Beginning the Process with a Plan

            For anything to begin there must be a starting point, my starting point will involve developing a plan which I can follow and carry out which should help me on my new journey towards being a more creative person.  Now I am already aware that this plan has to be a living document one that will be constantly changing based on how I'm developing in the position I find myself in.  Now in developing this plan I will have to consider the lessons I learned during my Leadership Development class.  A class that has been worthwhile to me because it made me realize that I have to start taking control my life instead of letting my life control me.

            To begin my plan I must have a series of goals in mind since I have multiple projects and skills that I want to develop. Some of my goals include learning Photoshop and Illustrator, getting back into photography and developing my photography skills, begin to world build my literary worlds, learn to draw as well as continuing in developing my own blog.   Now as anyone can see from all that my plan will have to be diverse to cover all these areas and in fact may involve multiple different plans for each one while keeping in mind that I must continue job hunting to find a new form of employment.             

            One of the items I have to keep in mind is the goal of finding a new job and what that may entail for me.  It may include making a slight career change for short period of time, or speeding up bachelor program to complete it sooner or even entering a new diploma program at NAIT after completing the bachelors.  My primary goal is to find a new job which I hope will be in my previous field but I have already come to the conclusion that I may have to change and may involve in taking a severe pay cut compare to what I previous was making at my first job.  I already know that I won't be making as much money as I did my last job unless somehow my old union gets me back old job back or some close to it.  To be truthful I'm not going to be holding my breath since that is unlikely, though I am hopeful.

            Now my plans will take some research to do everything that I want to accomplish.  One of the items that I will have to take a look into is how much longer till I complete my bachelor's at NAIT.  If it's under a year then I might have to consider getting a student loan and just completing it as rapidly as possible.  Once I get my education out-of-the-way then I can start considering other forms of employment since all have the educational background I may need.  I will have to speak with one of my instructors to discover which courses would suit me and my final educational objective.  I want to balance the project management branch and the sustainability branches available within my program since I believe these two branches will best server me once I regain employment.  It may involve taking one or two extra classes beyond what is required but I still believe it will be worthwhile to have as much underneath my belt as possible.  It may even help me finding a better job in the future.

            Another part of my plans will be to develop a routine which will allow me to continue improving my writing, my photography and allow me to develop some drawing ability.  No irony realize that once I have employment I will have to reset that schedule or routine to still allow me to do what I want but I believe its well worth it.  Getting into the habit of creating these blog is but one step in developing a writing routine.  I hope to get in the habit of at least creating one blog week and dedicate at least a few hours a week world building my literary projects.  First have to discover which part of the day would best suit me for writing for prolonged periods of time.  Now this will take some experimentation on my part, whether its getting up earlier or writing later into the evening.  I do believe it is possible since every other writer out there has been able to do it themselves and if they can I should be able to too.  It may even result in me needing to find a different location to do my work in such as coffee shops, writing at school, going to the local library or I hope discovering that I'm able to write at home.

My photography may be a little bit more difficult to progress since for some styles of photography I will need willing subjects take portrait shots of.  I hope one or two individuals can still fit in their wedding dress so I can begin practicing some wedding photography.  I already own several photography workshops’ books which I will allow me to explore different types of photography and give me something to start from I just have to find the time to do so.  I believe that I can persuade my sister-in-law or even some of my friends to pose for me if I want to practice portrait but I am not one hundred percent sure on that.  I may have to look into possibly getting some models to pose for me.  Now I'm little bit hesitant in using professional models since with my limited funds right now I can't afford to pay them all for their time.  I have heard some models a willing to pose in exchange for photos for their portfolio which is an alternative I will have to explore.

I also plan to take part in the photography challenges posted by my photography group as well as the different photography communities online.  Taking part of these challenges will I hope help improve my own creativity, develop skills and even possibly getting some productive feedback on what I am producing.  The Shutterbug group that I joined have monthly challenges which I will be taking part and  I know some online groups have weekly challenge but I don't believe I can keep up with those especially since I'm still learning how to edit my photos.  Developing my editing skills goes with my photography development which is something I have to keep in mind as I keep find project to work on.  I have already invested some money into some books to learn more about Lightroom and Photoshop and found online tutorials that should help improve my editing skill and understanding of the programs I am using.

I might discover the greatest challenge to my photography is not the photography but developing my skills and ability to edit my work.  Already found even small amount of editing as drastically improve the quality of the photos I have taken and that's my only scratching the surface of what these programs can do for me.  I might have to dedicate a piece of time were I'm only editing photos which may be boring at first but I have to keep in mind the results, which I hope will be better photos.  I think Lightroom will be the first program I invest time in since I have already been using it for some of photos and already seen some positive results from it.  I hope to continue to improve my skills using the program as well see what Photoshop can do for me down-the-line.

Now continue my development and understanding of the drafting platforms I have used in the past and may have to use the future is a whole another matter.  I already know that I have become rusty using AutoCAD and Civil 3-D, which fortunately I do have student copies of the programs so I can brush up on my skills.  I may have to talk to some my old instructors from my engineering design and drafting program to see if they can give me so I can improve my skills with.  I may even have to buy some workbook from the school bookshop to do this and look into buying more student programs to learn the different drafting programs out there such as Revit which is used in architectural drafting.  I have more positions open for architectural drafter than I have for civil or the standard AutoCAD drafter.  Even learning the basics of those programs may open doors to potential employment and will allow me to find a new job faster.

I've already downloaded several books on the basic AutoCAD programs I have which I hope to use to increase my skill level with but MicroStation on the other hand may be a little bit more difficult to develop.  The public library doesn't have as many books on MicroStation as they do for AutoCAD and I already have from my original program all that is available from them on MicroStation.  I may have to use alternatives such as YouTube or the Bentley forums to continue my development in MicroStation.  It may prove a little bit more difficult but it is one of the few choices I have open right now. I hope using the forums and hunting around on YouTube will be the only resource I’ll need but I what books are out there to help me even if I have to buy one or two of them.

The most difficult goal that I want to accomplish is not my writing or photography or even developing my drafting skills but learning how to draw artistically.  Drawing isn't like drafting or at least that's what I found so far, I may be able to draw buildings or other geometric shapes but animals’, flowers or even people still prove a challenge to me.  Luckily the library has assortment of books on learning how to draw from figure drawing to cartoon illustrations. The more difficult part of this goal will be the amount time I will have to dedicate to learning how to draw properly.  I will have to dedicate more time compared with any of the other goals.  To succeed at this one goal I will have to set up her daily routine where I dedicate several hours to simply drawing which for me might be a little bit difficult especially with my attention span as it is.  But I still believe this to be a worthwhile effort especially since I can transfer some of those skills to help develop sketches for photography projects or even design projects for drafting.  If I become good enough I may even start a web comic and possibly develop some revenue from it.

Now how I go about performing all this?  To be truthful I don't know, and just reading over what I wrote, I am feeling a little bit overwhelmed with everything I want to do.  Looking at it as a whole give it does give the impression as something too great to be carry out but if I break down each goal to the most simple I should be able to do everything.  Its about breaking down everything I want to do into the individual parts and then sorting how I want to go about doing it. Now how that is going to be done I don't know right now it will have to research or reflect more on this. I do believe the first step is writing down what I want to do and I hope what my angles which is the whole point of this blog post “beginning the process with the plan.”  I know I need a plan so I can call this all this in the first step in planning is discovering what I want out of it which I think I've just done.   So I hope in the next post or two I will be getting to developing a real plan to carry out everything or to the least the beginning of a plan.

I admit it might be madness want to do all this but right now madness is all I have.  While madness and, a lot of time on my hands I might as well be using it to do something besides hunting for a job and waiting for the next interview to come.  At least now I don't be so bored anymore or at least I hope so.

Beginning the Process of Self Evolution

            It's never easy start from scratch but that's position I'm in right now.  It seems that all my progression over the last few years has been for not.  Because of one simple choice and now find myself in a position where I have to take a job that pays well below than I was making before making the choice.  Just over six months ago I decide to leave one job for another, and it was easy for job that I originally applied for they in fact hunted me down and asked me to come for an interview.  I only went to the interview to get more interview experience and was shocked when they offered me the job, for the simple fact that I didn't have all the qualifications for the job they offered.  I even pointed this out to them on multiple occasions and only accepted the job because of the promise of mentorship and proper training.  The training ever came and I never received a mentor, the training game he was in the form of a manual that I had to memorize within a few months which is contrary to how I learned. It was also not what I originally agreed to when I took the job became to know shock when they finally terminated me.

            Now I've been unemployed for a month and a half and already bored to tears.  It isn't like I haven't been applying for jobs, in fact I've applied to more jobs in the last month and a half than I ever have in my entire life and at least been having one to three interviews a week with no luck.  I can't even begin to describe the frustration I am having, this is the longest time I've gone without employment including my three years of my original diploma.  Even when I took a week vacation I was still working since I had classes and course work to complete.  This is the longest time I've gone without anything to do besides my one class a week which I have to admit has been a godsend to me.  It wasn't for the class I would still be blaming myself for losing that job but now I find myself in a position where I can no longer around and wait for a new job, I need to be doing something.

            Now I will admit to everyone that I wasted the time on my hands.  I could've been working on the various creative projects I have on the go or indulging in the many hobbies I have but I haven't.  All I've been doing is my schoolwork, job hunting, writing cover letters, sending out applications and going to as many interviews as I can and only focusing on finding employment.  Now I'm not saying that's not important I do want a new job and I do need to find a new job but besides that I'm been wallowing in self-pity and is becoming more depressed which hasn't been helped me in the long run and in fact could be impeding me in some way that I am not even aware of. 

            I still plan to look for new job and in fact planned to dedicate at least three hours a day to job hunting but I will also be exploring alternatives.  I intend to get back to the gym which even though I've been paying the monthly fee for it I haven't been going, which has been only a waste of money. I need to get back to being active for all the progression I made in my weight loss journey will be for not.  I also want to get back to writing and not just these blog posts which I just now undertaking but on the back to create a right, my poetry and possibly working on the world building I have been putting off for many years.  I also want to get back to my photography in learning more about it, improving my skills and I hope one day getting to the point where a connection make some form of income from it.  I also have been meaning to teach myself how to draw again.  I remember a long-time ago, back in junior high that I was fairly good at and in fact enjoyed it and since I am a draft by trade I should be able to transfer that skill to a more creative area or at least I hope so.

            I'm also going to take this time to teach myself new skills and improve upon the skills are have. I should be taking this time to improve my drafting skills and my understanding of the programs I use such as AutoCAD and MicroStation and seeing where I can progress on my own initiative.  I also want to take this time to learn how to do Photoshop and work with illustrator as well as learn how to use Lightroom better, since it is the primary platform I use for editing my photos.  I even want to learn how to edit my photos and work better and this is time I can use to do that.

            I finally came to the realization that if I don't keep up on my skills and continue to learn it at least keep active somehow I will simply slide back to bad behaviors; bad behaviors that allowed me to become over 400 pounds, which made me a social outcast, and slipping back into old habits that will only hurt me in the long run.  I know all this will take much time but since I have the time I might as well use it to begin the process of becoming something more than I am now.  I might be without a job for now and have come to terms with the fact that I may be without a job for some time but it doesn't mean I have to waste that time or just use it to find a new job.  I can use that time to prove myself, to regain the creativity I lost, and expand on both my drafting skills, my understanding of the programs as well as the new skills and learning in school.

            Like the less I learned in leadership, a true leader has to take it upon themselves to continue learning no one else is responsible for.  I have to start taking responsibility for my own development and my continual development into who I want to be and not just who I am and what others think who I am.  Too long have I allowed my bad habits, negative behaviors, and other people's views on the to control how I see myself.  It's time that I redefine myself and see what I'm capable of doing.  I'm not saying I won't stumble on the way but any path in life starts with the first and I think putting this down to text is the first step in becoming something more, something greater than I am now.  I know I have the capacity and the ability within myself I just have to have more faith and take it on myself to prove that, not just to myself but to the world as well.

            Years to taking the first step in beginning the process of my own self evolution and hopefully transforming my life into something what I want to be and not just what it is.  As I have always said "time to embrace the madness for that is where true creativity and our future lies."  Time for me to embrace the madness and see what I can become form it.

Working Class or Working Better

            As I sit and eating my morning breakfast at my normal restaurant for choice for such a meal I am awestruck by the severs and the skill they show at their job.  Now most people may not even give them a second thought but I have been doing to the same place for Saturday breakfast for over two yours now and some of the server I have gotten to know well.  Hell I am such a regular that I have a regular table and my server who I normally have knows me by first name so I have had a long time to watch them. 

Not to say I can’t understand why I can’t understand why people over look those that server us our meals, get us our coffee and just simple make our live a little bit easier.  We as a society have been program to overlook them, as if they were just simple cogs in a machine that runs life.  It easy to do and easy to think that, after all they serve us and not the other way around but is that right?  I don’t think so.

My waitress without evening knew my drink order and half my order even before I sat down.  She knew how to time my starter, how long to wait before entering my main meal order into the kitchen so it would arrive at the exact moment when I finished the starter.  That is simply amazing and doing it all with a smile too.  Now most would just over look that thinking, “Well that makes sense she worked there so long and you been going there for two years.  She should know that.”  But that isn’t really the point; the point is she constantly does this, not just for me but for every order, it simply amazing.

It made me think of the girl at my Tim Horton’s or those that work at the KFC on cheap chicken Tuesday.  They move at a speed that I couldn’t keep up, serving us with a smile even when some of the customer treats them like dirt.  Think about it; really think about it, it simply amazing they can do it.  It is something I know I wouldn’t be able to do or keep up with but they do it every single day. 

We should take a moment and thank them for what they do and remember even though they are severing us they are still people who deserve our thanks for what they do.

So from me to them, thanks.

All Good Things Do Have to End

It's true what they say, "All good things do have to end.” It's a sad reality of life but we have to deal with endings, even the end of our very own existence.  I say this today reading the final strip of a web comic I have been following for over five years and the sadness as well as the joy knowing it has ended.  It has been my great pleasure to have followed the final journey of it characters and in part being part of their lives though I am sad that there will no longer be another strip it was wonderfully unwrapped up in a way that even I didn't expect.  The artis and the written should be proud on how he wrapped up his saga and the memories it will leave with his fans for years to come. 

Sometimes we have to let go of the things we care for and let them. simply end. That is the afflictions I see a lot with the comic industry today.  The simple lack of the willingness to let go of their iconic character and finally let them past to memory is a failure I see in the comic industry these days..  It's become a common group to say a favorite superhero or villain will never stay dead for long simply because the producers don't want to let go of what has been making them money for so long.  And that is what is making most comics simply stale.

They no longer want to take risk in something new and exciting that could truly rekindle the fires of fandom and bring in a younger readership.  How many relaunches of Batman or Superman have we seen through the years?  How unkillable have the mighty Wolverine have become? 

These characters have entertained us for yeas but it comes a time to let them go and star something new and inspiring.  The web cartoonist I previously referee to has inspired le to focus more on on my own creations and other creative endeavors and I do thank him for that.  I hope that one day to being my own characters to life and as he has done have the courage to let them go when their stories have finally been told in full.

All good things do have to end someday but they don't have to be forgotten ever.

The New Normal

            We all have different definitions on what "normal" is but basically it's the day to day habit of our lives.  Recently I have just made a major change in my life and so have to get use to the new normal which is harder than it sounds.  No one like change in their life but it's something we all faced.

            For five years I had a set routine for my mornings, at work and for the period between work and when I inedible pass out so I can repeat for the next day.  That routine linger works and so I have to change it and doing so is harder than most people think.  People get set in their way very easily and it is very hard to change those ways.  in the morning now I struggle to wake up a simple 30 minutes earlier than I did before and something so simple sound should be easy but it isn't.  I am so use to those 30. minutes of extra sleep my body literally fights back causing me to literally dragging myself out of the bed.  What was a simple drive to work is now far more complex since I now have to get use to a different flow of traffic altogether since I now head a different direction. 

            Once I get use to the "New Normal" it will become far simpler but till then I guess I just have to fight through it.

Post Pure Spec and Lesson Learned

Okay this is really post but I only now getting back to posting.

            Near the end of last year I was fortunate enough to find time to attend Pure Speculation and was able to indulge my growing photography hobby.  For those people who are unaware of it Pure Speculations is the local Science fiction and Fantasy Con in which focuses mainly on the genre of Sci-Fi and fantasy wither they be literary for or illustrated.  As part of this event they old several seminars/panels covering a verity of topic from self publishing, the history of cartoons and even the science behind comic super powers.  And as with any convention focusing on pop culture there were chances to take a lot of picture of people in costumer, merchant table as well as other fun things.

            For me I went to the con with my DSLR with the intention of practicing my photography and taking the opportunity to try my hand in event photography.   This was something totally new to me since I never took it upon myself to shoot with a specific goal  in mind before and neither do I have much experience in event photography and I learned so much doing so. 

            When reviewing my photos I realized I didn’t really capture the meaning or spirit of the event.   Even though I did get some great shot of people in costumes, I missed out of several great chances to tell the story of Pure Speculations and the people that attended.  I focused too much on the people in costumes and not on other things, such as the new location, the merchant table and their wares, how the other attendees were interacting with each other, or even how they setup and tear down for the con would have showed more what Pure Speculations was.

            One of my best photos was a test shot I took of one booth’s merchandise and it when I was looking at it I realized I missed out telling a story.   I didn’t even think about taking picture of other things till it was too late.

            There were other things I learned while taking pictures such as the importance of light, having an external flash and depth of field, all of which I never really thought to much about till shooting at Pure Speculations.     The light wasn’t the best specially for someone, like myself, whose lenses didn’t have a low aperture so I was forced to use my external flash and the modifiers I had on hand. Now luckily I had a soft box that could easily go over my flash but at times it was too bright and gave a burn out feeling to the picture. Now I learned the hard of using the soft box and reflecting the lights of the walls and ceiling which did help but I wished I didn’t have to use it.  Having a flash in your eye being near one is never nice.

            Another thing I learned was depth of field and focusing which is damn hard in low light and hand holding.  As people know the lower your aperture the shallower your depth of field, well I didn’t realize how much that can affect a picture till trying to do a group photo at the contest.  Because of the lighting and hand holding the camera I couldn’t get my shutter speed as low as I wanted so I set the f stop as low as it could go.  The results were photos that were mainly out of focus and poor quality.  I should have use a tripod or my monopod for those shots so I could have had a lower shutter and kept a good f stop for the shot.  Other possible solution to this could have involved wireless flashes set up around the stage to add the additional light or just gone with under exposure and then fixed that in lightroom or photoshop.

            What I do intend is take advantage of lenses rental so I can have a good fast lenses and enjoy trying out a new piece of glass.  I also hope to take advantage of off camera flash to see if I can better shape the light.  Either I will need someone to hand hold the flash or have a small tripod with me that I can easily use there.  

            Hopefully I will keep this all in mind when next Pure Speculations 2012 comes along and have had additional practice with my camera and simple photography skills.

Finding The Time

            One of the greatest difficulties in my life is finding the time to do everything I want to do.  I have multiple creative projects that I want to get underway but with the day job as well as part night school and the homework that entails I simply can’t invest as much time as I would like to in any given projects.  Among the projects I want to get underway is some world building for some of the literary work I want to be doing, some photography projects that my friend have proposed,  advancing the drawing project I wish to use to teach myself how to draw as well as trying to get in the habit of blogging.  On top of all that I still have my day job and school work still needs to be done.  So life is very busy but I think we all can agree with that.

            Most people have suggested prioritize you tasks and for the most part that can work for people but the issues is when the work life develop priorities it assumes should over ride other priorities such as school.   I have had case where I had to choose between going to class for the night or staying at work to meet a dead line.  In some rare cases  where I had to sleep at work for a few hours before driving home since I was to tired to drive and I’ve pulled 18 shifts at work on consecutive days to meet a dead line.  After the fifth day I had to have someone drive me home since I couldn’t safely drive.

            I jokily comment to my friends that I should have kept my camping gear at work and just live there.  It would save me on rent, I have access to a fridge and as long as I make it to the gym I can still keep clean.  Hell with my camping grill to cook food here it might be better then home since I don’t have to pay for power and the internet here.

            I understand that with working full time and school I won’t have as much free time as I would like but I still would like to find time to do the things I enjoy.  It came down to setting limits to everything including to work.  I had to limit how I let work dominate my life since I will not allow myself to fail my classes to make my bosses happy.  I also had to limit myself on the time and scope of my creative projects.  Even how I go about completing assignment for school had to be limited.

            It all comes down to how a person allow event or situations control one’s life.  I am now trying to set limits on the amount of time I dedicate to any one aspect of my life. Hopefully doing that will allow me to be a little more productive as well get on doing the projects I want to do.  Only time will truly tell if it works.