Ryan Glovka:
I originally thought I had settled on a different concept for my short film, but after considering the technical challenges of creating/rigging a robot vacuum cleaner with all sorts of protruding arms and gadgets I decided to work on the Jewel of Denial idea instead.

I tried coming up with an overall theme or moral before thinking of an actual story, plot, setting, type of character, etc. In this case, the theme was greed with a "bird in the hand is worth two in the bush" kind of feel. I pictured a greedy, adventurous Indiana Jones type of character climbing up jagged rocks and cliffs looking for loot. I liked the clean and simple design of the jagged, ice formations in the Ice Age movies with a blue sky in the background and pictured a similar, stylized look for the rocks and sky in my short. Originally, the idea had many different ways it could go, but with the help of my mentor Will Mata and all my fellow animation peers it more or less got sculpted into what it is today. I had basically decided I wanted a progression of risk vs. reward as the character would have to decide whether or not to pursue going for the bigger prize at the risk of his demise. I also wanted a concept that would give me a broad range of animation including physical action and acting/thinking shots for a more, well-rounded example on a demo reel.

Ryan Glovka:
I learned a lot about the storytelling aspect of animation. Learning how a character arcs/changes emotion, how different events affect the character and how the story can be told visually with composition, cuts, camera movement to achieve clarity, lead the audience's eye, create drama, etc. I also gained a greater appreciation for how difficult it is to put together a production and why it is typically a team sport consisting of hundreds of people working together to achieve an entire film. Also, in doing so many different types of shots, I learned that every shot has its own unique challenges and it made me aware (painfully!) of areas I was weak in and needed to improve as an animator.

Ryan Glovka:
"KEEP IT SIMPLE, SUCKA"!!! This concept of keeping it short and simple was reiterated over and over again, and for good reason. The less you have to do, the more you can put your heart and soul into each little part of it to make it great. The grander/longer it becomes the more each part will suffer in order to simply complete it. My short ended up being about 90 seconds when I told myself to shoot for 45 seconds and no more than 1 minute and because of this it took me a long time to finish it and the animation lacked the quality that it deserved in many parts. At least my mentor talked me into going with this idea that had only one character instead of my other concepts that had 2-3 characters.

Ryan Glovka:
I followed what Animation Mentor taught me for my planning process. I started with mind-mapping, then I looked for some interesting things to put down on the mind-map and picked a few items to tell my story. Then I pitched it to my mentor, and he gave me some cool suggestions. After a few passes of pitchings, I started to create the storyboard. And when I was sure it was what I wanted and everything was working, I started on my animatic and rough blocking to work on the timing. That was my planning process.

Ryan Glovka:

The first thing you're looking at is my final animatic after working out my storyboards into how I wanted the shots to go with rough timing and camera work considered.

Next is the 3D layout. Basically taking the ideas from the boards and setting up the scenes and cameras in 3D and crudely roughing in the character's position throughout each shot.

Next is the animation in the rough, blocking phase.

Next is the final animation after going through and doing many passes of refining and polishing to each shot.

And finally, is the finished rendered version of Jewel of Denial.

Ryan Glovka:
There were many obstacles and challenges in making this short. The biggest challenge was probably the length that it evolved to. Having to do 90 seconds of content vs. 45 seconds as I originally intended added a lot of time and work. I worked full time during the making of this short, so I had to work on it in the evenings and weekends which is taxing and can be hard to find motivation. Luckily, my mentor Greg Whittaker allowed me to fall short of the production schedule in the hopes of having better quality for the work that was getting done. I spent at least six to seven months after I finished Class 6 at Animation Mentor working on this short to completion.

Other things like modeling the set, texturing, and lighting the shots were also a challenge given that I am not an expert by any means. In hindsight, I would have liked to have a more professional audio track and had it lit and rendered by a more skilled person. I didn't shoot ANY video reference either, which could have been helpful in planning/blocking out some of the shots more effectively.

Overall, the sacrificing of sleep and rolling through the world each day in a zombie-like trance was probably the biggest obstacle!

Ryan Glovka:
Animation Mentor was an irreplaceable assistant to the creation of Jewel of Denial. From the wisdom of the mentors in both helping guide the story into a great place in the early stages to guiding and directing the performances of the animation throughout helped a ton. Also, just all the wonderful training that I went through in the four classes leading up to the short film gave me the foundation I needed to animate my way through tricky physical shots with a lot of body mechanics as well as acting shots where showing the character's thought process is the key. The huge amount of support my fellow students gave me along the way was super helpful and encouraging when frustration was running rampant! I had a really satisfying and educational experience at Animation Mentor and in the production of Jewel of Denial and can't think of a better way to learn this art form. As an animator, I learned more than I can tell you throughout this love/hate saga of the Student Short Film!