i'm listening to "rio" by DURAN DURAN.
fuck i love this song.
i watched more production featurettes from the Aliens DVD last night. if other companies put the effort into their "special" features that was put into the Alien Trilogy's release, i would be a much, much happier person. you can tell that someone (or a board of someone's) really cared about the fans of those movies enough to put some energy in mixing old and current interviews with production footage and drawings and stuff to make a really nice presentation.
i get really excited by this stuff.
at roughly this time last year, i was in new jersey at the heartbreaker's mom's house, working out the plot to a horror movie i came up with in my sketchbook. i don't know if it was the inspiration from the Aliens stuff or some kind of cosmic skip in the forward locomotion of my life, but today i found myself working in the same sketchbook on the same horror movie. i worked out a couple more of the plot points and drew a couple of the main characters out.
ever since SHAUN OF THE DEAD came out i've been really bummed, because i had an idea for a romantic comedy with zombies, years ago and i'm starting to realize that if this shit just stays in my head its not gonna serve any purpose. of course, after finally SEEING that movie, i have no worries, what i have planned is completely different from that movie and i'm not entirely comfortable even CALLING that a "romantic comedy... with zombies." it was more of a funny zombie movie with a minor relationship problem. it wasn't very romantic. (for the record, i did think it was a cool movie though).
this got me thinking about the resources that are involved with writing, directing, producing and acting in a movie pretty much by yourself. this is a project i will never be able to undertake unless i get a pile of seed money which will give me time to solicit investments and such...
at my current not-paying-all-of-my-bills pace, this may never happen.
but...
what if i took the story, and did it as a graphic novel?
now, i know your asking "but BuckyKatt, don't you already HAVE a story for a graphic novel? a story you've called the most important story you could ever tell at this point in your life?"
to which i answer, yes. yes i do.
but, let's face the facts, a black and white graphic novel about a boy coming to terms with a world that does not live up to his standards doesn't stand a snowballs chance in hell of in the comics market as what i've got planned for this horror graphic novel does.
now, of course, i've got a signifigant investment of heart and guts in each book; both will be deeply personal stories that will feature artwork that i KNOW i will labor over for many sleepless nights; it's just that one of the two stories has zombies in it.
zombies = bling
literature = poverty
"but BuckyKatt... does this mean you value money over your art?"
no, no... you misunderstand. we're only talking about my FIRST major creative work here... i have to pick the project that not only can i pour my heart into and work tirelessly on for six months to a year, but also one that stands a fair chance of building a name for me and bringing in enough money that i can quit my day job and concentrate all of my energy into my career. only then will i have the kind of creative freedom that will allow me to work tirelessly on the original graphic novel story i had.
we'll see. it depends on what happens on D-DAY.
if i have to keep working at the sign shop (the day job) i know i'll need to be doing something fun like drawing zombies to survive the next couple of years.
regardless, the story itself isn't finished in my head, i'm not ENTIRELY comfortable with my abilities in sequential narrative and i've done NO preproduction (sets, costumes, etc) work at all... so, if D-DAY ends up with me working on my OWN career, i will be working on relaunching the magazine for the first six months of this year anyway, before i could start to seriously dig into this project.
i think anyone who reads this journal has gotten a glimpse or two at what drives me and also at the sheer amount of projects i have lined-up, the dedication that drives me and the ambition that guides me, keeping all of this in mind,
how awesome is it that i can't do any of it because i can barely pay my rent?
bah. i'll figure it out. complaining is for sissies.
fuck i love this song.
i watched more production featurettes from the Aliens DVD last night. if other companies put the effort into their "special" features that was put into the Alien Trilogy's release, i would be a much, much happier person. you can tell that someone (or a board of someone's) really cared about the fans of those movies enough to put some energy in mixing old and current interviews with production footage and drawings and stuff to make a really nice presentation.
i get really excited by this stuff.
at roughly this time last year, i was in new jersey at the heartbreaker's mom's house, working out the plot to a horror movie i came up with in my sketchbook. i don't know if it was the inspiration from the Aliens stuff or some kind of cosmic skip in the forward locomotion of my life, but today i found myself working in the same sketchbook on the same horror movie. i worked out a couple more of the plot points and drew a couple of the main characters out.
ever since SHAUN OF THE DEAD came out i've been really bummed, because i had an idea for a romantic comedy with zombies, years ago and i'm starting to realize that if this shit just stays in my head its not gonna serve any purpose. of course, after finally SEEING that movie, i have no worries, what i have planned is completely different from that movie and i'm not entirely comfortable even CALLING that a "romantic comedy... with zombies." it was more of a funny zombie movie with a minor relationship problem. it wasn't very romantic. (for the record, i did think it was a cool movie though).
this got me thinking about the resources that are involved with writing, directing, producing and acting in a movie pretty much by yourself. this is a project i will never be able to undertake unless i get a pile of seed money which will give me time to solicit investments and such...
at my current not-paying-all-of-my-bills pace, this may never happen.
but...
what if i took the story, and did it as a graphic novel?
now, i know your asking "but BuckyKatt, don't you already HAVE a story for a graphic novel? a story you've called the most important story you could ever tell at this point in your life?"
to which i answer, yes. yes i do.
but, let's face the facts, a black and white graphic novel about a boy coming to terms with a world that does not live up to his standards doesn't stand a snowballs chance in hell of in the comics market as what i've got planned for this horror graphic novel does.
now, of course, i've got a signifigant investment of heart and guts in each book; both will be deeply personal stories that will feature artwork that i KNOW i will labor over for many sleepless nights; it's just that one of the two stories has zombies in it.
zombies = bling
literature = poverty
"but BuckyKatt... does this mean you value money over your art?"
no, no... you misunderstand. we're only talking about my FIRST major creative work here... i have to pick the project that not only can i pour my heart into and work tirelessly on for six months to a year, but also one that stands a fair chance of building a name for me and bringing in enough money that i can quit my day job and concentrate all of my energy into my career. only then will i have the kind of creative freedom that will allow me to work tirelessly on the original graphic novel story i had.
we'll see. it depends on what happens on D-DAY.
if i have to keep working at the sign shop (the day job) i know i'll need to be doing something fun like drawing zombies to survive the next couple of years.
regardless, the story itself isn't finished in my head, i'm not ENTIRELY comfortable with my abilities in sequential narrative and i've done NO preproduction (sets, costumes, etc) work at all... so, if D-DAY ends up with me working on my OWN career, i will be working on relaunching the magazine for the first six months of this year anyway, before i could start to seriously dig into this project.
i think anyone who reads this journal has gotten a glimpse or two at what drives me and also at the sheer amount of projects i have lined-up, the dedication that drives me and the ambition that guides me, keeping all of this in mind,
how awesome is it that i can't do any of it because i can barely pay my rent?
bah. i'll figure it out. complaining is for sissies.
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xoxo