I'm still around, though my animation has been on the bench for the last little while. I'll be updating my profile with some more animations. So, I'll throw some links up on the forums.
Being self taught can be troublesome in certain situations. Sometimes you just hit a road-block and can't get around it. This is very much the case when you're committed to a certain level of quality. It can be difficult to teach a computer how you want something to look or move when the tools aren't necessarily designed for that application.
I've taken the time to look around the net at some animation portfolios. You can always tell when someone's fresh out of the art school. They've got half a dozen animations that look like everyone else's stuff because they're all told to do the same project. Being self taught as I am, I keep trying to convince myself that I should do all those drills, but I figure if I ever animate someone picking something up, I'll go check the theory out.
Another thing I've noticed about the guy's right out of collage is they tag everything with "WIP". Seriously, you're telling me that you're gonna go back to all that stuff and tweak it one day? Or, maybe it's their way of saying, "Ok, I know it's not great, but it's a work in progress." I won't always put up the greatest thing anyone's ever seen, but it'll only be the best I've done until the next thing I work on.
