Please Sir, may I have more talent?
I try to do a lot of things myself when it comes to my creative projects. The main reason for this is, in the past, working with others or depending on others has sometimes fallen flat. This is mainly because of the rule I believe in: No one will care more about your creative project than you do. That’s just the way life is. People have their own lives and you can never expect anyone to make you creative project their focus, just like they can’t expect you to do the same to them.
So when it comes to something like my latest audio drama project, Deputy Guppy, I’ve tried to handle every aspect of it. Writing the scripts, scheduling and engineering the recording sessions, editing, tracking down of sound effect, prepping the episodes to air, creating Podcast artwork, the list goes on and on and on. I like doing all this work. I did most of all this stuff on Dr. Floyd (not all but most) and it comes easy for me. I have a very clear image in my mind of how the final result should be so it is also just easier if I do all these things.
To get others to lend their voices, I’ve been saving money for months to be able to pay these folks to come in and record. Now, what they are getting is not ‘scale’ or anything like that, but they are getting enough, I think, to make it worth 30 minutes or so of doing silly voices for western fish. I’ve also paid an artist to do character artwork and I am paying a musician to write some music cues for the show. Again, these folks are not getting what they are worth because of their amazing talents, but they are all thankful for the pay. I find that when money comes into the situation people ‘care’ about your project a little more.
But now in the development of Deputy Guppy I’ve hit a snag. I have an idea for an added element of Deputy Guppy that would break some new ground in the world of podcasting. It’s something that, to my knowledge, has never been done in podcasting before. (This is why I’m being so intentionally vague on what it is.) The problem is that part of this new idea requires the creation of more art. It’s not fancy art, but it does take someone with skill to do it.
Last night, I attempted to do the art myself because, as I said, it’s not overtly complex. The results were laughable. It looked sloppy, the colors were uneven, there wasn’t a straight line anywhere….It looked like a three year old did it. Actually worse.
This morning I decided to use Jim Henson’s credo that: Simple Is Good. So I kept it simple and took my time. I extremely carefully started redrawing the art, then slowly inking it. I’d come up with a plan to NOT to have to color it, since my coloring was so awful last time, so that was a time saver. Once it was done I scanned it into the computer and….it was so horrible. Just really bad. Perhaps after I decide what I’m doing with this aspect of the project I’ll post them here so you can see.
The point of all this is simply…I wish I was more talented. I wish I could whip out decent looking art for this project. The main reason is because now, if I want the project to go forth, I’ll have to pay someone to do the art for me, because it’s a pretty decent sized project, 15 pieces, minimum.
I get so frustrated when I run into the limits of what I can do.