Today I did a lot of restructuring my script and adding a lot to the story. I really think the parts I added added a lot more depth to the story, and creates greater sympathy for the characters. It was a good reminder that side plots, even if they don't directly affect the main plot, can improve the story. I still have a few areas of the story to work through, but it's progressing quite well. I'm probably not going to finish the script entirely. I have to picture scenes before I can script them out, and once I have the image in my head, it's easier just to port it directly over to animation from sketched out storyboards and the images in my head rather than to transfer them to words, back to storyboard, and then to animation, though getting a solid outline on paper is definitely very helpful. When I finally get to the production phase, I will still have a whole lot of work to do, starting with the building of 30+ dolphin models, with at least 10 of those models being highly detailed. Sure, I only really have to make 3-6 models and modify those for the other models, but my first dolphin model I made for the Startide scenes I did is not too detailed, and that still took me 12 hours to make (though it was my first organic Lightwave model, so it was expected to take a lot of time, but with much higher detail levels, I expect the models to take more time, not less). I anticipate about 150-300 hours of modeling work, 50-100 hours of texturing, 100-200 hours generating object skeletons, and an indeterminate number (probably 500+) of scene layout and animation hours. If this estimate (which is a very low estimate) is accurate, it'll probably take about 2 years to do (I only have so many free hours in a week). It will probably also take 2-4 years to render, but I plan on buying a second computer, so I can render around the clock on one machine while still having the other machine available for scene setup work and other stuff, so there will be some overlap of the timelines. Expect this animation to be done in about 3-5 years. Sound and music will be inserted afterward, I will probably be working on the music during the render time and hope to record live sound samples for the sound to insert into the animation. My new running time estimate with the added scenes is about 90 minutes, I could try to pad it out more, but I don't think that's necessary. Michael Harney [EMAIL PROTECTED]
