We are making great progress on our animated shorts.  I say shorts with an ‘s’ because it will be multiple 10-15 second shorts that we will be creating.  They will all be in the same environment with the same character, but each vignette will have a different “event”.

So far this experience has been so much fun, and it really re-energizes my passion for animation.  The feeling that you are creating something out of nothing, and how almost endless your options are to create this imaginary world. I’m not expecting to make my money back on this short directly, and honestly I don’t plan to make any money from it.  Everything is being paid for by the company out of our savings.  I’m looking at the expense as an advertising expense, since I plan to use this to help get more paying customers.  It will hopefully show what kind of work our studio can make.

So you might be asking where we are at with everything?  Currently we have our character in the final stages of character design, and he will soon be heading over to modeling. All the action will take place in a single room, and that room is currently being modeled.  I’m also in talks with a surfacing artist, and a lighting artist to be ready for the next stages of production.  There is a lot of asset building that needs to be done before we can even start animation. We should be ready to start animation sometime in September or October.  I’m hoping to have the first 5 shorts done by the end of this year.

I plan to post some concept art in a later post, so keep following to see what we are working on.  Also now would be a great time to subscribe to our YouTube channel, since that is where we will be posting the shorts once they are finished.

In other news, next Tuesday (July 21st) will be our first Creative Professional Mixer, so if you are living in LA I hope you will make it.  So far we have over 30 people RSVP’ed to the event, and it should be a great time.  I plan to have a mixer once a month, so join our Facebook group to get updates on the events.

I have also started the process to change my company into an S-Corp, so soon I will be the CEO of Eric Miller Animation Studios.  Sounds so fancy, right?  This will provide me with some tax benefits, and legal protections.  I have been doing a lot of work in trying to grow my business, and this is the next logical step.  It is a very exciting time, and I’m looking forward to the future.

If you have not already, I hope you will join me on my journey by subscribing to my blog.  If you have any thoughts or advice I would love to hear what you have to say, so please feel free to leave me any comments below. Otherwise, be sure to stay connected with me on Twitter (@MillerAnimation). Only Time Will Tell.