Week One
Week of 1/21/25
We didn't do a ton this week. We already created the Encroachment discord (thank you Helen!) and started talking about possible roles (I know these are not final; we mostly were just trying to figure out what everyone might want to do). We also collected the existing resources (pitch deck, concept art, references, etc) and created a shared Google account so we could consolidate everything. I created duplicates of my existing organizational documents (asset list, task list, shot list, render list, contact information) and modified/cleared them so they would be ready for this group. I also let the group know that I will be out of state for a while this summer due to surgery. I have to go down to California for five weeks so I told them I would still be able to work on stuff, it will just be slow progress due to post-surgery exhaustion / intense recovery and the fact that I will only have access to my potato laptop, which runs Maya but has a pretty small screen so it takes about five million years to get things done). Everyone was fine with that so I'm glad that's out of the way. I'll still remind them once it gets closer and we start doing the schedule for the summer.
Last Wednesday we had a meeting (voice call) on discord. In all honesty I don't remember exactly what we discussed (my memory is not so good with these things) so you'll have to find that out from one of the other members. I think it was just an overview of the general plan though.
On Monday we met in the lab where Jeremy taught Surfacing and Lighting 2 and started discussing assets. Sienna went through the script and pitch deck and listed out the sets and props that were important to include. Others added to it and we got a nice list going. I wrote all of these ideas down in my asset list and then created a more detailed task list that mirrored the one Jeremy showed us. Here is a short part of it to show the template:
I couldn't remember exactly all of the steps so I'll have to go back and add some later (can we get access to the powerpoint Jeremy showed?) and then add the shot tasks once we develop a shot list. Sienna is working on the storyboard and should have that done soon.
Overall, things are going really well and I'm excited for the project. I was relieved to see that I was on this film and that we have a really great group of people working on it. I have a hard time making friends and a couple of the team members are people I've slowly been trying to befriend so I hope working together will help with that. I think this project is going to turn out well. I know there will probably still be lots of stress and frustration later on but I'm confident we will end up with a good film and will have learned a lot about the process along the way.
I decided not to say anything in my survey because I recognized that working with people I really didn't want to work with would likely benefit me in terms of learning how to work with people that frustrate me but I was still relieved to see that none of them were in the group I'm in. It's taken me a long time to get back to school (did my first year in 2018 back when Dane was the head of the program and there were a bunch of sticky chickens on the ceiling of 840) and I've had to fight against my various medical stuff in order to stay in the program. So, while it would have had some benefit, not having that added stress is a massive relief.
I also am not particularly worried about my conflict management skills because I've learned an awful lot about how to effectively communicate with people over the last year (shoutout to my DBT program. Unbelievably helpful in this regard) so I don't think I necessarily need that experience. Checking in with people, figuring out what the roadblocks are and how to overcome them, and (when necessary) being a bit of a hard ass in order to get things done are all things I'm decently good at so I think I will be an asset to my team in that way. I know the production coordinator and other related roles are ones a lot of people really hate and don't want to do but it actually sounds incredibly appealing to me. I think that through this project, I can get a lot of solid experience doing that sort of work and I can start to fine-tune what works and what doesn't so I can take that experience and knowledge to my first job out of school.
