to stay on the Double Rainboom team. Not only to contribute to what would hopefully be a successful film that opened up new doors for all of us, but to put myself through would essentially be animation boot camp.
That summer was an awful experience for me. Graduating SCAD left me feeling post-partum depression, and I filled my time with video games and Double Rainboom. I was able to help build the puppets for most of the main characters of the film, but I did little else but game otherwise. By that August I hit rock bottom. My pathetically-attempted job search unsurprisingly bared no fruit, and I reached a peak in my self-awareness. I had experienced these emotions before, after I had graduated high school and had no idea what to do with my life. I was too used to the structure of education to make decisions for myself, or to concern myself with the future. But now the future was staring down at me like the barrel of a gun, and I had no other choice but to make a choice. I uninstalled all of my games, cleared my life of all other distractions, and re-dedicated myself to Double Rainboom as a healthy way to be productive.
Fast-forward to January of 2013, and I still had no promising job prospects for the New Year, and the release of Double Rainboom had yet again been delayed. Our fan-base was losing confidence in our abilities, our crew was growing tired of the non-stop production, and the stress took its toll on Zach and some of the rest of us. However, a local marketing company that I had been in contact with for months finally offered me regular freelance work with them. After months of prospecting with no results, I had struck gold. A chance to work in my field, to be paid for it, to spend most of my time at a 9-to-5 job, and to finally leave the wacky world of retail behind. Barely working part-time at the mall doesn’t help one’s self esteem, but Double Rainboom at least kept me grounded. It was at this point that I officially ended my direct involvement with the project, even though I had been promoted to a lead animation position a few months prior. In February I started my new job, and loved every second of it. And Double Rainboom was finally seeing a major turnaround in its production, and Zach was able to nail down an exact release date. Things were looking up for us, and I once again felt that renewed sense of optimism that the show gave me over a year ago.
Now here we are. Like both of my graduations before this, this milestone is a sad one for me. I grew to love each and every one of the crew members I worked with on this film, and would hate to fall out of contact with them or to never work with them again. Our nonsensical Skype chats were what kept me going through my emotional lows, and their own work inspired me to push myself farther than I was willing to go on my own college film. But beyond reminiscing about the past, I am left looking at my future once more. But this time, it is not with existential terror or dread, but with hope. I now know what it takes to make it in my industry, and how hard I have to work to achieve the success that had previously evaded my efforts. I no longer fear rejection letters from studios or struggling to learn new software or animation techniques; I see them as opportunities to learn from mistakes, strengthen my skills, expand my knowledge, and take on new challenges confidently. I have a project under my belt that far surpasses my own senior film in every way, and I look forward to all the benefits it will undoubtedly bring me because I didn’t give up. I gained more friends in a single year than I ever did my entire life, and that network will continue to lift me above their shoulders in the future as they did during my personal struggles. And I finally regained the infectious positivity that I now share with our beloved director, Zachary Rich. Aw thanks to this light-hearted, but ambitious little movie.
But to think about the future again, I am still at a crossroads. New job opportunities may come up that I will enthusiastically take on, or they might not come at all. How I fare at the upcoming SCAD Career Fair will largely influence the outcome of that. But I was also in a private discussion with Zach, and once again he told me about his crazy future plans. If I hit rock bottom again, which is a possibility I don’t rule out but I am also no longer anxious about, I will absolutely join him in his new venture. The best possible situation for me would be to get picked up by an authentic animation studio, hopefully in partial thanks to my contributions to Double Rainboom, or to be permanently employed by my current office. Either way, my future no longer looks as bleak as I thought it did back when I was a melodramatic teenager. Double Rainboom was a grand quest, and now the adventure that is my life will continue as I take on its obstacles with renewed vigor and truly appreciate all of its little moments, whether they be silly cartoon shows or year-long film productions.
Thank you, Double Rainboom Crew, for helping me become the professional animator that I wanted to be, and more importantly, for being my friends. I couldn’t ask for a greater birthday present. It’s the gift that will keep on giving for the rest of my days. Here’s the video I posted earlier this last week as a token of my appreciation. I look forward to working with all of again in the near future. Feel free to contact me for anything at all, and you all know how to reach me. Shine on, you crazy bronies.
Halfway through the summer, I finally said “Oh, what the hell” and streamed the first two episodes on YouTube. Aside from cringing at the songs, I thought they were okay. I still didn’t understand why there was an entire legion of fans for it, organizing their own conventions dedicated to it. But it grew in the back of my mind like a communicable disease, and by the next week I had finished the entire season, discussed it openly with my classmates, and eagerly awaited the next season. If there was one noteworthy effect that it had on me, I had become far less angry than I normally would be. I was tired of being an animator who hated cartoons without watching them, and I was tired of being a cynical pessimist who only related to anonymous strangers online. For the first time in my life, I wanted to be happy, and share that happiness with others. For the next few months, My Little Pony brightened up my life.
In the spring of 2011, my senior film was nearly complete, and graduation was upon me. I reveled in my achievement, believing with a close-minded view that I had succeeded in mastering Flash and directing a short film. It was also around this time that I first noticed the official promotional posters for Double Rainboom that were being hung on the walls at Montgomery Hall. I was in a good mood, a friend of Zach’s and a new fan of the show, so again I said “Oh, what the hell,” and sat in on the first recruitment meeting for his film. I was a cautiously optimistic at the premise, but I sat there with about a dozen of my future team-mates and watched the pre-composed animatic and storyboards on a projection screen. I was absolutely blown away at the scope of his plan, and the contents of which can be found in the link above, to avoid spoilers. I immediately signed his Non-Disclosure Agreement, and committed myself to a production that I thought would only last a few months.
And then I attended Zach’s weekly Flash animation tutorials, which were hosted every Saturday evening. He taught me and handful of others artists not only how to make vector art in Flash, but how to make fully-rigged characters for animation in the process. I was dumbfounded. I realized quickly how I fell short of being a “successful” animator. How many corners I cut in order to finish my own film, at the sacrifice of quality and learning basic Flash skills. How easily another film I had worked on could have been done, if we had employed Zach’s time-saving techniques. I became very self-conscious by the end of that quarter, and it didn’t help that graduation, the end of this enlightening college experience, was looming. I acknowledged my senior film to be a failure, but a necessary one. I now knew the choices that I would never repeat in a professional production, and I knew that if I were to ever improve in my field, I would have to stay on the Double Rainboom team. Not only to contribute to what would hopefully be a successful film that opened up new doors for all of us, but to put myself through would essentially be animation boot camp.
That summer was an awful experience for me. Graduating SCAD left me feeling post-partum depression, and I filled my time with video games and Double Rainboom. I was able to help build the puppets for most of the main characters of the film, but I did little else but game otherwise. By that August I hit rock bottom. My pathetically-attempted job search unsurprisingly bared no fruit, and I reached a peak in my self-awareness. I had experienced these emotions before, after I had graduated high school and had no idea what to do with my life. I was too used to the structure of education to make decisions for myself, or to concern myself with the future. But now the future was staring down at me like the barrel of a gun, and I had no other choice but to make a choice. I uninstalled all of my games, cleared my life of all other distractions, and re-dedicated myself to Double Rainboom as a healthy way to be productive.
Fast-forward to January of 2013, and I still had no promising job prospects for the New Year, and the release of Double Rainboom had yet again been delayed. Our fan-base was losing confidence in our abilities, our crew was growing tired of the non-stop production, and the stress took its toll on Zach and some of the rest of us. However, a local marketing company that I had been in contact with for months finally offered me regular freelance work with them. After months of prospecting with no results, I had struck gold. A chance to work in my field, to be paid for it, to spend most of my time at a 9-to-5 job, and to finally leave the wacky world of retail behind. Barely working part-time at the mall doesn’t help one’s self esteem, but Double Rainboom at least kept me grounded. It was at this point that I officially ended my direct involvement with the project, even though I had been promoted to a lead animation position a few months prior. In February I started my new job, and loved every second of it. And Double Rainboom was finally seeing a major turnaround in its production, and Zach was able to nail down an exact release date. Things were looking up for us, and I once again felt that renewed sense of optimism that the show gave me over a year ago.
Now here we are. Like both of my graduations before this, this milestone is a sad one for me. I grew to love each and every one of the crew members I worked with on this film, and would hate to fall out of contact with them or to never work with them again. Our nonsensical Skype chats were what kept me going through my emotional lows, and their own work inspired me to push myself farther than I was willing to go on my own college film. But beyond reminiscing about the past, I am left looking at my future once more. But this time, it is not with existential terror or dread, but with hope. I now know what it takes to make it in my industry, and how hard I have to work to achieve the success that had previously evaded my efforts. I no longer fear rejection letters from studios or struggling to learn new software or animation techniques; I see them as opportunities to learn from mistakes, strengthen my skills, expand my knowledge, and take on new challenges confidently. I have a project under my belt that far surpasses my own senior film in every way, and I look forward to all the benefits it will undoubtedly bring me because I didn’t give up. I gained more friends in a single year than I ever did my entire life, and that network will continue to lift me above their shoulders in the future as they did during my personal struggles. And I finally regained the infectious positivity that I now share with our beloved director, Zachary Rich. Aw thanks to this light-hearted, but ambitious little movie.
But to think about the future again, I am still at a crossroads. New job opportunities may come up that I will enthusiastically take on, or they might not come at all. How I fare at the upcoming SCAD Career Fair will largely influence the outcome of that. But I was also in a private discussion with Zach, and once again he told me about his crazy future plans. If I hit rock bottom again, which is a possibility I don’t rule out but I am also no longer anxious about, I will absolutely join him in his new venture. The best possible situation for me would be to get picked up by an authentic animation studio, hopefully in partial thanks to my contributions to Double Rainboom, or to be permanently employed by my current office. Either way, my future no longer looks as bleak as I thought it did back when I was a melodramatic teenager. Double Rainboom was a grand quest, and now the adventure that is my life will continue as I take on its obstacles with renewed vigor and truly appreciate all of its little moments, whether they be silly cartoon shows or year-long film productions.
Thank you, Double Rainboom Crew, for helping me become the professional animator that I wanted to be, and more importantly, for being my friends. I couldn’t ask for a greater birthday present. It’s the gift that will keep on giving for the rest of my days. Here’s the video I posted earlier this last week as a token of my appreciation. I look forward to working with all of again in the near future. Feel free to contact me for anything at all, and you all know how to reach me. Shine on, you crazy bronies.
