I haven't really done a full year in review before... I've been close to doing something like this with the occasional "updates" every now and then, but I think it's time that to give it a full shot, in case people are interested. If you're not interested, that's cool too, but you should probably go do something else then because this might be a huge waste of your time.

As you may have noticed, the amount of animations released this year were few and far in between. Unless I totally blanked out and forgot, I think I only got around to two this year. And that is because of a compilation of many reasons.

But let me just start out by saying: 2021 was the definition of mid, at least for me. I can't really put a finger on it, but overall I would say nothing really "good" happened this year. Instead, a lot of "moderately okay" to "bad" things occurred. And if I delve into my own personal life, I'll end up over sharing, so you can use your imagination for this one... However, the culmination of all these events sort of led me to focusing on other things rather than animating or drawing. I had found new priorities to worry about before I could even begin to think about animating, I had to take care of stuff regarding my own personal problems before I could even register touching my tablet. But once again, if I talk about it too much in depth, I will end up oversharing and probably embarrassing myself in a year or so.

But it wasn't just crappy developments in my existence that brought my animation abilities to a halt. There was this w o r l d w i d e p a n d e m i c that had removed my motivation entirely. I didn't stop animating because the pandemic had me down in the dumps, however sometimes that could be the case, but instead I had halted animating because of online school. I would spend hours staring at my computer screen on zoom calls, totally rotting my brain out and developing consistent headaches. It was an absolute nightmare, and once I got off of online school for the day, my head would just be throbbing and I would genuinely feel dizzy. Afterwards, I would be unable to even sit at my desk without wanting to vomit. I couldn't handle using my computer for more time then I already was, and thus, any animation I was working on would only get an hour or two of work on the weekends.

But another problem actually stemmed from my distaste of screens in this time. I lost all the capacity I had to text my friends, and soon enough I stopped responding to them all together. It's not that I didn't care about them, it's just that I was so burnt out from everything that was going down that I didn't have any motivation to lift up my phone, let alone any device with a screen. The problem is, I still haven't been able to undo this habit because, even to this day, I just feel so wiped. Balancing school, socialization, and animation still proves to be a challenge, even when school became in-person again. (Sorry, Pete. I'm doing my best)

But in-person school created a whole slew of new challenges. Although I could now focus on animations without wanting to vomit and collapse, the school workload was dumped on me majorly. My schedule involved plenty of APs and advanced classes, and time management between the work and free time became increasingly difficult. There would be days in which I woke up, went to school, came home, worked, went to bed, repeat. Although much less straining on my eyes and head compared to online school, there was no denying that it brought my great challenges in how I balanced my free time. Weirdly enough, I'm saying this in the past tense, as if all of this is magically over, when in reality, I'm going to be diving straight back into it after winter break.

My last real reason for animation progress slowing down majorly was the 2020 christmas special... Yes, I know... I still can't believe it's biting me in the ass a whole year later. After the chaotic creation of that animation, I just couldn't stand animating anymore, at least for a couple months. The pain and exhaustion it had caused me wasn't worth repeating, at least not after I had warmed back up to the idea of animation itself. For the first few months of 2021, I barely even turned on my tablet at all. I had practically called it quits for a couple months, but soon I tried it again and decided it was worth the effort to continue animating.

BUT ENOUGH ABOUT HOW WIPED I WAS! Because, even during that time, I managed to at least publish the fourth installment of my graphic novel series AND I got them all published in paperback! You can view them all here on Amazon! If you buy them, you'll make my day and I will be so happy!!

https://www.amazon.com/s?i=stripbooks&rh=p_27%3ATyler+Basham&s=relevancerank&text=Tyler+Basham&ref=dp_byline_sr_book_1

(I don't really like 1 and 2, but whatever. I'll remake them someday)

Anyways, I hope you enjoyed my long complaint essay. I hope these excuses provide good insight into the totally mid existence of 2021, and I hope that you all understand where I was and what I had to focus on before I could even think about animating.

To be totally truthful, my hopes for 2022 are even lower when it comes to animating. This year is gonna be the year of SATs, college applications, and all that fun shenanigans. However, I think when it comes to my actual state of being, I have much more motivation for the future and I have planned out a couple good episodes! I hope you'll stick around to watch them, and I hope to see you all soon too!

-Tyler