Stoppity starty stoppy start

It’s been 13 to 19 November 2016. Between inhaling large chunks of “Independent Animation” and settling back in at the ol’ day job, it’s been a week of rewriting, retooling and experimenting.

I restated the story beats and compiled a shot list early in the week. For an attempt to condense the film and cut the fat, It still felt too much like reshuffling what was there instead of compressing it. I expected something much more streamlined – less shots, less pauses in the action, less to do. After that early misstep, it turned into a rewrite week where I zeroed in specifically on issues of character motivation and pacing.

The task before me is to condense and arrange the events of the story to get the right tone, pacing, character interaction and comedy. It is very tricky. I’ve settled into the groove of rewriting in passes, seeing what I like and most importantly making no assumptions that any new rewrite will be The One.

I’ve found that the trick is to have a specific problem to solve (e.g. solving lumpy pacing by spreading out the introduction and revelation of certain things), and to not to get desperately attached to anything like thinking “YES! THIS will be the one where everything will finally come together!” before I’ve even started that draft.

Unfortunately the rapidly changing requirements of the story has meant that poor old Pointy’s had a bit of an identity crisis, shifting from self-proclaimed Zen master to inexplicably (but consistently) angry little man and many steps inbetween. Hopefully the coming week will be kinder for everyone. 🙂