Hello guys and welcome to the Animation blog HypefroActive. Yeah, i know its indeed been another long while and this one looks more like an AWOL kind of long while and as usual again, i apologise for leaving you guys hanging. I'm still into 3D even more than i've ever been and i've been busier than ever and still am. But this time, i wont be leaving you guys without sharing a post and in the nearest future, i hope to be more stable here. Today i‘ll b talking on the above so that newbies with the desire to learn animation can take a cue & make life a bit easier for themselves. These were things i didn't know but dived into anyways because of my passion for the art. Well, i am here and i hope you "the new" guys don't make the same mistakes.
1) Passion n Patience: These P-squares r not your average dancing twins, neither is any of em an Ozokwor. Yet, u‘ll need them like crap. U must b passionate enough to push on & through during very tough times n b patient enough to wait for gradual results without been stupid about it. Both ingredients must be in the right proportions n mix. So if u don't have these two, go out and borrow, steal or buy because you‘ll need them. Afterall, what is learning without patience and passion?
2) Ying n Yang: See this as a calabar/chinese word and you may not b wrong. Its infact chinese and means Balance. Hot and cold, Hard n soft that is, anything with DIRECT opposites. Taking on animations in this part of the globe means you are crazy enough to do anything because the challenges that follow are quite overwhelming. So in that same state of insanity, you‘ll have to look for a way of been sane. The key is to always b happy, so whatever it is you need to do to keep yourself in that state of suspension, please do as long as you are not hurting or bothering anyone with it.
3) Electricity & Finance: Finance would b needed for maintenance and running costs attributed to you and staying on course. Including and not limited to buying softwares and how-to dvds plus google and YouTube. Add any other to the basket but these cannot be compromised.
On Electricity, that's a major problem here in Nigeria where i come from and pretty much Africa generally. Someway and somehow, something needs to power up your computer. If you fix that, then you could well be on your way towards learning and getting good.
4) Computer: As far as this goes, the laptop or any other computer device that can store at least 3hrs of light while modelling after your generator or electricity goes off is what i recommend. RAM should at least be 4gig, a minimum of 500gig HDD, GPU is optional but wold be good if you have access to one, a backup Hdd would also b nice if you can afford one and if not, that shouldn't stop you either. And you can check on google or other pros for their expert advice if you want to go higher or want to be more precise on specifications.
5) Softwares: This one is tricky and i wouldn't want to cause any e-war because of it so here goes. It is true that the artist makes the software n not the other way around. This means, regardless of your choice of software, what comes out of your head and how creative you are is what would matter. This does not mean that they are all on same level because even d pros agree that there are industry standards. Industry standards don't mean others are not good. Its just that these are regarded as the benchmarks. Now while still on this, we should also consider “time“. This sub factor is one thing nobody has or can control & as such manually trying out all d softwares in a bid to pick one, like some artist would recommend should b avoided like AIDS. Truthfully, beginning to know a software wont happen until about 6mths to a year. And we have more than 10softwares doing 3d. Now how long do you think it will take to go round all of them? A month or two is certainly not enough to study one software, so testing out all of them wont work. Now, how do you solve this mystery? Visit Pro Cgi forums and hear what pros have to say about them. Use google and go dirty. Search for “software vs“ threads, what your focus is in 3D for example visualizations, modelling etc. Yeah, also check out the help forums and fan base as these tells how popular the program is. The more popular it is, the easier you are likely to find learning it.
