As has been estimated, April was VERY busying.
After I came back to my study place from a week of vacation over Easter, I was greeted immediately by a sickness that went on for over a week more. It had drained me and I could barely keep up with a commission I had at the time. Still, I went on to do some sketches for my Island setting but the following weeks would hinder me from developing any project in that regard. For one, we had a local little film-festival going on, which I could hardly visit due to being ill, which made me quite miserable. Then, additionally, I was helping out with the Animation Festival I was working for last year, which grew much more intensive in the following week. It wasn’t particularly hard work but required focus and manual labour which took quite the time. In hindsight, I was quite bummed out just how much time it ate from me and that I could have spent it at the festival or with friends or working on my animation film but I have to see it as a sidejob covering half a year compressed into one month and I think once I received my full pay and cover my monthly expenses, it will feel worth it.
The week of the festival itself was quite a ride. Work itself was mostly underwhelming honestly but doing my part in getting it going was energizing. It’s not just a job, per se; I really like the festival and the people working there, it feels like a common project about art and soul in a way and you have to make all the logistics around it work for it to succeed in the following years also. Aside from work, I also got to experience many well crafted animation short films that motivate me to keep doing my craft and hopefully one day also find the audience that draws a liking from it.
It would be appropriate to share my favourite films here but sadly, they are not yet available and I would love to credit the directors (I just had not the time to write them down).
Another thing I didn’t mention until now was how my workload this year got increasingly heavier as I got the note to be accepted at Eurofurence’s Dealer’s Den this year!
It altered my project schedule for the following couple of months monumentally. I will have to produce lots of new designs to have a bigger catalogue of products to sell as well as stock up on existing merchandise. Partly, I already began my work with brainstrming and sketches. Technically, I have more months to prepare than with last Year’s Furvester and I already have many things figured out but the time needed to work on School projects – especially courses I don’t really want to spend my time in – make things quite stressful and I have to carefully consider how and where to spend my time this year. I probably have to reduce my involvement with ArtFight (which already feels bad :c) as well as move projects back into the next semester.
I’ve been thinking a lot about study and how to go on in the past couple of days and whether or not it is good to continue with just how many obstacles are still preventing me to do the things I really want. It’s out of the question, how much I enjoy studying, it is lovely! But I just can’t deny my cravings to be more independent, working a job, living in my own place, cutting projects I know won’t help me out much according to the trouble I have to go through to realize them…
Compared to where I stood last year, I am much more active to take matters in my own hands, I actively reach out to make more earnings, participate in events and have too much work on my hands to handle the balance >v> But I also know, I need more time. I don’t feel ready yet to dive into the world of my own, which is this nagging feeling of everything taking too long to develop somehow.
*sigh* but I know I can’t rush things, I have to take one step at a time.
Anyway!
Next up is a more focused month for me. It is tradition to produce my annual fruit hat piece which is already in the sketching phase and I am very much looking forward to working on it further. I also want to get some school stuff out of the way so I don’t lose track of my main objectives. It will be another full month but a more creative one!
This shall be it for this reflection! I really gotta make me something to eat now.