I quit my day job as a data entry and customer service rep. Not because of any issues I had with management, or the pay was too low, or even that I got a better job somewhere else. To be honest, it's probably the opposite since now I won't have any assurance of where my next paycheck will come from. I quit because I have the opportunity to create something - a pilot for an animated show.
But why leave my day job entirely? Why not just "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" and try to make the show after work? Seems like a big gamble to go from employed to pro bono work, hoping it will pay off later.
First off, I had already tried the bootstrap method. But my schedule was eight hours of work, a one hour lunch, and a total of two hours (or more) of commute time every day. That's a minimum of 11 hours a day given to my day job, plus eating once I get home, and hopefully you can see the problem that will arise. I'm bloody tired at the end of the day! Who has the energy to go from that to a technically and artistically challenging side project of 3D animation? To create two models, it took me 8 months of squirreling away an hour here and there, sometimes waking up at 4 AM to get it done when I knew my nights were filled up with, well, life. And you know what? There's still work to be done on those models even now! It's simply not possible given the scope of 3D animation to create a short when you give all your time and energy to a day job.
Second, this was not a decision that I took lightly. You could say the decision was eight months in the making, but I didn't really feel like this was actually a possibility until about two months ago. And I didn't make this decision alone. My wife - my dear, sweet, analytical, let's-think-about-this-a-hundred-different-ways wife - was surprisingly the optimistic one out of the two of us.
Finally, ok so I won't be completely jobless during this time. I have freelance opportunities already and the extra time I have will be spent networking and building a social media presence (hey! Waddaya know, this blog is an example of that presence). And, as my project collaborator (who will be revealed next week) said during a speech he gave during the convention we first met: "You can always get a shitty job somewhere else." That's the most comforting idea through all this. I can always go back to those kind of jobs, but I'll never get another opportunity to do this, to be fulfilled and make good art.
I am making an animated short. This blog will be a record of that journey as I share my experiences, frustrations, insights, and whatever else happens along the way. I'd love to have you with me. I will give more detail on what the project is and what my goals for this blog are, but for now I wanted to show that there has already been a lot of work done. There are some more social media links at the bottom of this page if you want to stay up to date on my progress there. Next week, Day 1 of this new phase of life comes.