Well, we had our last session of storyboarding tonight. After finalizing some last minute boards meant for the ending moments of the animatic, we thanked each other for all of the hard work and parted ways. I picked up my bag and laptop and started cleaning up, leaving a couple of things behind – figuring that I’d grab them after boarding next week. I don’t think any of us are quite digesting that we won’t be getting together on Tuesday.

It’s December. My system is hanging on for dear life and the animatic has one or two more spots left to smooth out and finalize before it’s complete. Adrian and I both feel that the last 2 minutes are the most impressive of the piece. Partly because that’s when the energy really starts to pick up, and partly because we put the thing together linearly and were getting better at what we were doing by the end. This thing has really started to take on a life of its own.

We scanned in the last of the boards a little while ago and started looking through the ones that we’d completed months ago. Phil has really grown in his sketch work during this process. He originally struggled with rendering obscure backgrounds and found complex perspectives challenging – not so, anymore. He asked us a couple of days ago if he could have all the charcoal originals when we’re finished with them – we’ll probably hand them over in a few months or so. I want to make sure we’re not going to need the originals for anything.

The group made the decision to get together when we have the animatic finished to preview it over some beers. We had even talked about asking Jeremy over for it so he’d get a chance to see where we went after he exited the process. Noble gestures – but I have this feeling that we won’t actually make the time. Part of me wants to do everything to keep on boarding, another part never wants to see Phil or Ryan or Adrian again. But, I guess that’s the way things work.

I’m going to take a break from journaling until we’re finished with this thing. Need to open some time. Chris and Micam are going to be back up here in a week or so and I want to make sure we’re through all this madness. It’s time to make it up to her that I’ve been totally absent these past few months.