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Dial “F” for the Fear of Failure Demon!
Ever notice that whenever you begin an new artistic project like a new book, painting, portfolio, short film, etc that the frickin’ Fear of Failure Demon always seems to drop by in order to petrify you? You spend sleepless gut wrenching nights consumed with images of doom. Your brain subjects you to a non stop power point where both you and your art are featured as objects of scorn, ridicule, or even worse objects of pity. So for the thousandth time you give up and eighty-six your dream.
Think you’re alone?
Nope!
All artists go through this. At least the sane ones do. Its normal.
To us, it seems like the successful artists, the superstars of the art world, the ones we look up to, must own some secret magical map to success that they hide from the rest of us. We figure they must be blessed with courage and ingenuity that we can never hope to match.
Bull crap!
Ask the top painters, cartoonists, designers, illustrators, comic creators, animators, poets, writers, directors, and they will all claim that they are no different! They too have had to deal with the Fear of Failure Demon and have had their shares of crushing disappointment.
Fear of Failure is something within in all of us. Every one of us is terrified of the unknown. We as a species like to know what to expect, and we like our expectations to be comfy. All of us seek approval and gratification and prefer to avoid hurtful experiences that bring rejection.
So how do we slay the Fear of Failure Demon, and make our dreams come true?
Use Extreme Prejudice when dealing with your Fear of Failure Demon.
There are a some steps that can make the battle a little easier for us to win. Does this mean you won’t fail? Of course not. You will most definitely fail! Because you can’t succeed if you don’t fail. The key is to adjust your thinking and only then can you dispel your detrimental Fear of Failure.
You can minimize your Fear of Failure if you stop imposing unrealistic expectations on yourself. Failure does not make you as a loser. Failure just means you made a mistake. But remember! A mistake can be corrected. View failures as mistakes, learn from those mistakes and move on.
Don’t ever just give up. Great success has often followed the most severe failures.
Remember whenever you feel that the Fear of Failure Demon, is overtaking you:
- Communicate your fears to a friend, or write them down or whatever it takes to put the fear in perspective.
- Think to yourself, “what is the worst case scenario?”, then imagine yourself overcoming it.
- View failures as steps to success. With each step you gain more courage.
- Never give up. Success always comes when things looks the most hopeless.
Fear of failure is one of the most crippling fears you can have. Many have had to struggle with it on their way to success! But huge numbers of people remain unconsciously crippled by fear of failure … and never achieve their true potential.
Fear of failure has many forms. But more often than not, it’s a completely unconscious HABIT. Fortunately, like other habits, it CAN be changed!
Dive in and just go for it! Your real fear should be the fear of never trying!
I’d like to thank listener Lee Krukowski for writing in and getting me to think about the Fear of Failure Demon! Check out these great samples of his work!
Check out Lee’s Website
Follow Lee on Twitter
Krishna Sadashivam PC Weenies!
I’d like to give a shout out to Krishna Sadashivam The creator of the killer web comic PC Weenies! He called in and left a voice mail question on the Man vs. Art Minion Hotline! He asks what animation studios are looking for in terms of Storyboard Artist Portfolios. Check out the podcast if you want to know what I had to say on that.
PC Weenies! One of the best Web Comics out there!
Man vs. Art Pantheon of Awesomeness.
Art and words by Minion Henry Wiggins
Hey Raul…
Great show you aired last time. Really enjoyed it like all the others. So on mentioning submissions to the Pantheon of Awesomeness I would like to toss in the one and only…
Isaac Asimov
By Henry Wiggins
Born in 1920 Isaac Asimov was a writer of some of the greatest classic Science Fiction stories of the last hundred years. Of his works The Foundation Series… The Galactic Empire series and his Robot series were major contributions to the world of sci-fi literature. And These are just a few among the 500 books that he wrote or edited in his lifetime.
In particular Asimov’s Robot series generated 2 lasting concepts in science fiction including the invention of a robot’s ‘Positronic’ brain and the 3 laws of Robotics. Both concepts were featured in the movies ‘The Bicentennial Man’ and ‘I Robot’ which were loosely based on his characters.
Though Asimov was a professor of biochemistry at Boston University he had also written many books on the subjects of physics and astronomy and even on the Bible and William Shakespeare’s works and of course chemistry.
For more than a half a century Science Fiction lovers around the world have enjoyed his thought provoking adventures across the vast universe and time itself. Asimov will forever be remembered as one of the great thinkers and writers of our time.
I have been an Asimov fan for as long as I remember reading sci-fi. His work was amazing at the time and I would say is required reading for any science fiction fan. Hope you enjoyed the submission Sir. Take care brother.
Henry Wiggins
Click the Image to see the rest of the Pantheon of Awesomeness!
Man vs. Art Friend of the show “La Cosa Nosferatu” Geo Brawn IV revamps his website!
Get it? Revamps?! You know, because he does vampire comics and stuff.
Hey Minions, are you into vampires that don’t sparkle? Do you like pin-ups, horror, and all around good times? Then join your Ol’ buddy Geo at his newly revamped brawngraphix.com for the best in all the above!!! Now you can check out the latest of Geo’s Vixens, read his latest blog post, or unlock the world of the Untold Chronicles. At Brawngraphix.com it’s a bloody good time!
Geo on Facebook!
Click the pic for more GEO!
Geo on Facebook!
Click the pic for more GEO!
MY ANIMATION CLASSES
Lastly I’d like to present you with some samples of the 2D Traditional and some 3D digital Animation my students did from my History and Principles of Animation and Timing for Animation Classes at the Gnomon School of Visual effects in Hollywood California.
Here is the final exam by the four students in my History and Principles of Animation class.
Richard Daniels, Adam Nixon, Hartwell Durfor, and Margaret Byrne.
I asked them to animate a walk cycle using any technique and character they wanted. They all did a great job and gave me something unique.
Then using Adobe After Effects Hartwell put all the walk cycles together in an homage to Dick Williams Survival Kit Animated Intro.
These are some of the Traditional 2d animation assignments I gave my students in the Gnomon School of Visual Effects Winter 2011 Timing for Animation Class.
Annie Khoo, Hejin Kim, and Wen Reimi Hseih. Walk Cycles, run Cycles, and more!
Ciao!
R.
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Cartoon Guy!
Jerry Beck is an animation historian and cartoon producer. His fifteen books on the subject include The Animated Movie Guide, Looney Tunes: The Ultimate Visual Guide and The 50 Greatest Cartoons. He is a former studio exec with Nickelodeon and Disney, and is currently a consulting producer to Warner Bros., Universal and Disney for their classic animation DVD compilations. Beck has programmed animation retrospectives and animator tributes for the Annecy and Ottawa Animation Festivals, The Museum of Modern Art and The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences. He has taught animation history at NYU, SVA, the AFI and UCLA. He is currently teaching Animation History at Woodbury University in Burbank, California.
Cartoon Modern written by Jerry’s partner on Cartoonbrew.com Amid Amini
Jerry mentioned that Nick Cross is one of the hottest indy animators out there. I totally agree! I mean look at his stuff! He’s currently working on a feature length film callled Black Sunrise.
Looks really heavy and cool Minions!
Coconut Fred’s Fruit Salad Island.
Jerry mentioned the WB’s short lived Spongebob knockoff Coconut Fred’s Fruit Salad Island. I didn’t remember it and after a little research I can see why.
John K!
You guys need to check out John “Ren and Stimpy” Kricfalusi’s blog John K Stuff! Absolutely awesome animation history, technique, and style resource! John tells it like it is!
Some Animated Short Goodies. A couple of fans were kind enough to post our cartoons on youtube guys!
Jerry’s most recent animation project, Hornswiggle. Tom Sito came on board to Storyboard the cartoon.
Hero Heights My animated short I made for the same shorts anthology series as Jerry. The lower quality version has over 46,000 hits!
Here is a higher quality version.
Burbank International Film Festival!
click the image for submission info!
This Year’s Burbank International Film Festival invites all animators to submit to its September 17th full day of animation programming! This is the first year of Burbank International Film Festival’s exclusive Bill Plympton Award for Indie Animation, to be presented by Bill himself whom we’re honoring with our Pioneer in Theatrical Animation Award. Also honored this year with our “Pioneer in Television Animation.” is Mark Kirkland, senior director of The Simpsons! Both honorees are judges for the final round of animation along with Cartoon Historian and CartoonBrew.com founder Jerry Beck.
Guess What? Yours Truly your Man vs. Art will be one of the animation Judges as well!
Animators! Submit at burbankfilmfestival.org! Click the image above for submission info!
Regular submission deadline is June 15th.
Project Jose 2! Rise of the PokerBots!
click the pic to see Jose's Blog!
Jose Gonzalez is a faithful Minion and developing artist! The guy loves to draw and I have taken him under my wing to help him improve his drawing skills! I assigned him to draw some robots playing poker below is what Jose drew.
Jose’s turned in a couple of rough concept drawings of robots playing poker.
PokerBots rough concept #1 by Jose Gonzalez
PokerBots rough concept #2 by Jose Gonzalez
I then took Jose’s concept and went over it with red to punch it up a little and help him make a better drawing out of it! I recorded a video of my notes session with Jose!
Below is his final inked piece with the adjustments I suggested!
Final Illustration! WOW!
Let’s give it up for Jose folks!
Until next time Minions!
Ciao!
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I’m going to make a big sweeping generalization right now. I’m going to “paint with a broad brush” so to speak.
It’s tough being an Artist.
Yup.
It always has been I suppose. There’s a bunch of crap we have to put up with! But you know which artists have it the worst I think?
Little kid artists. Especially lower income little kids. In the hood there is no support for the arts. The kids have no access to supplies, equipment, training, mentors, books, or even a place to sit down and draw. Luckily for the young artists in El Monte California there is a guy like Enrique Diaz, a wonderful and generous man driven by a great passion for the arts!
A sketch I did of Enrique.
Viva Jalisco!
Born in Tecomatlan Jalisco Mexico, Enrique’s family immigrated to East Los Angeles when he was a child. In 1977 he graduated from Roosevelt High and spearheaded a baile folklorico (folkloric dance troupe) at El Sereno Junior High. There Enrique performed in and choreographed routines for junior high and high school students.
Enrique the dancing machine!
Diaz, Enrique Diaz.
Served his country!
In 1981 Enrique enlisted in the United States Navy, and served proudly on the USS New Jersey where he collaborated with like-minded servicemen to share their written stories and essays. This group was the beginning of Nuvein Foundation for Literature and the Arts. After an honorable discharge, he returned home to enroll at Cal Poly Pomona where in 1992 he earned his degree in English Literature.
For 23 years he worked as an instructor at Mt San Antonio College, UEI, Pasadena City College, El Dorado, Palladium Technical, and at his own school, The Digital Business and Design College a private college he founded that provided technical degrees in multimedia and computer design.
Enrique was involved in many community organizations, serving as Webmaster for various Chambers of Commerce offices throughout the San Gabriel Valley.
Nuvein began as a dream of founder Enrique Diaz. Ever since his days in the navy Enrique had been gathering and writing stories and sporadically printing them in a magazine called Nuvein, until in 1996 it all changed. Enrique realized the limitless possibilities this new thing called the Web brought to the table. He dedicated Nuvein to voices rarely heard in a world increasingly devoid of diversity. In 2007, Nuvein became a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, with the help of the community and business leaders from various San Gabriel Valley cities, and established its home in El Monte CA.
Enrique and Javier Hernandez
The MISSION of Nuvein
Is a solid commitment to connecting communities to the arts by raising funds and scholarships for students pursuing a career in the arts and to support those already in the arts. Nuvein is also committed to showcasing the arts through community arts presentations, live performances, and educational programs.
VISION:
To carry out its mission, Nuvein has been building an arts infrastructure beginning in the San Gabriel Valley, where it has established online radio and TV outlets, an e-book online store, an online magazine, as well as a network of partner organizations, private and public.
Enrique was so awesome! He would plan events for the Cartoonistas all over town. If there was a festival he had Cartoonistas there to do live art for the public. Enrique allowed us to use his facility to hold meetings and whenever the Cartoonistas had an event outside of Nuvein Enrique was there in full support. He provided Jim Lujan, myself , and the rest of our gang of indy animators with the screen and projector for all of our animation festivals. In fact for the last one the we don’t need no stinking badges show he Drove from San Diego where he had a Nuvein event all day to Los Angeles just to deliver the screen and projector for our show! That’s a 2.5 hour drive people. He looked tired but never stopped smiling and was glad to see our cartoons.
Fighting the good fight.
Enrique understood that a strong arts education enhances the skills children need to succeed. Exposure to art promotes learning and sharpens critical and creative skills.
Sadly this great man and friend passed away suddenly on March 28th. The Art community took a big hit when we lost Enrique. He will forever be remembered as “Our Storyteller”, and will be sorely missed by the countless lives he enriched by means of mentoring, entrepreneurship, artist collectives, scholarships, fund-raising, and leadership in community service.
Art encourages kids to see things differently. It challenges them to explore new concepts as well as ideas and provides a outlet for self expression.
Simply stated, the arts are worth fighting for and Arts Advocates like Enrique are needed to close the gap between art and policy. Guys like Enrique are needed to make public presentations, write blogs and speak at civic meetings, to develop educational programs, and to communicate the importance and benefits of arts programs to civic leaders. It’s a role that requires an understanding of art education, passion for the arts, and the drive to share your passion with others a role Enrique performed exceptionally.
Enrique thank you so much for everything you have done for us.
He is survived by: his husband Jeffrey Bickel, his mother Aurora Diaz, and siblings Nicolas, Herman, Maribel, Judith, and Arlene.
R.
The song Rosas Tears by Makrolon was provided tonight from Mevio’s Music Alley.
