Today is September 17th, 2025. I came up with this idea of documenting my thesis every week, sort of a personal diary, just something to remember by once this is over. Maybe I will even open it up for people to read. Depends on how articulate I am during these updates.
September 15 - September 21
September 15
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Compiled old post-it notes and made some sketches for the animatic.
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September 16
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Finally showed my professor and my classmates what I want to do visually. Got some feedback including making my film more abstract in order to show more of the environment. He even suggested doing poetry in Vietnamese, which gave me an idea. I texted Vy to ask she could help me write the voice-over for my film.
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I got on a call with her to discuss my ideas, and she is impressed with my story, which is honestly very flattering. Quan suggested I use higher and lower POVs for the mother and son.
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September 17
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I'm searching for films with great cinematography for inspiration, because if I'm going to show my environments I should show that there's a story behind it too.
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Did a rough sketch of the tiger for the sculpture. Debating between drawing the animatic or do the block-out, but probably will do a redraw since that's quicker. Will try to do some block-outs this weekend.
September 18
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Started on a rough block out of the first environment. I will try to get it done today.
I also spent a hot minute to create an excel sheet to visualize the production, just an attempt to look more legit I guess.
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I will also try to finish my second pass of storyboard where I try to play with the camera a bit more. ​
September 20
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Technically it's like 4AM on the 21st but let's pretend. I forgot to update for the 19th but I'm a little behind schedule. I have done the block out for the terraced paddy field, the block out for the oasis was also finished. I came up with a new concept for the Ha Long Bay one, so it wont' be just be natural environment.
I redid some of the storyboard, adding more details and camera notes, but I'm still not done with them.
Today I'm working on GAME 720, which means adding details to the interior of the stilt house. Still a work in progress though.
September 22 - September 28
September 24
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A bit slowed down this week, no motivation unfortunately.
Did block-outs for the oasis scene, the Phong Nha scene and the terraced field scene. Probably will go back to the Phong Nha scene to add some spice to it or something more mystical. The Ha Long scene should be easier, I will be doing that tomorrow.
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I'm thinking of making the animals and characters 2D in Dong Ho style. Let's see how that one works out.
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Started working on the thesis statement, the artist statement, and the abstract, will probably get it done by tomorrow.
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I kinda worked on the stilt house, the modeling is quite atrocious in my opinion, but I will polish it up this weekend, getting it done next week.
September 25
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Still in development with the thesis, abstract, and artist statement. I have a rough thesis and artist statements already, but no abstract yet. However, I got the synopsis down.
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Got a lot of ideas for the storyboard, I can kind of visualize the final product, or at least how I want to look like in full, so I'm excited for that at least.
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Also excited to get the script at the end of this week so I can finally time how long the film is gonna be.
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Last thing, I kinda work on scheduling everything a bit. They are still pretty rough plan, and I know I will not be following, but just something to keep me in check. I know that once I get the animatic out, things will feel more manageable.
September 28
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I HAD THE SCRIPT!! It was only for the first and second act but still, something to work with. I did the translation for the poem, and will be working on the storyboard tomorrow.
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September 29 - October 5
September 29
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Did some of the storyboard. Timed the voice-over with some of the imagery. I modeled a deer candle holder as a set piece, which took a bit more than an hour and literally on the last step of merging the meshes, Maya crashed and I lost everything. That's fine. I drew the candle holder into the scene.
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(Things I forgot to say yesterday)​
Forgot to say but I did a voice-over for the script. Talked to Vy about what I want changed so it would match better with the storyboard I have in mind, that's why everything is not completely synced up right now.
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October 6 - October 12
October 6
October 13 - October 19
October 13
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It looks like I lost the update I did 2 weeks ago, and I didn't log in any updates from last week because there wasn't that much update and I was in Atlanta for most of the week, so here it is.
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Vy gave me an update script two weeks ago, so it's no longer a poem. She also gave me the translation for it, will be working on the animatic with them after this. I did a very rough one last week, and it's looking like I'm going through a slide, so while in Atlanta I did some rough sketches for the scenes.
I'm going through the notes and will be working on some concept proof after this too. Tonight might be a long night.
October 19
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I'm afraid I have been a little lacking when it comes to updating this. I started very simple mock-ups in Unreal Engine, still working on the oasis scene and have a rough one for the final environment. The outdoor of the house environment will be worked on soon. My hope for tomorrow is working on the rough idea of the cinematic.
October 20 - 26
October 21
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Today I worked on the animatic with the screenshots from Unreal Engine. Didn't get really far with what I want to do, I only got the beginning scene up until the conflict and the very ending scene with the river returning to the sea. I think I need to calm down with the ideas and actually getting a cohesive animatic done for the candidacy review. The plan is to get it done before the end of this week so I can send it to Vy and hopefully get a script at the end of the week to update.
October 25
October 27 - November 2
October 27
Nov 3 - Nov 16
November 3
November 4
November 18
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I had been busy, which then made me forget to update. I will attempt to retract my steps now.
By the 27th of October I was able to get a working script and a very rough animatic that was just screenshots pieced together. The consensus was I needed to make the story more coherent, the screenshots were almost too random and there's no flow. There were also too many environments that I was trying to tackle, so I had to omit the cave scene.
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I decided to put a halt on the script (which was done, but I was working towards it matching with the screenshot animatic that I had.)
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On the 3rd of November, I gave my professor a brand new "one-shot" animatic. I added some black and white concept arts to further show my ideas on top of block-outs.
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Did some edits after that and prepped things for the candidacy review, which I passed.
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November 6
December 12
Definitely didn't get as much done as I had hoped just because I couldn't figure out what to do with my story, but here's the big update of the past month.
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I sculpted out two big stones or mountains (?), I don't know how to call them, and placed them in the environment. I'm sure they will look better with mosses and small plants covering parts of them. If not, I will redo the UVs and recolor them.
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I did a block out of the paddy field to have a better understanding of the scale and resculpted the environment and the river route. Now that I look at the screenshot of the river, I think I need to reroute it more to be more wavy.
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I'm also messing around with the atmsophere, I want it to be foggy for the further distance but not in a cloudy way, so I'm working to fix that.
