🦊 Oh Snap!
QBF #49 — Animation collaboration, a new version of an old fable, and a poem on the beauty of writing.
Hey friends,
I hope you're doing well and staying safe. I’ve been continuing to ride a wave of creative energy, but am now struggling to maintain consistency with my physical exercise habits. It feels like whenever one area of my life starts to prosper, I lose focus on another area. It reminds me of the common idiom of “pick two”. I’m trying to take it in stride, and accept the nature of the ebb and flow in different parts of my life. It's a perpetual juggling act.
I have a couple of upcoming events to share with you:
On March 20th @ 11AM PST, I’ll be hosting Drew Austin (author of the wonderful Kneeling Bus newsletter on cities, technology, and the future of urbanization) for a Clubhouse discussion. As a passionate urbanist nerd, I’ve been following Drew’s work for quite a while and am really excited to pick his brain on a variety of topics. Our focus is will be to explore is how cities have been affected by then pandemic, and how they can evolve and adapt for the future. Check out the Clubhouse event link, and be sure to Follow me to get notified.
On March 30th @ 11AM EST, I’ll be hosted by Luis Giraldo for a Café con Luis webinar, where I’ll be sharing lessons I’ve learned in embracing my inner polymath, and how the approach can help future-proof your career. Luis’ background ranges across technology and music, which should make for a fascinating discussion on polymath careers. Fun fact: Luis used to play the keyboards on tour with Shakira! You can RSVP for the event here.
Hope to see you there!
Playground
I’m so excited to share this new animation with you! I went the extra mile on this one, and decided to collaborate with my friend Jeff Romejko (a talented music producer) to create an animation with sound. I love how this turned out! You can watch the video with sound on my @salmanscribbles Instagram:
There were a lot of steps and many alternate versions along the way, so I posted a full thread breaking down the entire process behind making this video. It’s a fun look into some of the animations and different music we used. At a high level, I took a slo-mo video of my own fingers snapping, and then illustrated and animated them one frame at a time using the Looom app on my iPad. From there, I collaborated with my friend Jeff who produced some great beats to go along with it, and that led to some more creative experimentation (such as modified colors and varied sequencing).
The project was a ton of fun, and I’m looking forward to more collaborations like this in my creative journey!
Fables
I’ve been working on a new fable, which I’m excited to share with you soon. Now that I’m building some momentum with writing these stories, I decided to create a dedicated section on my site to host them. You can now view all my fables in a new stories section on my website:
The first story featured is Where the Wind Blows, which I originally wrote many months ago. It’s about a bird who struggles to find his way, until he eventually has a moment of awakening. I’ve revised the story a ton, and have learned a lot about story writing through the process. I’ve been told by readers of the original that this version feels like an entirely new story. If you liked the original, you’ll definitely enjoy this expanded version!
The second story is The Farmer’s Secret, which I shared in a recent newsletter. I really like the short-and-sweet format of this tale. I’m curious to see how my story writing style could marry the longer fairy-tale-like format with this shorter fable format.
Stay tuned for the next story coming soon — it’s a tale about a wolf 🐺
I’ll leave you with a love letter to writing that came to me this week, somewhere between editing drafts of an essay and a fable:
Words liberated,
I set my truth free
Mirror constructed,
I look upon myself with clarity
Light magnified,
I shine so you can see me
Forever hooked,
I write so I can be
Until next time,
—Salman
🌎 salman.io | 🐦 @daretorant