Killing In The Name

I was going to write a blog post about my first few days of my second placement, but I forgot.

I then wanted to write a post about how I wished that life had an RPG aspect to it, so you could measure how good you are at stuff just by looking at your stats, but something else has come up which is, to me at least, more important.

I've been thinking for a while now, and I'm wondering about killing some stuff from my life, either forever or just for the time being.

The first part is the CLICvlog project. I'm in two minds with this, as it feels like there's no point continuing with it. It was only there as a means for me to pass my second year in university. Now, a year later, it just seems kind of pointless to continue. I don't have as much time as I dod to continue with it, and it seems that all it brings now is just shit.

So, for at least the time being, CLICvlogger is no more. And if I can't find any reason to revive it, CLICvlogger is dead.

The other thing, which might not be as immediate as the demise of CLICvlogger, is that I'm considering  either deactivating my social media accounts, or only using them as a means of private communication with people who I usually talk to.

Oh, and on a Wicid point of view, I've decided that I'm no longer an editorial team member. Again, many reasons, none that I'll share here. But on the eve of my fourth anniversary of being involved with Clic, I've sent an email saying I'm no longer going to be part of Wicid's editorial.

There are many reasons why I've been thinking this. Reasons, reasons, reasons. The main one is that I just don't care about it all anymore. Facebook's just a pool of people who just try to convince themselves that they are whatever they delude themselves to be. Most of Twitter just seems filled with attention seekers and men faking kindness just to get attention from women.

But yeah, this is what has been going through my mind these past few weeks. Some thing needs to be changed, whether it's small or large.  I'm not completely sure if these will work, but it doesn't matter, that's life, eh?

- FIN you, I won't do what you tell me.

Take A Number, Stay In Line

Once again, it is a blog post at the end of the year.

Once again, I'm going to review my year.

Once again, I use a lyric from a song as a blog title.

And once again, nobody cares.

So, what did I write this time last year for myself? Thanks fuck for copy-paste, that's all I'm saying...

1. Stay up there with my university course. Basically, I'm aiming for a first overall, but I will be content with anything from 2:1 up (or a extremely high 2:2 and up).
2. Improve my abilities with the Welsh language. This should get better due to me translating stuff, but I'm not doing too well at the moment...
3. Don't go into debt (and, if they allow it, stay as a Clic employer for as long as possible - optional).
4. Keep writing my Dear World series (though it might turn from a weekly thing to fortnightly, depending on what else I'm doing).
5. Improve my musical abilities.
6. Complete as many Final Fantasy games as possible. This isn't being serious, I just think it's sad that I've only really completed two of the games (three if you count Dissidia Duodecim) and I've got about five or six of them. It's rather sad to just not complete the games from this epic series (and write reviews for them - optional).
7. Improve your new media skills. And no, I don't mean social media, I mean with editing and design stuff.
8. Build up confidence. I don't mean this so I'd go out more and start performing Shakespeare's plays in the middle of Cardiff, but more so I'd be able to edit a video of myself without flinching over the sound of my voice or how hideous I think I look...

So, did 2012 me succeed in what 2011 me wanted to accomplish?

Well, I would consider the first one a success. I passed my second year in university with a 2:1, earning a few firsts in my assignments. Bad thing is that I only had one assignment that was less than a 2:1, but luckily the average is that I had a decent 2:1 for my second year.

I'll be honest here, although I didn't write it down, I have no idea about my success in my placement. If I had to rate myself, I'd say I'd get a third for my performance. I don't know, just seems as if I'm not doing good enough. Ah well.

Second, my Welsh. To be honest, I don't think I've improved at all. I've been told that my translating skills are good and are improving, but as for linguistical skills, I don't think I've improved at all.

I mean, there have been a few instances where I've spoken to someone in Welsh without feeling I'm being judged. The main one was when I was in the Eisteddfod and I was talking to a past student of Glamorgan Uni about Welsh and courses. It was the first time where I didn't feel like I was an amateur when speaking the language. Which, you know, was nice.

Third, money. I can happily say that I've not been in debt once yet. Not even touched my overdraft. An even better thing is that I'm still employed by Clic. That's still mad, that. I have no idea why they still think I'm good enough to be employed by them. Mad that.

Only down side is that I've still yet to actively save up money. Hopefully in the new year, I'll bunk up an ISA or something. Anyway, back to the drawing board.

I've totally failed with keeping up with my Dear World articles. Simply put, I haven't had the time. I'm still writing them, and I think I've surpassed fifty of them this year, but nowhere near once a week. Same goes for the CLICvlog thing. That should have been once a week, but I've missed twelve of them. Ah well. Maybe I'll improve next year.

Not going to lie to you, but I have no idea if I've improved any of my musical skills. I suppose I've kind of improved with guitar, considering I can now play the intro solo for Metallica's One. I know it's a simple part of the song, but I finally (almost) nailed it. Nowhere near performing standards, mind, but still.

But since I'm here, might as well talk about the social media one. I guess I've gotten a tad bit better with it. With After Effects, definitely, but with other things, I'd say I failed to improve. Feels like all I've done is just stay average in everything else, or dramatically failing in some aspects (ahem... Photoshop). But yeah, still a ways to go if I want to be at a standard where people would pay me a pretty penny for my skills.

And to my joke one. I think I've only really completed one Final Fantasy title, and that's Dissidia Duodecim. Ah well, I didn't really mean I'd complete all of them, I just thought I'd look more into a franchise that I rather like.

And last, my confidence. The only thing I can confidently say is that I'm still that prick with no confidence. The only thing, I'd say, that has remotely improved is my confidence in motion graphics, but then there's things where I just look at and my confidence just falls back down to non-existent levels.

More so towards the end of this year, it's been a bigger problem, and it's been more obvious that something has to be done, otherwise I'll just die a lonely bastard with nothing to my name except a headful of regret.

I have nothing else to say, really. So, with that done, lets see if I can try and write some goals that I'll fail at like the last few years.

1. Build confidence. It's obvious that I need to do this. I don't know where to start, or how it will happen. Long story short, this needs to be done, or I'll just be a prick like the last few years.
2. Not to cock up, university wise. 2013 will see me finish my placement and start my last year. The last thing I want to do is mess up with my placement, but hopefully I'll be on my way to at least a hight 2:1 in my course.
3. Same vein as the last one (and last years), improve my skills in media. You know - audio, video, animation, text and iamge. Includes using the Welsh language as often as possible too.
4. This isn't as strong as the other ones, but at least two CLICvlogs and two Dear Worlds a month. Twenty six of each should give me an achievable challenge.

Those are the ones I've given myself, but I've been given a few as well by some people too. Which are...

1. Eat different stuff. Not entirely sure what was said, but I think it was try to eat something totally different than what I'm used to every month. Because I usually eat basic stuff. 'Cause, y'know, I'm not really a fan of eating things.
2. Eat socially every other month. They said eating in the car after picking up a McDonald's doesn't count. Poo. I'm also guessing socialise outside of work/uni is one too. Meh.

So yeah, that's it. 2012 was the year where I tried to do things and failed miserably. If I didn't fail, I wouldn't be writing this at eleven at night. I'd be out, celebrating the new year.

What a way to end a yearly review post.

Actually, fuck it. I'm not ending it there. There's a handful of people I want to thank, but not in the emotional way actors do when they win an award for crying good. By the way, I'm not going to name anyone, just certain things. Go me and my insecurity of calling someone a friend because I don't know if they consider me the same.

First of all, to those who took part in the CLICvlogs. I know it's not the best project in the world, so the fact that some people are actually interested in doing it. I hope that there's a part of their want to vlog on their own channel is a result of taking part in the CLICvlog project, even if it's just to create something better than I could. Happiness indeed.

Second thanks goes to those who work at Clic. Y'know, for being patient with me learning the ropes and helping me with a lot of things, whether it's work or personal. 

Last, to nobody else, because I don't think I have anyone else to thank. Man, that makes me sound like a dick.

So that's it. My last blog post of 2012. Roll on '13.

And to quote my Dear World series.

I thank ye, world.

- FIN. FIN, FIN, FIN. FINpa Gangnam Style.

Turn Of The Century (And A Half)

For those who are counting, this is my 150th blog post.

150 blog posts in five years. Not sure that's a good or bad thing.

One thing I'm also unsure if it's good or not is that I'm getting back into Guitar Hero. I used to play that to death back in the day. I even wrote on the wall next to my television the scores I had when playing certain songs, mainly Free Bird in II and Through The Fire And Flames in III (both on Expert, but the latter one on practice mode, I could never get past the first section).

It was like my way of competing with myself. I only just manage to five star Free Bird once, Always did the same thing when I played on III - Played Talk Dirty To Me and other songs to warm up, then try to FC Reptilia and other songs before I try and beat my old scores in the harder tiers.

And you wonder why I've been single all my life...

I still remember the path of Talk Dirty To Me. I played that song to death, that and Knights Of Cydonia and My Name Is Jonas.

Well, I suppose it'll be a good thing that I'm getting back into Guitar Hero. I'll need to do something to keep me occupied when it's Christmas. Because, y'know, I just do the same thing as always, stay in doing fuck all. Maybe this year, I'll actually create something in After Effects. Maybe I might skin a cat, or . Nothing is impossible. Well, maybe the After Effects thing is for me...

In other news, I've had my first credit for work I've done. In this thing I've been working on for the last couple of whiles, I'm down as the Compositor and Motion Graphics person. Which is, y'know, the things I did for it. So yeah, my name is down as a credit for something. Suppose it's a good thing.

Another thing is that I've let CLICvlog slide. There are many reasons for this. One is that there hasn't been a time where I could meet up with people to film one. The other is that I just haven't had the motivation to film and edit them.

It's not that I don't want to do the project anymore, because I do want to keep it alive. I just seem to be consumed by utter shit sometimes. Yeah, like that makes sense.

That's it really. The only other things that I've learned is that the Welsh apparently use "goc oen" as an insult and I can only look at photos of myself if I don't look straight into the camera. Makes perfect sense, that. Oh, and I feel taller after I play the drums.

And that, as that old man from Final Fantasy X say that they say, is that.

Am y tro, boyos.

- Every time I look in your eyes, every time I'm watching you FIN.

Blog Post: A New Update

Every time I start to write something for this, I instantly have Comfortably Numb in my head.

This is just a short update, considering I wanted to post at least once a month and haven't done one for July. Sorry if nothing in this post is informative.

But before I start, Google - adding that nav bar onto Blogger has just totally shat over a decent design. Grr.

Anyway, it seems that my days on earth revolve around rendering. Not complaining, it's just that it feels like I'm wasting a lot of time because my computer's just stuck in that state of rendering for the majority of its life now.

In other news, might have already said it, but I've passed my second year in university with a 2:1. None of my marks for my assignments are lower than a 2:2, and I still managed a first in one module. Win.

In other university news, it looks like I am definitely having a year off to work in industry. Half with ProMo Cymru, half with Burning Red. First half concentrating on video shit, the other on everything else. I consider this a massive win.

CLICvlogs are being a bit rocky as of late, just due to people slating them like right motherlovers. Kind of wish other people would start emailing in and wanting to be part of it. Ah well, at least I have (for some reason) a group of people who want to be part of the project. Hopefully they'll be in it for the long run.

Also, would it be worth making a Facebook page for the CLICvlogs? I'm tempted, but I'm rather unsure if it's worth it or not.

In other news that will only make sense to me, I thought of a saying today. Coward or failure.

Basically, run away and not try, or try and fail. It totally shows my optimism where cowardice and failure are the only options, eh?

Today, I chose failure.

But, not sure it's lucky or not, I didn't even have the chance to fail.

Yey.

What else. Oh, I shall be attending the National Eisteddfod for the first time this year, which will be interesting. Will be going as work, but I'm not complaining, at least I have a reason to be there, ya?

Yes, this is a short post. Will write a less selfish post one day next week. Probably. If I remember.

- When I was a child, I had a FIN.

Ideas Inc

Two blog posts in a day? Man, shit must have really hit the fan.

Well, not really, I'm just saying stuff for the sake of it.

For the past like, month or so, I've wanted to do so many things and I don't know why. So this is just a chronicle of my failures, even though most of them will never happen. How lucky are you?

Number one, even though I am in no way a photographer, I would absolutely love to go to Cardiff Bay at three in the morning and just take photos of things, especially when the sun comes up.

I have no idea why, but for a while now it's something that I want to do. To cover an area that I have no real knowledge of and photograph it in a time where the majority of the people in Wales are asleep. It would be brilliant. But there are problems.

Well for starters, even though there'd hardly be anyone there, I'd still feel awkward taking photos in public. Secondly, the chances of someone else coming with me would be slim, meaning that I'd be on my own, meaning that I'd feel even more uncomfortable. So, until I somehow gain confidence or until someone else thinks shit, that sounds like something I want to do too, count me in, then it shall forever be a dream.

And I know, Cardiff Bay isn't the best place in the world, I just thought that would be a good starting point.

The second one is also linked to photography. And also sounds like I'm a sad deluded child.

I have this image in my head. It's of a girl sitting down in a park or something similar with the sun behind her. She's looking down, and she's smiling. Not one of those half arsed smiles that people give when you point a camera at them and tell them to smile, but a genuine smile. One of the images is of her just about to smile (you know what I mean, right? As in that moment before you fully smile?...) and then another shot of her fully smiling, again not after I say cheese.

And now I have probably lost fifty man points. Then again, I wasn't doing well in the manly stakes anyway.

I can't get this image out of my head and, considering my Photoshopping skills aren't that good, I won't be able to just do a cut and shut job to give you as an example. But again, this brings a few problems, mainly considering that the subject is a girl.

And by that, I mean that I feel awkward asking a girl if I can take photos of her. Even if I state what I have in mind and I'm not trying to get both of us into the porn industry, it still sounds slightly odd.

Not only that, and this is probably going to be construed as sexist, but I find it even awkward still if it was male. But that said, I feel rather awkward when I'm editing a picture or a video of a male person. I just feel much at east working with imagery that has a female subject. And now that's going to be read as if I'm a pervert.

I can't explain it. It's not that I'm secretly gay and I always feel attracted to any male people in the imagery that I edit, because that's not true. Neither is it true that I want to bang any girls that are in a certain piece of footage. There's some unexplainable reason that I find it at least ten times easier to edit an image that has a female in than a male. If that does indeed make me sexist towards my own gender, then so be it.

The third idea (part one) is totally down to my inexperience with 3D software.

I have an idea for a series. A series which uses 3D throughout the thing. For some reason, I've codenamed it Fallen.

Basically, if you've watched Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children and most importantly the last half of it, you might have an idea of what I'm thinking of doing.

But I don't mean that I want to do a rip off of Advent Children. I want to do something similar, yes, but not rip off. I don't want to create a character that is similar to Cloud, Tifa, Sephiroth and co and have them do the same moved they did in that film. Neither do I want to rip off Devil May Cry 3, but just use them as influences to create this impossible series.

I have no idea what the focus of Fallen would be. I don't know what the story is, or the characters or the structure of the series. All I know is that I have this idea, and every day I keep thinking of different scenes, and after I think of them, I just imagine how bollock hard they'd be to pull off. Shit the bed.

Part two, which I'm linking with my Fallen idea, is that I want to do an animation relating to bullying, using this song by My Morning Jacket as the background music. The part I want to use for the bullying animation is from about 4:30 onwards.



The idea I had for this is someone being bullied is contemplating committing suicide. They are up on a tall building (so tall that the camera can't even see the ground, if that makes sense). They then turn around to look at the people behind them, and sees ghosts of people who has bullied them, and begin to fall backwards (the moment the guitar does the dive bomb thing).

Then after a few seconds of falling (and other shit), there's a hand coming from the heavens. The person thinks it's the hand of God, and reaches out to hold it. There's a slow motion sequence where they are about touch, which cuts back to the building top. It was a human hand, grabbing the person who was about to fall, stopping the inevitable death. It ends with the two hugging each other, crying. Others appear on the rooftop, standing there, staring at the person who was about to die.

Yes, it makes no sense theoretically. When I came up with it, I had a slogan saying Bullying: It's Not Worth Dying For at the end of it. It will not work, mind, mainly because the idea is utter shit, but also because again my skills with 3D are terrible. Maybe one day, but in a decades time, not in the short term.

The forth one is similar. Kind of. I again have an image in my head. This time, it's of a wedding dress.

No, there's nobody special in that dress, so nobody ask me who I was thinking of in a wedding dress. The person doesn't matter.

What matters is that I thought of an idea for a wedding dress. The problem? I can't draw to save my life. The only conceivable way that I could illustrate what the dress would look like is if I either go an create it in real life or using a 3D program. And both of those will fail because I have no idea when it comes to fashion design and am incompetent in 3D software too.

The only thing I can say is that Final Fantasy has indeed influenced it. And no, I don't mean that it's short and shows off the girls booby area like some of the designs (especially Tifa and Rikku in X-2). If you're an FF nut, try and think of a hybrid of Yuna's wedding dress, Lightning's costume in XIII and Haley's wedding dress in that episode of American Dad. You know the one, that one where she's a sleeping agent and Stan activates her by saying I'm getting tired of this orgasm? Yeah, not sure if anyone can actually imagine a hybrid of that style.

I honestly don't know why this idea is in my head. I've never really had an interest in fashion design, and yet here I am, laying in my bed, imagining someone wearing my idea as a wedding dress. I don't know.

Fifthly, I want to actually do a CLICvlog of my own.

On what? Well, I'd like to do a tutorial one, maybe one about how to set up a green screen or how to colour correct images. The problem? You've probably guessed it, it's my confidence.

I feel much better when I'm behind the camera. I have no qualms when it comes to me not being the centre of attention. But for some reason, I have a sudden urge to just share my (lack of) knowledge with others and actually know how it feels to be in front of the camera. But yeah, I feel awkward in front of any lens.

Even if it's a camera on a phone, I feel awkward when someone takes a photo or a film of me, so filming and editing a CLICvlog which I'm in would be melon-twistingly awkward.

I don't think there are any other potential fails in my head that I'd like to share. There is one more, but it's way too personal to share here.

Bye then.

- Touch me, I'm going to FIN.

The Tale Of The Seven Assignments: Part Two

In the gripping saga of mine which I've dubbed seven assignments, two weeks, we saw that last week I spent roughly an assignment a day for four days, and I only had three assignments due in by the end of this week.

Let me start by saying this, conclusions for investigations are a bitch.

If I was writing an essay about how I created a certain design or the findings I've collected in a series of tests, that's a piece of piss. But the moment you ask me to conclude an investigation into 3D theory? Ball sack of Oedipus, that's hard.

But, I managed it, and after my presentation on Wednesday, I handed my final written report of the year.

And that's the second assignment mentioned. Remember those CLICvlogs that I probably mentioned before? Yeah, I had to present them to my lecturers and nine other people that I've never met (because I asked to do mine first because I had work to get to).

To my surprise, I felt much more comfortable with the fact that I hardly knew the other students there. If I was standing in front of others in my course, I'd feel like they were judging me, comparing my shit to their gold, as they would see it. But no, I had to present CLICvlogger to those who had never heard of them. And for my confidence, that was surprisingly good.

That said, it was terrible for my grammar. I remember, not half an hour before the presentation, I tweeted that the chances of my grammar failing me while talking is staggering. And it came to pass, that my grammar failed like a motherbitch.

One of the biggest fails was one of the last things I said. I said that through the project, I learned about photography and how to use a DSLR to its full potential. I then, trying to show the lecturers that I've applied knowledge learned from both this module and the course in general, told them that I've taken photographs of events.

But I didn't say it like that . I said something like I also covered some events photographically.

Now, is that even a fucking term?

I was so soddingly tongue tied during all of it, must have explained what the idea of CLICvlogs to them at least three times. But as the video played of people saying what they thought of the vlogs and the project, I eased into it.

Technical wise, I doubt I'll have a good mark. Come on, all I've done is film fifteen vlogs and post them online. I'm hoping that my saying that I've helped young people learn about editing and given them a chance to share their opinions with others in Wales and the world will get me at least a 2:2.

And finally, the biggest load of shit I've ever made.

I'm in no way in saying that the content is shit, nor the way its presented. All I'm saying is that the editing is utter wank, and the fact that I was supposed to make a visual effects sequence and what did I end up making? Just some shitty text appearing. I'll be lucky to scrape a third...

And that, as they say, is that. At about ten this morning, I handed in the last assignment, and as the receptionist gave me a slip confirming my final hand in, I finished my second year of university. Now, five months of nothing. Thank fuck I have a job now.

In other news, there is none. For now. Apart from I might chronicle all the derp moments from the CLICvlogs in GIF format. So many potential GIFs, so little time...

- I know it's going to be a FIN, a FI-I-I-IN.