Happy Valentine's Day!

I haven't been posting much lately for two reasons, one, there isn't much news you haven't already read to report, and two, I've been busy. I practically have weekly animation commissions now, and though the animation is relatively simple, it still takes up time. Combining that with the fact that I'm working on a big cartoon that I've been on for nearly a year, and that I'm practicing drawing in general, it makes for a very tired Twisted.

These last few weeks have been a little heartbreaking, if you were to ask what's been going on in my little emotions. Keeping it brief, and since none of this has to be publicized to begin with, I've been having a few relationship issues. It's painful craving affection or communication from someone you want to spend time with, however deep your feelings may be, but they simply don't feel the same way, or, at least, aren't willing to share what's going on in their own heads with you. Although not always the case, it can sometimes feel like total rejection. We've all got our own little imps we deal with, but one that keeps coming back for me is this one, I realize. But perhaps it's just karma, I've done the same thing to others for my own reasons, feeling as if they're justified. Maybe there isn't anyone else to blame.

It raises the question why we desire to be with those who don't even care to be with us. At times it feels like arbitrary emotions are hijacking my logical reasoning. All of this stuff really messes with your mind, which affects your body, your spirit, and progress and performance of projects. I try to just turn my brain off and work, just get this stuff done, because it's just what I love to do. I love finally publishing something I'm happy about and being able to share it with those who find it entertaining. Which brings me to another thing...

They say don't focus on numbers, how many people are looking at your stuff, how many people are clicking a like button, etc. All very true, confidence comes from within, and you shouldn't actively be looking for people's approval and praise. That being said, even if you feel something you created (in my instance, artwork) is good, and after publishing it and getting a very underwhelming response, and then comparing it to something you feel is similar which gets a much more positive, impacting reaction, it makes you question yourself. You start to wonder "is this actually good", "am I just attached because I made this", "am I just crazy", and so on. The world and websites are very biased, but when that bias seemingly is against you, it can truly kill your confidence if you're not grounded.

So basically if you got anything out of this post, just stop overthinking. Hope you and your sweetheart have a nice Valentine's Day, and if you don't have anyone right now, be your own sweetheart.

-T4k

We all knew this month would come.

Just droppin' in to whoever is reading these things that I'm doing a lot of stuff still. I was about to change the site update sign to somewhere in November, and then I realized it wasn't November anymore. I can't believe my last post was in September. Time has been flying by so fast for me it's been insane.

Why? Still working on a big animation project for the channel, and then there's also commission work I've been doing. Tryin' to bring home the bucks. I wanted to draw more, but because of all this work, and on top of my day job, it's been nuts. However, for those of you who care, life has been pretty kind and generous to me as of late, and I do have the time to get everything done. Remember, having time is a choice.

I really want to get the video released before 2019, but due to its quality level, and if I want to keep it consistent, I don't see it happening... unless I REALLY BOOK IT!! Wish me luck.

-T4k

Madness Day is just about 30 hours away, and I'll have a new animation uploaded then. In the meantime, I figured I'd make a post about, after being an aspiring writer, game developer, animator and artist as well as a hobbyist music composer and voice actor for a lot of my life, there's a lot I have learned. There's a lot of do's and don'ts that I have concluded thus far if you do not wish for your progress, productivity, and general spirit to be staggered, if not completely broken. And if you are any sort of ambitious media creator as well--no matter what medium it may be--you are free to read what I have to write, and I hope it does you well.

First and foremost, nearly everyone in the community of art and general creation, from what I've both experienced and observed, are a more sensitive people; we're a bit more perceptive, intuitive and emotional than many out there, and this is what normally leaves a heart in us that has this burning desire to create and express ourselves artistically, whatever form that may come in. Those who feel they are sensitive people in an insensitive world tend to have these symptoms. Due to this, it is in our earliest nature to take things more personally. Not to say that "other types of people" don't, but again, from a general perspective, this is what I believe is true.

Now, when we receive criticism for what we have may spent an immense amount of time and effort on, of course our initial reaction as humans is to become defensive; subconsciously, we see our creations as an extension of us, not something that we just made in the past. And it's funny to think that there's people out there that are so insanely insecure that they even get violently defensive over some of the pettiest things, such as products that they purchase, what food and drinks they like to consume, what they wear, what kind of car they drive, what games they play, so on and so forth. These things simply are not extensions of ourselves.

But the main point I want to bring up with this are these two facts that my little journey of life so far has taught me:

1) People who are confident do not care about what others think of them.
2) People always want others to feel the way that they feel.

It's incredible how true these two statements have proven to be based on what I witness every single day of my life, whether it be in the art/animation community here online, or at Walmart. These just seem to be two undeniable facts that I have yet to see be contradicted, and my belief in this is further solidified based on how I used to behave (and at times still struggle with) as well.

So what am I saying here and what does this have anything to do with being a media developer and taking criticism? First off, never take criticism personally. Yeah, you've heard that one many, many times by now, and you've probably figured out that that is a lot more easily said than done. But here's something you may not have heard much of: criticism is often times meant to be personal, not to help guide you to improving your skills and talents.

There are loads and loads of envious, jealous, bitter people out there of all ages and backgrounds that are deliberately on a mission to tear down what they see has the potential to be successful. Why? Because they lack confidence, have low--if not any--self-esteem, and they want others to feel the way that they feel. They feel like crap, so what do they do? Give people compliments and try to help them with their endeavors? Usually not. Instead, they want others to feel like crap, too. Why is this? It's because so they can feel better by comparison; these people do not like who they are, they do not like their life, they are completely miserable, and instead of trying to better themselves because of it, they take the path that just feels easier to them: hatred. They choose to hate what is around them, seeing every negative aspect they can pick out of everything everybody does, creates, and is. Because they hate themselves. But again, I firmly believe that people want others to feel the way that they feel. So if they hate themselves, guess who else they hate? You got it: everyone else.

And these are the types of people I classify as "arrogant"; arrogance essentially boils down to artificial confidence. If someone is not confident, they try to bring others down, rather than to help them to rise up. If someone feels as if they are worthless and never succeeding, why in the world would they want to see others get what they want but do not have?

Now this brings me to part two of my little post here: people who are happy do not want to screw anybody over; they're confident, and over time and through what life has taught them, they chose to be receptive and learn the very basic laws of the way the world works, instead of choosing to be arrogant and take "their own path". If you're happy, content, and confident with your life, you won't have a desire to mess with anybody. You won't have a desire to make others feel bad.

The trouble with criticism is that it is in this murky blend of people who genuinely just want to help and want to see you improve, and people who just hate themselves and want you to feel bad because of it. But 100% of the time, these people loaded with self-hatred will never, ever admit it.

Ever.

They will always disguise their "constructive criticism" as existing because of reasons such as, "I'm just pointing it out so you know", "if something can be better, it should be better," and "what you did 'wasn't correct.'"

Again, if someone hates themselves, why in the world would they care about watching somebody else improve? It's simply a psychological paradox and their argument fails, every single time.  Arrogant people do not want to admit that they are arrogant, so they lie about it. Don't believe me? Call someone out on it and immediately watch them get aggressive and hostile towards you. It will happen literally every single time.

EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.

"You suck," "you'll never become a good artist," and general childish name-calling are not constructive pieces of criticism; they are in fact what I like to call destructive pieces of criticism. They don't offer anything for the creator to build off of, they're just negative words, and nothing more. If someone sees a project you are working on, digs it up and makes a post about it on one of their social media accounts stating that "this person doesn't know what they're doing," how is that constructive criticism? It isn't, it's just a symptom of self-hatred; they just want to show their followers someone that they want to believe is "not as good as them" exists.

Let me just conclude this quickly because I could just go on and on about symptoms of negativity in people who claim to be "critiquing" your work; here is my personal advice from one human being to another:

1) Never take criticism personally, even if it actually is designed to be personal and not constructive. Even if you're still a bit new and tend to take things more harshly than they're intended to be, frame what you were told about your work positively. Instead of thinking "oh, this person's right, I suck," flip it around and tell yourself "hey, my new drawing/animation/whatever will now be even better than this!" And trust me, later in time as you improve, you will not care about how "bad" your previous work is. And again, if the person is just trying to attack you for making something they couldn't, ignore them. Listen to what allows you to improve, and ignore what is just an attempt in tearing you apart.

2) You are awesome. Don't forget it and don't let negative, bitter, envious people bring you down because they see that in you. The only people that want to bring you down are the ones that feel down themselves. People who are happy do not want to mess with others.

3) What you focus on expands, and what you ignore, dies. If you angrily reply to hateful comments on your work, you are feeding them. However, if you ignore them and realize that whoever said/wrote that about your work is miserable and they want you to feel just as awful as they do, laugh at how much time they're wasting and how they're only making things worse for themselves, and begin focusing on what makes you feel happy and what actually makes you improve.

None of this is easy to learn, but nothing that doesn't cause any initial pain is not worth doing. Nobody became amazingly talented at what they do and had no times of hardship. The storm may last a while, but it will never last forever. Be kind to one another, practice, practice, practice, indulge in every good feeling that you are blessed with, and frame even the most harsh of criticisms you receive as positively as you can; bad people exist, and the world will not change for us, but we can change ourselves. No matter what.

-T4k

It's been a rough year. Productive, but rough, emotionally. I've been working on multiple projects, some that I felt like starting, some mandatory. For those of you wondering, as usual, YES, Team Fortress School IS one of the projects. But I've been hitting some more inevitable speed-bumps with it lately... getting voice work finalized has been proving to be difficult.

There's a game I've been developing in the meantime for the last few months, and though going well and functioning properly, I've been hitting some writer's blocks with it. It's incredible how much time can pass and you can get literally nothing done, just waiting and waiting and waiting on a good idea, something to move you forward... and it's like, no matter how hard you utilize your spare time to come up with something, it seemingly never comes to you. You have the full capability to move forward, but the idea just isn't there, you don't have anything to work with.

On the positive side, animation in general has been looking very good in my eyes and I'm happy to see how some stuff I've been cooking up lately has been turning out... that being said, knowing that it's already June, I feel like I hit a mid-life animation crisis of some kind... the year's already half-done, and still nothing new really got uploaded lately. Even if I know stuff WILL be published soon, seeing it from the audience's perspective, I definitely understand how it looks like nothing is going on. I really have been trying hard to get these projects done, but life, trouble with individuals out there, work in order to stay alive and have a place to live... there's just so much getting in the way, and even when I have no more obligations for the day and am alone, I get emotionally overwhelmed at times and I just can't seem to get much production taken care of. I really have been trying, and this past week, things have noticeably been getting better, but it's been far from easy. I really am trying, I really do want to have more work published, and I really, REALLY want this to become my career one day, one day soon. It's just been rough.

​-T4k

A lot has been going on. It hasn't been awful, it hasn't been great, it's just been... weird. Progress of the projects have been good but recently I hit a bit of a writer's block in just about all of them simultaneously. Like, what do I animate next? What moves do I make this guy do? What do I start on afterward? I end up staring at the screen for an hour and realize I didn't get anything done. This cycle has repeated multiple times for the past week and I'm getting tired of it. I'm trying to break free of its shackles, but life in general has hit me with a few curveballs and it's getting on my nerves. When mentally you're not doing so hot, it will come out in your work, and perhaps that is what is going on. I hope I can get it together soon. I know I can, it's just a matter of when.

​-T4k

It's still a bit early, but it's been very disappointing; the film I recently uploaded was, compared to the amount of subscribers the channel has, barely viewed by anyone. Not necessarily because they did not click on it, but mainly because, apparently, most of them weren't even notified whatsoever by YouTube that it was uploaded. I don't know how the site's system works exactly, but obviously there is some kind of system it has implicated in it (most likely recently) that picks and chooses who gets to see what. My theory is that Mick the Mercenary: The Movie, being a film and not a cartoon--as cartoons are primarily why people subscribed in the first place--had an extremely limited release; I've had viewers tell me they didn't see it in their subscription box.

I don't know what the system is and I don't know why it exists, but it's stupid. Regardless of what someone originally subscribed for, why limit the notifications down to less than 1% simply because a clearly faulty system believes it picked up on something somewhat unrelated to what the channel usually shows? What is this supposed to accomplish? When someone subscribes, they want to be notified when the channel has a new video uploaded. Why remove the one and only function of that? What's the point of even having people subscribe at that point?

There's a channel I have that has about 500 subscribers that had a video uploaded to it today. Within hours, it reached about 600 views. The channel with over 50,000 subscribers' video took 4 days to reach that. How innovative.

YouTube's just been a sinking ship for so many reasons the past few years, but unfortunately this, to me, is just a final nail in the coffin. Sadly, there currently aren't any realistic websites that provide the same services YouTube does. Nobody is or even knows about any of the site's equivalents. There's nowhere else to go.

It's a shame. I want to be doing this animating/directing stuff for real one day, and seeing the way things are now, that day couldn't come a moment too soon. Here's hoping.

-T4k

In a world filled with chaos, Mick the Mercenary, a self-employed hit man, is visited by a nearby US military veteran, Chester the Combat Vet. The two form an alliance when the leader of a mercenary compound offers a position for the two to assassinate a list of bounties. As the newly-found associates accept the position, Mick and Chester soon realize they have agreed to more than they bargained for. Watch it here!

A couple of years ago, I created a channel where my homies and I could just whatever we felt like doing, "Mick the Mercenary". It later became a--primarily--flavor-reviewing channel, but at some point, I felt like making a movie about the characters the channel revolved around. Thus, Mick the Mercenary: The Movie was born. Enjoy the VFX and aluminum foil grenades!

-T4k

As 2017 comes to an end, here is a brief overview of how the year went before we enter 2018. As a whole, I was pretty happy with how much better this year was over the last few I had. Here's hoping 2018 is even better!

HERE IS THE YEAR IN REVIEW VIDEO!

-T4k

I can't believe it's been like 6 years or whatever and I never had my own domain name for this site. It was super easy to get one. I just never really thought about it for some reason. Well, I have one now, and that's what matters. I'm happy about that.

​-T4k

I can't legitimately say I'm confident in the fact that this is the 76th progress report I've posted, but it's probably around there. It's been awhile since I've let whoever's reading these know what's going on. In short, it's been both physically and emotionally busy and stressful for this poor devil lately, but I've been pulling through. For the month of October, I pretty much spent it all drawing; making pieces that I published up on the internets as well as just sketching and practicing. Since this month, I've been working on Team Fortress School again, and it hasn't been the most pleasant of experiences considering I started it nearly two years ago, so I've been seeing all the mistakes and roughness that I feel needs to be polished and re-tuned. So needless to say, I've just been fixing up and even redoing a few segments of the animation. Not very fun.

However, I'm finally about ready to move on from what animation has initially been completed and to the next few sequences the video has. Hopefully I'll be able to just plow through it, because this thing has been hanging around for so long and I keep getting people telling me they want to see it. Hopefully it'll do well and people will like it.

After that, I have countless ideas of cartoons I want to do, but it's such a shame considering there's so much to be done and even then they'll take a long time anyway. Either way, life's been pretty good, and I'm happy the way things are turning out and shaping up. 2017 has been so much better than the last 2 years I've been through.

​-T4k