 Welcome back to the FNA and today I want to talk about what to do when you're out of ideas. This topic came up actually just yesterday. Yesterday someone messaged me and asked, hey, I did this, we kind of advise in a different clip about what to animate, but I'm running out of ideas. What should I do? And I thought, you know what, let's just wedge this topic into my long list of FNAs. And why not? Because I think this is something that everybody struggles with me included. What do you do when you are sitting down to animate? What is the big idea? What is something that will get you excited to work on this? I mean, excitement and fun, that's overall anything I want to say, hopefully will also be fun to you to do, but also have a list of something that is less fun. But before I start, hi, my name is JD and I do animation lectures like these. And I do a bunch of stuff, quick little pitch. My channel covers news and lectures and reviews and a bunch of stuff. You can see all the thumb is flashing by. If you like this, if you want to miss any of these, feel free to subscribe. And if not, maybe I'll come into your later. But that's it. That's what the channel is. That's what I do. So now let's cover ideas. So point one is going to be something that serves my channel, but it's there exactly for that reason. It's my act analysis and tips for animators. It's there to inspire with ideas. It's me looking and analyzing movies and TV shows and basically taking a scene and subjectively interpreting what it is about and how to go about it. If you would take the idea, the contract of that scene or sequence and put that into an animation shot, it's not do this and copy that. But what's the idea behind that scene? And what could you do to tweak that and transform it to make it your own thing with your own scene, your own rigs? And this goes into acting. This goes into prop usage. This goes into environments, how character functions within all that. And it's there. If you don't have time to look at movies and TV shows, it's there as a springboard, you can just look at this and go, Oh, that's interesting. What if I do this with this and ideally it's something that you would do on your own. So every time you watch a movie, watch a TV show, play some VR experiences or games or play games or anything where there is a character doing something and reacting and thinking about things that could be a springboard or ideas. So what I would do is write that stuff down. Whatever you're watching, whatever you're playing, anything can jog a new idea and go, Oh yeah, I like this combined with that into this new idea. So analyze and write things down their ideas everywhere. That being said, maybe you can't afford streamers and Netflix and Hulu and all Disney Plus and all that stuff that's out there, or you can't play video games. I mean, this is all costly. And it's also dependent on where you live. You might not have access to all of this. So the next best thing, and I would argue the better thing is actually just observe real life. Look at what happens around you. Look at what happens to other people through your lens. Your interpretation of a certain event is going to be a unique perspective and a unique view on things. So it's going to be just more original. It's going to be more truthful to you because the danger with watching movies and TV shows is people have gone through that process already. They're drawing on their own experiences, doing something with that. You're looking at that, which is already kind of an interpretation and stylization of it. And then you take that and do almost like another copy of it. So if you observe real life with your own experiences, your own environments in your own thought process behind and the reactions to that and put that into a shot, that's going to be more original. So at any point, if I see something, I write things down. I have my notes app and I send emails. My inbox is like 95% my emails, which is horrible because the emails get drawn up, but it's a whole topic, but inbox zero. But I send myself emails all the time and this could be, oh, I like this as an idea and that the subject is item idea or item ref idea or set environment idea, or I take a photo of it or I see a toy or I see a design and I constantly write that stuff down and put it somewhere. I have a blog online or I have my notes app is filled with observations. And sometimes you have that combined with something that you saw in a movie, TV show, and so on. And that combination can be something new and fun. That being said, if you can't afford to go outside again, depending on where you are, the limitations or you're always maybe really busy at home, there's stuff you got to do, but you have at least the phone, hopefully then you have access to online material. So look at reference there, look up photos, Google any topic that you're interested in, and then seeing that can lead to an idea. You look at a specific expression of a character or you go on Instagram, whatever, like you see a bunch of photos and stuff, that's kind of neat. I like that. Like I follow an Instagram account that's sea and water bunch of stuff and nature is metal. And there's a bunch of stuff with animals and just nature. And I see sometimes like a little story, either a photo or a movie go, that's so cool, man, that would be cool to animate. So that's something you can do as well. So look online for photos, environments and character faces, just Google in and that photo of a specific set maybe will give you like a spark of an idea of Oh, I can put my character into this environment and do that with it. Speaking of phone, I mean, I do a lot of walks right now in the morning, I listen to my audiobooks and podcasts, maybe you have that, maybe you like listening to specific, I don't like crime stories or just audiobooks with fictional stuff or nonfiction, whatever it is, and maybe that can spark some ideas. It's like for me, when I work, I a lot of times have something playing a movie or TV show that I already know about, but it kind of plays in the background. Maybe now then you hear a new dialogue is like, Oh, yeah, I remember this from the movie, but I never thought about it this way. And then that audio piece, which I have again, another folder where I collect audio pieces from a bunch of stuff that I either watch or listen to. So my collection of audio clips to animate to is huge. Don't have time to do any of this. Well, I keep collecting because again, it's it serves as an idea for something else or maybe something at work, we have to quickly think of an idea for a client. And then that helps it with that. So it doesn't have to be just like I said before, watching movies and TV shows or whatever to collect visuals. You can also watch something, and especially with something like an ensemble cast like way back remember lost so many characters in there. And there's so many good lines from that show. So when you do watch movies and TV shows and so on, think in terms of also audio, it doesn't have to be a visual thing, but it gives you also snippets of audio pieces that you can animate to later. And if all that fails, another source of inspiration for me are rigs. Because sometimes you have an idea, right? You do everything I just said, you write it all down, you got great ideas. And you go, yeah, I don't have a rig for this. Like what I want to do with this character does not exist. I can't model, I can't rig, I can't, I can't even do what I want to do because the rig is not there. And maybe you're not good at modifying the rig to make it look like that. So then look at the rigs that are available and then start from there. So I see a new ring and I go, that's cute. Okay, what could I do with the character looking like this? Maybe some modifications and put that maybe into a different set. Oh, that's interesting. Or this is a cool rig. This is also cool. What if I combine them? Oh, I could do this with that. So sometimes for me, it's looking at rigs or CG sets. Every now and then you see like a lighting competition and they provide the sets for free. Look at those CG model sets. You can go CG trader or many other websites where you can download sets for free and you can look at that selection. So okay, I don't know what to do, but I like this staircase. Maybe it's like in an old broken wooden house. Oh, maybe that could be some emotional scene about the breakdown and the visuals emphasize that or it's a creepy haunt that mentioned everything. Anyway, so for me sets can also be a springboard of ideas. Then you have that plus the rigs are available. Combine that into a new original idea. All of that you can also splinter into two ways because you can just do animation for yourself and have fun with it or it's an animation for a demo reel. So everything I said before could be for just an exercise for yourself. And that's the problem too because then you're you have unlimited ideas in a way. It's like you're not limited to anything if there's too much freedom. And what helps sometimes is to think about what is a box that I can put myself into which limits certain things, but at least within that box that can be really creative. So you don't have that idea paralysis, I guess if that's an expression. So for me, that will be a demo reel. So okay, well I want to do then decide something for games, VFX, cartoony stuff to be like, and there's so many areas that you can explore. And if it's something that where you are learning animation, you want to get a job, then think very practically, okay, I want to work this company in a couple of years or next year or next week and go, okay, what has this company done? What is their style and what type of animation have they done with what kind of looking characters with that's English. And that's already a box that you're now in and that can maybe set off a new string of ideas of, okay, well it has to be this style with these kind of characters. Oh, I could do this, this and this. And that way you're not lost in this sea of unlimited options. If all that fails or in addition, you can also look at other people's animation. And I say this more towards the end because people's work either be it in movies and like animated movies, animated TV shows and all that stuff and people's demo reels or exercise shots online, you can see that on LinkedIn, on Twitter, on Instagram is that those shots have gone through that same process that you're about to go through or that you're in the middle of. People have had an idea that went through the idea process, ideation, if that's a word, and it's kind of like it has gone through the stylization and the process of making this work for them. So if you look at that specifically and then copy that, not saying one to one, but still taking heavy inspiration from that, then it starts to feel like a copy of a copy of a copy. And if you're not careful, then you might even take something from a movie where you go, I like this idea, I'm going to do that too. Not realizing that for an older generation of animators who might look or you know, maybe look at your reel or something, you might not realize that they know exactly what that scene is from. I remember way back someone did a character on the walls like a parkour type of stuff fleeing from people and then they were at the wall and then it was this imagine those are hands, the butt and legs and going up and doing kind of the leg up like that while folding itself. It's basically Mowgli from Jungle Book, the 2D version. It was exactly that shot replicate. That's a very famous shot. It's a really well animated shot. It's just a classic that you should just not copy. So there are some things where if you start looking into animation reference specifically at animation and you take that as an inspiration, there's a danger that you copy it too much or it's going to be just a rehashed idea that has its origin from someone else that has gone through the same process. Basically, it just won't be as original. So it's cool to look at and I definitely do that as well. I see a bunch of stuff online. I save it and I have a folder that says to study and then I go frame by frame like how why does this work? Why can this pose pop from this to this without feeling like a pop? And I go through that frame by frame. Absolutely for me it's like a technical inspiration learning thing but I don't take it as an idea springboard because again that's very dangerous. But in terms of I want to do this too, who else does what I want to do? Oh that's cool. That's inspirational. That gets me motivated. Well sometimes you just need a little kick of motivation to get going. At the same time, I would not wait for motivation. That's a whole different topic I should probably do in as an FNA. I wouldn't wait for motivation and then start going. A lot of times you just start. You get motivated by working and if you just start with something that's even boring out of that suddenly something comes up and like oh actually I actually want to do this and not that. So I would work and then inspiration will come in on top of that or motivation will come on top of that. I wouldn't wait until inspiration or motivation you know zaps you and then you start. I think that's the wrong way to start a show or get into something. I think that's a different topic. Comment maybe if that's something that resonates and you want me to talk about that but I feel like that's a separate topic. Now if none of this works you can also be very pragmatic. Just think in terms of what have I not done or and what am I not good at and do that. I'm going to say I'm not good at walks because I haven't done them in a long time and I always think about I'm going to do a walk a week. It doesn't matter how crappy they are. I want to go through the process so that I'm not intimidated by even starting. I just want to go through that. Be very comfortable with that. Haven't done it yet but that could be something so you don't know what to do. Okay well maybe the next thing you do is not a splashy thing for your reel or something online. It's going to be I just got to be better at this. So make a list of I did this. I did not do that. So do what you haven't done yet or in case you've done it all. You can say oh I'm done it all but I'm better at this than that. Well then go with what you're not good at. It's very pragmatic but it's something to do and again out of that something might an idea might be generated out of that boring task that now turns into a more exciting idea. And speaking of ideas and last but not least you can always sign up for my workshop. I can't even I can't even end my my pitch without laughing but if you feel like all this is cool you like all of this and you're doing all of this but you need an extra help and maybe someone that coaches you through this idea generation moments you can sign up for workshop but that's exactly what we do. We can talk about things all those layout back and forth idea discussions none of these kind of submissions we can just talk forever and then once we settle an idea then you start submitting you got 16 submissions anyway there's a link description there's a bunch of stuff out there that you can watch in terms of the info I have a playlist of workshops you can see how I critique but that's what I do you can sign up at any time you can start whenever you want it's very flexible very cheap and very tailored towards you so hopefully that works for you questions of course let me know in the comments I can always expand on that. Speaking of expanding what is this 16-ish minutes with edits I don't know 15-16 minutes I know so I think that's enough rambling hopefully that was a good list for you to start with I probably not probably I most definitely forgot something so let me know the comments as well what helps you maybe you can make a list in the comments this is what I used to get ideas I'm sure I missed a bunch of stuff this is what came to mind is what I do and if that helps and you don't want to miss other movies about ideas subscribe you know the pitch at the end as well but that's it for me listen I'm not gonna waste your time even longer so thank you for watching thank you for watching to the very end if you're still there I appreciate it that's it for me thank you and I'll see you in my next upload