Life

Inktober and other life things

| Saskia

Tomorrow Inktober is starting again and I’m super excited! This year I’ve decided to use the daily drawings to play around with story ideas for the harpy characters I came up this summer. Yes, the one winged harpy isn’t alone anymore: I have ideas for at least five other characters and a vague plot line! ðŸ˜€

I’m not giving away any more, but I shall provide enough context with every Inktober drawing so you can slowly getting to know these new characters and their quirks. For now can tell you that Ms. one-wing has gotten a name, Jurmala, and she loves to put on pranks! 

In other news, the game project is slowly getting on it’s end. Next Wednesday we’ll having a presentation where the game has to be basically finished. If any game-breaking bugs appear we have till Monday 9th to fix them and finish all the paperwork! After that, we move on to our next project (a 3D game)!

The End

| Saskia

It’s been one week since I left Prague and came back to my little rainy flat country. It’s true what people say, going to study in another country, no matter where, is an amazing experience. You’re meeting people from all over the world, not just Czechs, and exchanging experiences and ideas with people from different cultures is such an amazing thing to do. It made me think a lot about what it means to be Dutch and what Dutch culture means to me.

The Czech Republic is an amazing country with amazing people. They might need a little time to open up, but when you’re past that initial hesitation they are truly kind and helpful.

I will definitely go back there one day.

Klauzura Exhibition opening night, part 2

| Saskia

The â€˜Poe machine’ was the most amazing thing our two curator-students put together: you could choose which trailer you wanted to see by typing in the corresponding number code. The code also matched the comics on the wall, so after you’ve seen a trailer you liked you could find the number (and name) and read the story.

A lot of students thought our studio had one of the best presentations of all the studios, a nice break of the usual white cube presentations, so to say. 🙂

Exam Time!

| Saskia

Preparing food for the jury that will grade our trailer animations…

The ‘jury’ concept is new to me, but works like this: the final Klauzura assignments are always graded by a jury which consists of teachers from all Graphic Departments, so apart from Animation (Film and TV Graphics) also Illustration, Graphic Design and Typography.

Unlike most other studios, we didn’t have give an presentation, our trailers were just shown one by one and the jury gave immediately feedback. Petr Krejzek, the Illustration teacher who was in charge of our comic assignment was positively surprised by my trailer, as he called the comic progress a â€˜tragedy’ (I don’t know if he meant that seriously or half-jokingly, but he was most of the time not very happy with the drawings I made for the comic). Still he and the rest of the jury found the drawings rather naive and childish. I don’t know what to do with that feedback. 

Anyway, we haven’t gotten our grades yet. 

Getting ready for the Klauzura opening…

| Saskia

This weekend was all about cleaning the studio and making everything ready for the Klausura expo opening next Tuesday night! Sadly some people slacked and didn’t help, but that’s always the case, in Rotterdam too. 

I’m excited about the exhibition, but it also feels a little sad because it will be the very last thing I’m doing together with my Czech classmates. In three weeks I will be going home again …

Studio Pictures

| Saskia

I promised pictures of studio a few weeks back, well, here they are! They were shot on a very rare occasion when I was the only one working there.

Main entrance to the left. There is a kettle and like ten brands of tea, as well as a small cooking plate if we are feeling hungry. 🙂

Beige door is to the teacher’s office. Screen in the back is for projecting animations, of course! Sometimes people take a nap on the blue couch. 😀

The teachers’ office

You see, no one actually likes cleaning up here XD Although this is primarly where our teachers will be working, we can freely enter here by using the key right behind the door. We actually have been given a key to the studio, so we can work here whenever we want to!

We also have an â€˜upstairs’! Can you spot the little dinosaur from here?

The main reason why it’s such a mess is because all the work from previous semester is still there. Though I don’t think it will be cleared up soon. 😉 Also the Mac is one of the few here, most computers are operating on Windows. Bummer!

Exchange Student Dinner

| Saskia

From left to right: Eleni from Cyprus (she studies Sculpture in Greece, but is doing Textiles in Prague), Miguel’s roommate from France, which studies Finance (I forgot his name, sorry!), the crazy person who writes all this, my roommate Pan-Ni (we’re allowed to say Penny) from Taiwan, Shiori from Japan who is doing Intermedia (don’t ask me what that is XD), Juan from Spain, studies Photography, and his sister, who will be leaving for Lyon soon…

On the other side of the table: Naama from Israel, Stein from Iceland, Manja from Slovenia (Fashion), Miguel from the US (Ceramics) and Eve from Dublin. She’s the only one who is doing a theoretical course! And this is not even everybody, mind you!

Manja and Miguel discussing how awesome the food will be…
My dish! 😀
Pan-Ni enjoying her soup, Stein looks jealously at my plate.. Just kidding! XD

Tours and food

| Saskia

Last Wednesday we had our first meeting at school, which was great! So many people from all over the world! <3 We got a tour through the school building, but I haven’t made any photographs (yet).

Thursday and yesterday we’ve been on a guided tour through the historical center of Prague, Thursday around Malá Straná (west bank of Vltava) and Friday through Staré Město (old town) and the Jewish quarter. All organized by the school, so great!

What’s also great is that we can eat in the canteen from the Charles University with our UMPRUM student card. It was a bit of a hassle to set up, but in the end it works! UMPRUM has it’s own tiny school canteen all down in the basement, but it’s really cramped and there’s not much to choose from. At the Charles University we can choose from a whopping 8 menu’s, all about 2 euros!

I first thought this bread-vanilla sauce thing was a savory dish, but it is indeed sweet. It’s very nice though, and you get good value for your money!

Monday will be my first school day, exciting!