Unproductive
I have a lot to do this weekend, and yesterday I got nothing done. In the morning I used an 18-gallon tupperware bin to collect the water from my shower (I just stood in the bin while showering), then cut off the water supply to the toilet. Since then I've been flushing the toilet with my shower water using a bucket. You know you can just dump about a gallon directly into the bowl and it'll flush. At 9:30 I went to the Seattle Art Museum to see the Impressionists exhibit. There was a painting of windmills that had a wonderfully chunky quality I really enjoyed. Dan couldn't go because he had to go over to the FishBeat house and work, so I went with Matt O. and Kevin, some guys from school. Afterwords we went to the Grill from Ipanema.
At two we went to DigiPen's main campus for the Big Fish company day. I was impressed (for the second time) by how laid back casual games seems in comparison to other areas of the industry. The Big Fish people talked about always being home for dinner, spending time with their kids, etc. It seems like they're mostly looking for illustrators.
Immediately following that, I went to help interview one of the candidates for a Student Services position that just opened up. She was sweet, and I related to her a lot because she was at UW for six years before she graduated, but everyone else said the woman from the morning interview was a million times better. Another candidate interviews on Tuesday, so we'll see what happens.
The interview transitioned smoothly into the Student Association meeting, which in turn flowed into the Art Council meeting. Around 6PM I got a ride back to the Art Campus with Josh, one of the Junior reps, and we got there just in time to catch Dan entering the building. He wanted to go to Tres Hermanos for dinner, so we called Mike and Audrey, and we all went out.
After dinner, I was feeling sick (I ate restaurant food two times in one day), so we went to the Food wHole to pick up some kombucha while Audrey was getting snacks for her game night. Then we went to game night, which was really quite excellent. We played Apples to Apples, and a game I learned from my boss at the Mercer Slough Environmental Education Center. She called it "drawlly," but it's pretty much like telephone on paper. Everyone gets a piece of paper. You sit in a circle. You write a sentence on your piece of paper and pass it to the person on your left. Now you have a sentence from the person on your right. You draw a picture illustrating that sentence, then fold the paper back so the sentence isn't visible, and pass it to the person on your left. Then you write a sentence describing the picture you just got, fold and pass, then you draw a picture...and so on until the paper you started out with gets back to you. Then you look back over all the humorous ways in which it was warped.
I laughed so hard I cried.
So that's why I didn't get anything done yesterday. Today I need to make 20-or-so iconic representations of gameplay elements (like those little icons at the beginning of Portal levels) for Narctopus (the game I'm working on). I also need to make concept paintings for five of the eight levels of our game, and color comps of the main character and her stupid boyfriend with an octopus on his head. I need to get this done today so that tomorrow I can focus on my Concept Art homework and my Post-Production homework. I haven't even started thinking about Porfolio or Sound Design yet. Argh!
In my dream last night, Dan's mom was giving some kind of lecture in my bedroom at home in Oklahoma. I tiptoed in to retrieve something from my closet, but when I got there one of the metal bowls I use for cooking all the time was lying in a plastic tub, all warped and melty. I picked it up and my fingers started melting. I wondered why the plastic tub was unaffected, while my fingers and the metal bowl were burned. My fingers crusted over with a rough, green, plasticky covering. I came out and told everyone I had hurt myself, but that it was fine: it was just hydrochloric acid. I washed my fingers off in the sink, but that just made some more of my finger fall off. When I came back, my bedroom had turned into the living room of some unidentifiable trailer home, and I could see out the window that it was snowing heavily. I laid down on the floor under an afghan.
In case there's anyone out there who hasn't heard, Dan won second prize in the Redmond Digital Arts Festival! I am very proud of him. <3<3<3
At two we went to DigiPen's main campus for the Big Fish company day. I was impressed (for the second time) by how laid back casual games seems in comparison to other areas of the industry. The Big Fish people talked about always being home for dinner, spending time with their kids, etc. It seems like they're mostly looking for illustrators.
Immediately following that, I went to help interview one of the candidates for a Student Services position that just opened up. She was sweet, and I related to her a lot because she was at UW for six years before she graduated, but everyone else said the woman from the morning interview was a million times better. Another candidate interviews on Tuesday, so we'll see what happens.
The interview transitioned smoothly into the Student Association meeting, which in turn flowed into the Art Council meeting. Around 6PM I got a ride back to the Art Campus with Josh, one of the Junior reps, and we got there just in time to catch Dan entering the building. He wanted to go to Tres Hermanos for dinner, so we called Mike and Audrey, and we all went out.
After dinner, I was feeling sick (I ate restaurant food two times in one day), so we went to the Food wHole to pick up some kombucha while Audrey was getting snacks for her game night. Then we went to game night, which was really quite excellent. We played Apples to Apples, and a game I learned from my boss at the Mercer Slough Environmental Education Center. She called it "drawlly," but it's pretty much like telephone on paper. Everyone gets a piece of paper. You sit in a circle. You write a sentence on your piece of paper and pass it to the person on your left. Now you have a sentence from the person on your right. You draw a picture illustrating that sentence, then fold the paper back so the sentence isn't visible, and pass it to the person on your left. Then you write a sentence describing the picture you just got, fold and pass, then you draw a picture...and so on until the paper you started out with gets back to you. Then you look back over all the humorous ways in which it was warped.
I laughed so hard I cried.
So that's why I didn't get anything done yesterday. Today I need to make 20-or-so iconic representations of gameplay elements (like those little icons at the beginning of Portal levels) for Narctopus (the game I'm working on). I also need to make concept paintings for five of the eight levels of our game, and color comps of the main character and her stupid boyfriend with an octopus on his head. I need to get this done today so that tomorrow I can focus on my Concept Art homework and my Post-Production homework. I haven't even started thinking about Porfolio or Sound Design yet. Argh!
In my dream last night, Dan's mom was giving some kind of lecture in my bedroom at home in Oklahoma. I tiptoed in to retrieve something from my closet, but when I got there one of the metal bowls I use for cooking all the time was lying in a plastic tub, all warped and melty. I picked it up and my fingers started melting. I wondered why the plastic tub was unaffected, while my fingers and the metal bowl were burned. My fingers crusted over with a rough, green, plasticky covering. I came out and told everyone I had hurt myself, but that it was fine: it was just hydrochloric acid. I washed my fingers off in the sink, but that just made some more of my finger fall off. When I came back, my bedroom had turned into the living room of some unidentifiable trailer home, and I could see out the window that it was snowing heavily. I laid down on the floor under an afghan.
In case there's anyone out there who hasn't heard, Dan won second prize in the Redmond Digital Arts Festival! I am very proud of him. <3<3<3