….and of course I’m thinking about what else can I work on!

Animation Mentor recommends that we take a break and I totally get that. The only problem for me is that I’m a rhythm type guy and I like to keep a constant groove going. So the trick is how do I work on something, make it fun and enjoy my break too!

Well the first thing is that I definitely need to get out and relax and experience the outdoors. Observe life! So I’ll probably go to a park or something by me for sure. While I’m out there…why not film some video reference while I’m having fun.

This weekend I plan on seeing Kung Fu Panda so there are some chilling out plans in the works while on break. Heck it’s only a week and some days so it’s not that long. The only real break that you getting is not having the pressure of the ever looming DEADLINE

Anyway, I figure to keep my brain on track and touch on some of the areas my mentor give me to work on I’ll do one animation before I go back. I’ve decided that I’m going to do an animation of character running up to a soccer ball and head butting it. That would be kinda cool. So through out the course of my break I’ll post my progress on that.

I’ve also decided to step into the 21st century and retire my five year old DELL Dimension 8400 which is a P4 3.2 ghz with 2GB of Ram. This rig has been my workhouse for a long time and has served me well. The only problem is that it cant handle everything I’m throwing at Maya sometimes. Plus, with the applications that I like to have open while working I just need more of a seamless experience by limiting the laggy responses I get between apps. Moreover, I’m hoping to bring down those dreaded awfully long render times into something more realistic.

So I’ve ordered a XPS 420 with an Intel® Core™ 2 Quad Processor Q9450 (12MB Cache,2.66GHz,1333FSB).
Talk about a beast of a machine…I’ve also added a few other goodies and should have this rig online by the end of next week.

The nice thing here is that I’m going from one processor to four and from 2 gigs to 4 gigs. The video card is a major upgrade too so maybe I can finally enjoy turning on some of the features in Maya like real time lighting and texturing while I’m working.