I wasn't surprised by the critique, because I'd been having doubts about the story myself. For a while, I kept convincing myself that I don't care about the story--that all I really care about is producing a good-looking film. But a good-looking film is nothing without the story. The production manager at DUCK told me to focus the most on the story, and make sure that its good, because it's really the backbone of your whole film. I've come to the conclusion this summer that I can't skirt the story. It needed to be fixed.
I was initially stressed out, because i had planned on getting a head start on production this summer. A fellow animator at DUCK, however, offered to help me rework my story. We got together for happy hour at Chan Dara and started reboarding, tying together the loose strings.
Fast forward to three weeks later, I have a brand new story. Same characters, same setting, new boards. The fat guy isn't there anymore, and there are no more guns. Rather, Ray turns into a monster himself. I have a new animatic, which I come to learn is actually called a story reel (times out the boards, with no animation). I also flipped the layout of the store.
I'm a lot happier with this story. I feel that it is much more reasonable and makes much more sense. The old story did have a charm of its own, which slightly saddens me that I've decided to drop it. Still, I think this new story is much stronger. I feel much more confident in it.
As for the background, its coming along slowly. Dom is in Singapore right now, so the production of it is sort of at a stand still. He's been modeling and I've been creating the textures. The store still has a very realistic look, so I'm going to check out toonshading. I started taking shots from the model to put in my animatic for layouts. I wonder if I made the store too large and spacious, but it seems to fit the boards...I dunno.
As for my goals this summer....since I had to retrace my steps for a few weeks, I don't think I'll be able to accomplish most of them, or any of them. Even the background is a little slow in production. Regardless, I just need to keep going.
