.........the end?

Well, I certainly hope it's not.....this project has been a great start to my final year of animation and I think that without a doubt our collaboration has been a roaring success.

This past week has seen the Dutch students arrive late on Tuesday night, and after several minutes of awkward standing about in the train station we all went to the Playhouse for introductory drinks. Having met in person everyone seemed to get on a lot better than over the internet, and after a while we all dispersed home to show our partners where they would stay.

Not coincidentally the Aurora Animation Festival, in Norwich, was held over the same week but we still had to finish up our film and set up our own exhibition (pictures on Bianca's blog).
I have to admit I was getting a bit stressed over this as we had several problems with compositing and rendering the final version for the dvd.....eventually we got it done, albeit without sound (for now), and there were only a few phantom mistakes that appeared when we weren't looking!?!
Later that evening we had quite possibly the first standalone animation private view, and it looked great, there were two floors of our characters, posters and films as well as a lot of snacks and drink!!

For the rest of the week I took Bianca around Norwich's sights; the cathedral, the castle, the shops, the old cobbled streets, and it was wonderful to see her in real life after talking in the virtual world for so long. Despite only being here for a few days it seemed a lot longer to both of us, and we hope to meet again in the future.

As for further collaborations........watch this space, it is almost, positively, without a doubt, certainly something that we both would love to do again since we have enjoyed working together very much.