Wassat!?

(from left to right) Myself, Ivan and Marquis after watching the new Nightmare on Elm Street movie. Which was great btw.



This is myself and my girlfriend at a friends birth/divorce day drinks



Lastly, this is one of myself in my mercenary costume at my 24th.

This post is something of an experiment really, pay it no heed. Maybe.

2009 End of year presentation. from Zac Seaton on Vimeo.

It's been some time since I last updated this puppy. Many months, in fact. I've been up to alot, including a trip to Thailand, a stint doing interior decoration paintings and one hell of a convention in canberra.

More important than my escapades abroad, the Diploma of Animation course I've been studying is very shortly coming to an end. The Screening Night held on Tuesday the 17th went very well and almost all of the final peices were very good. One or two weren't so crash hot, but you get that.

So now with the future gleaming brightly and mysteriously ahead of me, I go tentatively forward. Each step comes easier they say, but you must take those intial difficult paces before momentum and inertia can drive you forward ever bolder.

This post is just a quick update really, to get me back onto the damned thing and posting again. So take it easy all and enjoy.

Nifty websites aka Eh?

Hello and other face-noise greetings, fellow flesh bags!

For a brief update, lots of stuff happening and nothing all at once. I don't really feel a need to exaggerate beyond 'none of your damned business', so I wont.

I felt it would be prudent to briefly pimp the amazing new stop motion film 'Coraline' (mostly cause my Tafe teacher told me so, ha ha freakin' ha) and it's similarly nifty website with it's groovy motion graphics and what not. The address for any whose curiosity is piqued is as follows; www.coraline.com

The site is somewhat download heavy because of the groovy scene exploration. It's cool, check it out if you don't know what I mean. Also the movie itself is based off a story written by Neil Gaiman. If you don't know who he is, there is some thing basely wrong with your existence.

Well space cadets and bucket heads, that's all for now, stay tuned to see three poodles juggling small children. Or not, see if I care.

Wall-e vs Space Chimps

Silence your flatulence, you writhing tape worms!





I think I've been reading too much Johnny the Homicidal Maniac... or not enough, whatever. As promised, my opinion shall be spat in your general direction and you will swallow.

So, Space Chimps. While it looks pretty and the voice acting is enjoyable, it really seems to lack something. Acting, me thinks. The animators weren't bad, that's not at all what I'm saying, but there was a definite lack of symbolism and expression through their bodies. It was in essence, a movie full of monkey sized Keanu Reaves. To further my disappointment, the lack lustre compositions leave a series of poorly framed head shots to entertain you. Couple that with a classic 'you can do it' themed plot, it left me screaming at the movie store cashiers intestine.

In stark contrast to the luke warm effort of the affore mentioned monkey business, wall-e was brilliant. Emotional, deep and breath taking, the team at Pixar have out done them selves. While director Andrew Stanton is no Brad Bird, I was truly awestruck by the complexity and yet simplicity of the plot. With no voice acting per se through the fist portion of the film (robot sounds were composed by Ben Burtt), the level of acting required to convey the situation was astronomical. The brilliant visual compositions giving us an insight into the mood and creating atmosphere. When your soundtrack includes 'Thus Spake Zarathushtra' (bombastic little number from 2001: a Space Odyssey) you know you're onto a good start. The genius use of such mood music gives an edge to the scenes that truly enraptures you.

Anymore Chimp bashing from me will have the RSPCA kicking down my door to open up my insides with sporks, so I end it here. I had intended to go more in depth into the break down, but alas, I work on borrowed time and toe nails.

I Sit and Wonder

So, may is here and winter comes bearing it's chilly wrath upon the great mass of land known as Australia. I feel a tad guilty right now because I'm hanging out at my mothers place drinking beer and not animating, planning most sincerely to drink a little more than is good for me. But hey, Mothers day is this weekend and it's her own fault for giving me free rein of the beer fridge...

Ahem, right... yes, so just recently Ian posted a groovy ramble on the ARC about managing time for our second and final year of study, which I found particularly amusing. In reality the post was more about making the course your bitch, than it was about managing time itself.

Curse you space-time causality! I will have acquiescence!

Where was I, right, the beer. What? no, not about the beer? LIES! FINE, be that way. So after reading this I found myself having something of a ponder. It was mostly things of a 'where do I want to be' nature. 'Well,' I said to myself. ' CHARACTER ANIMATION, YOU D**KFACE!'

So I'm a bit hard on myself sometimes, but someone has to keep me in check. It's kinda weird, sitting here looking the business end of the proverbial barrel that is my choice of career study course, thinking about what the hell I'm gonna do with myself after all is said and done. To be perfectly frank about it, I'm a little scared. I feel like an agoraphobic contemplating the big wide open spaces just outside his safe, confining walls. Maybe I should get another beer.

But I'm on a roll here. What scares me the most is the concept of failure. Failing is supposed to be the best teacher in life, yet it can also be the most brutal of adversaries, tearing to shreds what meager scraps of strength we can procure from our small fragile egos. That is what chills me to the bone, lingering thoughts of inadequacy lurking there at the back of my mind. I know what I want and to hell with anyone who says I cant succeed, but still as always my worst enemy is the blackest depths of my own imagination.

So now it occurs to me, as I sit here at a borrowed laptop surrounded by acres of open farmland (Agoraphobia, see? Wasn't all that random at all. Not that I have it, just seemed like an apt metaphor) nutting out my own thoughts as I attempt to master the laptop keyboard, that maybe, just maybe, I'm thinking too far ahead. Maybe I should get another beer, go back to Tafe on Monday morning and stop screwing around and concentrate on the next step to getting a job in character animation. Maybe I should focus more on changing my attitude towards the hard yards of animating and gods be damned, maybe I should get another fucking beer.

Maybe I will. On all accounts, we only have to wait and see now don't we?

Oh and the picture included is of a FF8 Gunblade replica I bought recently (I took the image from the global gear ebay page) for only 10.50! I am such a bloody nerd sometimes. But then other times, I FRICKIN ROCK!

I've got comics on my mind

Heya freaks and farts!

It's been awhile but I've been busy finishing up the Axeman music video for Amebix, more on that closer to it's release.

For the now however, the autobiographical comic for my course is finished, HOORAY! Boy, who'da thunk drawin thems prudy pictures was gunna be so hard? Apart form people with half a brain, ME! but it's done and it's turned out quite well.

The story is basically about me and my decision to stop being a victim of living and do something I want to do, not what others feel I should do. So, kinda obtuse right? You'd be right to say so, but I went with a stylistic choice of telling the story like a fairy tale, condensing it down and minimising details and even adding fantastical elements to an otherwise reality based story.

On the technical side, i feel it's too fast at the start. I did try and cram a lot of info into one page. The flow of the text and even the panels could have been enhanced and lets face it, i'm shite with photoshop. But that's O.K., it's all part of the learning curve.

So, my final judgement is that I have a long way to go before I match up to my heroes like Drew Hayes, or Neil Gaiman, but who the hell does?

Anyway, as usual enjoy and feel free to comment.

It's been and gone...

Every body who missed my 22nd, raise your hand.

You officially suck.

But yes, my party was absolutely bitchin', yeah that's right, bitchin'. There was heavy metal, drinking, lots more drinking and even a brief spurt of violence. Oh, and minor propery damage, can't forget that now. The celebration of me went down a treat and everybody woke up the next day sore (freaking hangovers) and happy. lots of photos were taken and i've decided to share some, just so you can see what you missed out on. Winner = me!