Why Animating on Lackadaisy Was Different

There are only a handful of phrases that can guarantee that your life is about to change. For me, this was part of a journey that started in 2014 with a random webcomic on a random website. It was like stumbling upon a hidden treasure, dormant, waiting to be discovered and what a treasure it was. No encore? What happened to you that made you hate fun? Oh, is it time to play now? It's time to tie up some loose ends. It's 1927 and prohibition is in full force. The city of San Luis is dry on the surface, but underground there is a source of illicit beverages.

Created by Tracy Butler. Lackadaisy follows the fate of the last members of the Lackadaisy speakeasy. They are half gangsters, half smugglers and 100% cats. In the summer of 2014, a young me. Well, I was actually 20 years old, but I discovered this webcomic and was immediately hooked. Its world was very well researched and the characters were alive. At the time I was taking a 3D animation program at a local university. But I decided that I wanted to learn to draw to move into 2D animation. And Lackadaisy was the first time I could appreciate the drawing behind that drawing. They weren't just cartoons.

I felt very painfully aware that someone somewhere sat down to draw these magnificent panels and I was terrified but extremely motivated. When people talk about Lackadaisy, they usually mean the sepia tones of the first few pages, but I can't put into words how the comic evolves. It's something I want you to be able to experience for yourself and to do for free at Lackadaisy.com. But a funny thing kept happening to me when I read a new page and thought about it the next day. The memory was an animation in my mind and I thought: Wouldn't it be better to see all this animated?

That would have to wait until 2020, when Tracy launched a Kickstarter alongside Iron Circus Comics for what was initially an art book, plus an animated short for $85,000. And you know how people say it's impossible to time the market? Well, Lackadaisy did just that and launched their Kickstarte on the same day the market crashed to the bottom. But the Lackadaisy fandom remained strong. You guys reached your Kickstarter goal. On the first day, how many hours were there? Six hours. Jesus. It has worked so far. This shows how much people love their animated cats. The Kickstarter raised $330,000, propelling the project into a full-fledged animated pilot.

Of course, I supported him myself and wished him good luck. And this is where we need to introduce another character into this story. The director of this project and the one who really managed to take the idea of ​​a Lackadaisy animation to its full potential. Fable Siegel is a force of nature. They are without a doubt the most talented artists I have had the pleasure of working with. When you talk to them, it just energizes you and makes you want to do your best in what you're doing. Plus, you can tell you're on a voice call with Fable because everything suddenly has chicken noises in the background.

A few months later, I saw a Fable post and it was an open call for animators. Because of indifference? For many people it can be a foot in the door or a stepping stone on the path to their career. You know, we're reaching out to people who have experience, but also people who maybe haven't had a studio job before and just have a cool portfolio and reel and stuff. That was me. The only thing I had was my graduation film, which I had finished literally weeks before the recruiting call, but it was Lackadaisy and I wouldn't miss it for the world.

So I put my best scenes on a reel and applied as a cleanup artist and on June 7, 2020 I received the email. You've gotten the job, and at least as an entertainer. I have no words to describe how excited and happy I felt, but then panic set in: Oh my God, I got the job. It is no exaggeration when I say that Lackadaisy changed the course of my life, and by the end of the video you will understand why. But this is what this video will not be. I won't tell you how working at Lackadaisy opened doors to the industry for me, although it did.

Because I know this doesn't matter to you. I want to open a window into what it was like to work at Lackadaisy. Obviously this is my subjective opinion, but I do so in the hope that more animation productions can take note and use these same elements. I truly believe there is value to every animation production and every animation fan. But first we have to talk about Crowdfunding. Since animation began to appeal to the masses, to someone whose only goal is to maximize profits. They have

different

names in each industry: Hollywood executives, production committees. They decide what we as an audience can see.

When the machine works correctly, they give opportunity to original ideas that try to be

different

. Some of them thrive, while others not so much. But as earnings targets continue to grow, the industry is becoming more risk-averse. And we, as the public, have absolutely nothing to say about it. We made a proposal and they told us to make our own animation because that would be the best way to get attention. It was said with a lot of love. It wasn't, well, go and do your thing. People like the artwork and all that, but it's just, you know, they say unless it has certain names attached to it, it's very hard for us to take a chance on something that doesn't fit a certain formula.

Yes, if you are not children's or young adult entertainment and if you are not. The New York Times bestseller lists or you know if you're not that prominent or you don't know the right people, you're not the child of a celebrity or something, then you don't really have any advancement unless you get on the Internet and do a lot. noise and then attract attention. It is thanks to brave people like Tracy, Fable, Iron Spike and the entire production team who decided to take many risks, not only financial, but literally giving entire years of their lives to make projects like this exist.

And let me make this very clear. The big production companies and studios are not the enemy. I am convinced that if a project like Lackadaisy wants to continue down this path, it needs to be picked up by a production house similar to what Hazbin Hotel did. There are benefits to the production and investment power these giants have, but the industry has become severely risk-averse and we must force them to listen. This video will be posted at the same time the pilot goes live. So I still don't know how it will go. But I do know because I saw the pilot a week before.

And as you probably know by now, studios should really pay attention to the independent animation scene and the power of crowdfunding. This is what is magical. Everything you're watching exists because of you, the audience, a large group of people, each donating a small amount of money to create a tremendous impact on the world. Now we really have the opportunity to help these new ideas flourish and we must keep pushing. If for some reason you're watching this video and haven't seen the animated pilot, go watch it. The link is in the description. This is your chance to tell studios that we're tired of them capitalizing on nostalgia and being afraid of new ideas on screen.

But above all we are tired of animation being treated as children's content. Vote with your point of view, but keep watching this video. Watch it after this one. Now let's see what it was really like to work at Lackadaisy and what was so special about it. There is no escape. The pandemic, which forced everything to be done online from the beginning. And they managed to do it by creating a Discord server. And while this isn't the first online production to do this, it's the only time I've seen a structure like this. You could see everyone's work, and I really mean everyone's work.

I was able to see what the background artists were painting when the storyboard team was working on the changes. And this is where I may make you a little jealous. We were even able to attend the voice acting recording sessions if we promised to be quiet. I cannot put into words what a learning experience this was. We all had to sign a confidentiality agreement, which meant that no one was going to leak anything to the public. That's why I'm deleting this part of the video. But even in that sense, we were allowed to broadcast and post progress on our social networks.

That's how it is. As long as you have asked for permission. And it wasn't a plot-crucial scene, you could post your animations. Personally, I only posted a test that I encouraged when we started, but the entire team was so supportive that even Tracy, Fabl, and Michael Kovach himself, Rocky's voice actor, shared it with their fans. This is actually very smart and I think most productions should do this as they will benefit from it. I know in some cases, like Marvel Studios, they could never do this because they obviously have to be secretive about it. But for independent animation productions, you are helping the production get more traction and helping the artists grow and also the social networks.

You never know what a little push can allow your team members to do. Going back to the benefits of having full access to the work of your fellow animators is the environment you created. In online productions, you would interact with production assistants, your animation supervisor, and that's it. But on a Discord server, you can see not only what they are doing, but also their process and the notes they get. And something curious began to happen. It makes you competitive in a good way because after seeing so many beautiful animations from everyone else and the fact that we all love the source material, you just have to make your take the best.

And that's why this rider looks, moves and sounds the way it does. We were able to challenge each other as artists, but also learn from each other, which brings me to my next point. Everyone noticed that there was so much value in these channels that the team came up with an idea. Do a process exchange, which is meeting for a couple of hours once a week and simply sharing your process with the entire team. Guys, these sessions blew me away. Before, this animation was like a bunch of different pieces floating around, and it was the first time I saw everything else, like a cohesive building block that you can use to bring the characters to life.

I'm not going to go too crazy. about what animation is. But these sessions made me go back and start doing studies again and realize that there were things in animation that are possible that I didn't even know where they were possible. It was also an environment that invited you to be creative with your shot. Here's a fun story with one of my shots. I decided to add an extra joke for Freckle at the end where he was basically shit carrying the coffin. And when I posted it for his review, Fable was actually streaming at the time and this is his reaction, this thing being added to the Freckle animation just crashes.

This is great. Oh Lord. Okay, this is great. I'm going to say that this is already approved. As someone who works a lot in outsourcing. Deviating from the storyboard would have been a repetition. But here we have to make our takes our own and make them shine. We were also defining what some things would look like as we went along. I helped figure out what Zib's cigarette smoke would look like and the team got on board with that. And honestly, it was all luck. I've never animated smoke in my life, but that's the fun part. Every new scene an animator posted for his review was refreshing for the entire team.

We also had many fun events. We played, we played Gartic Phone, we had chats with guests. But over the course of a long production, many feelings will arise. There was a time when I felt a little overwhelmed because I felt like I wasn't good enough to be part of the team. And Fable told me one of the most important messages I think I've ever received from a director. You got the job. That same phrase that started this journey. To me, what they meant was that if you got the job, it wasn't by chance. Trust yourself and do it.

Imposter syndrome stalks you quite often in an artistic career. So this quote has been an incredible reminder for both of us to stay humble. But remember that if I got the job, it means I can do it. And do what we all did. After exactly three years and five days from the Kickstarter launch date, it was finished. I can only imagine how exhausting this must have been for Tracy and Fable. They were literally on at all times. I don't want this to sound like it's a two-person project. I know you both would want me to say this too.

The crew was made up of over 170 people, and each of them played a crucial role in making the Lackadaisy pilot what it is today. There is a link in the description to all the crew names and links to their profiles. Each one of them is incredibly talented. What I'm trying to highlight here is that it really takes a lot of determination to see a mammoth task like this. All the way through. We even had a gesture calledGoToBedFable, because they never had it. This part of the story is being written as you watch this and it is up to you what happens now.

I want to make this video as a love letter not only to Lackadaisy, but also to crowdfunded animation projects. You, as an audience, have the power to bring to life so many projects and stories worth telling. And it doesn't take much. Anything you can give to support them. And if you really can't afford it, then simply spending your time watching and enjoying these productions is more than enough. Lackadaisy showed me that there is a world where if you have a story worth telling, you don't need to wait for someone else's approval. And that has been my goal ever since.

That's the reason I started this YouTube channel. I wanted to give creators the tools to tell their own stories to the world and hopefully inspire them by telling mine too. I know I'm not alone in this. I also want to mention other projects that you should definitely check out. Ramshackle by Zeddy Zi and FarFetched by Ashley Nichols. They were both members of LackaCrew, but they both started a journey towards projects of their own that we can support. So there are links in the description. To the entire crew. Thank you for taking me under your wing and for all the friends I made along the way.

There are no words to describe how proud I am of what we did. And how honored I feel to have been part of this production. This pilot has its own place in the history of 2D animation, and I'm sure many young animators will remember it as "Yeah, I got into animation because of Lackadaisy's pilot." Thank you all for inspiring others to pursue what we love and congratulations. Abyssinia! I will watch it again because I enjoyed it a lot. When you play it and it makes you smile, something is working. Just the way it collapses. Those shoes are really satisfactory.