ShoePie's Year End Review - 2011

What just happened?!

I'll start with the positives.  I became a professional comedy writer this year (sort of).  In that I wrote 5 episodes of a children's TV show which will be on the telly next year.  Unfortunately it's not enough work to justify giving up the day job just yet.  It was however a great learning experience and proof to myself that I can achieve a certain standard, hit deadlines and generally not suck when thrown in at the deep end.

My video output took a dip this year thanks to a 7 month layoff.  Only 5 new videos produced and two of them don't really count.  But I was pleased with the feedback for Terminator Ultimatum and the Penguin Thief sketches so the year ended strong.  I've also made a lot of improvements on the VFX front by adding Syntheyes to my skill set.

But what about the Stats?

According to Youtube statistics for 2011 my videos were viewed 363,000 times and my subscriber count rose by 64.  That sounds good until I look at 2010 when I had 602,000 views, and an increase of 211 subscribers.  More worryingly, the videos produced in 2011 accounted for only 7,000 of the 363K views, which is very sad because they're some of my strongest stuff.

I think I can improve next year if I start upping my output again although I probably need at least one big hit if I'm to get anywhere near 2010's figures.

Next Year

I'm currently working on some CG character animation for a friend's sketch show pilot.  I've learned a tonne of stuff working on that and my next Blender animation should be a giant leap on from what you've seen with Brian Park.

I have the same old ambitions this year as every year.  Develop a web series, make a kick-ass short film and do some television writing.  So fingers crossed I can achieve at least one of those goals!

Thanks for the support and here's a teaser for one of next year's sketches :0) - Happy New Year!

Christmas Card Designs

It wasn't all messing about with Penguins this year.  I also designed these Christmas cards for a friend and local personal trainer to send out to his clients.

The Christmas Penguin Thief

The ShoePie Christmas special tradition keeps going for another year!  Here's my 2011 effort, I hope you enjoy.  If you would like to share this video please share this link as that will help keep the traffic coming to my site.  Happy Christmas!!

But it's not all bad news!

In less depressing news I have brought one of these:

That's not me by the way!!

It's a Chroma key suit that's used for removing an actor from the scene.  I thought it would be helpful tomorrow when I'm filming a hand puppet sketch.  It means that I don't have to hide under a table when I move the puppets...  What a loser I would have looked if I had to do that!

Fed up with with 1and1 Internet

I like to keep these posts fairly positive but I've had such a miserable few hours courtesy of 1and1 Internet that I decided to post my first ever rant.  This is probably going to be quite boring for everyone else but hey, it's my blog.

1and1's Technical Support

About a week ago my website ShoePie.co.uk stopped working.  The VPS server was unreachable even to a Ping.  I had not logged in to the server for weeks so I was fairly certain that I had not done anything to break it.

1and1 tested the hardware, declared it fine and washed their hands of the problem leaving me with an unresponsive server.  They recommended that I run the backup facility in their control panel, so left with no other option I tried that... It didn't work.  The next idea they suggested was to completely re-install the operating system which would lose all of my work.  After pointing out that this was not acceptable they quoted some T&C's and told me it wasn't their responsibility.

1and1's Customer Service

Fed up with trying to fix this problem I decided to cancel my server package with them and host my website elsewhere.

After speaking to 8 different customer support advisors I eventually found out that they could not cancel my server package while I still had domain names registered with the account.  Fuck knows why not!?

They recommended that I set-up a new affiliate account with them to transfer the domain names over to before cancelling.  Another half hour setting up this new account and giving them my bank details I then find out that it will cost me an administration fee! to transfer the domains!

Why?!!  I've already paid for these domains!  I am ONE customer not TWO accounts!

So now I've given up and I'm trying to move the domain names to my 123-Reg account.  And as expected I am running into problems with 1and1's domain name transfer process.

The whole thing is just one big depressing joke and I can't wait to be shot of them.