CAUTION! THIS VIDEOS CONTAINS PLANS THAT SOME PEOPLE MIGHT FIND DISTURBING!
Hi! My name is Vaggelis Karadimas. I'll talk about some things
about my life, that give me trouble to do things that I want to
and we'll see how these are related to animation.
"What he'll do with his life"?
"Poor guy..."
Dude! What happened to the guy!
"He's finished..."
Summer of 2003 changed a lot in my life.
I was doing my military duty and I was diagnosed with a rare type of cancer to my leg.
Adamantinoma. This certain type cannot be treated neither with chemotherapy
nor with radiotherapy.
And if it strikes vital organs, it kills you.
The solution was to remove part of the bone and of soft tissues - the muscles -
and the placement of an allograft.
The cost for that? Disability.
It's nothing compared to losing your life, isn't it?
For the next some years, I was a "client" of some military hospitals,
since I was i the responsibility of the military doctors.
An in-hospital infection brought a series of surgeries - 7 or 8, I've lost the count -
in "NIMTS" hospital,
and I paid "visits" in the submarine of the army navy hospital.
All these, until 2006.
Today, my leg looks like this.
It's much better! Now, there are no open fistulas, nor I'm thinking of cuttin it off
in order to get rid of the infections.
I'm "cancer free" and I've quit smoking since 2006.
Paradoxically, in some respect I am healthier than when I was diligent.
I won a war, in which I've lost some fights.
That's logical. So, let me count my defeats.
I cannot run nor I can play football, and that's something that costs me.
I cannot walk big distances, something I did a lot in the past.
My leg swells respectively easy, and that has consequences to anything I try to do.
For some years, I got a disabillity allowance.
Today the public sector - depending on the service - in some occassion considers I'm disabled
and in other not, depending on what it is more profitable for them.
Disability effects - in some point - the work issue.
Someone, knowing that my health problems will cause problems in my work,
with great difficulty will ever hire me.
Especially today, when unemployment is generally high.
But, in the end I count winnings. It's an experience I wish I didn't have,
but I'm glad that - since I was one of the "lucky" ones - I took all the possible earnings!
I became more insistent, but also more patient.
I discovered that my strengths and my limits go far beyond than I thought.
Well, it seems that we all are a bit of super heroes.
I've learned to adjust to the situations in such a way to serve my cause.
I undertook subjects that I didn't believe I could do!
I've learned to better place my priorites.
I valued my time. I "felt" that we don't live for ever
And I've learned not to have illogical demands from others.
You never know what may happens to their lives.
Finally, with my leg still in surgeries, with open fistulas,
not being allowed for a big deal of time to step on my leg,
i managed two important things;
I completed my PhD.
I occupied myself with animation.
And now we come to how animation interjected with disability.
I developped relations with animation from my early days.
At the age of 3,5 y.o., I started learning to read,
in order to read the subbed - back then - cartoons in Greece.
As a kid, I was watching all the cartoons of that era.
In the university, some of my colleagues may remember me doing this;
In deed, when I made some time as a student, during the 1990's,
I created a short gif, that unfortunately is missing now.
Well, after the big surgery, I was thinking;
How could I spare creatively and with quality the time I was to be fixed?
So, I decided to start animating.
The wrong way, but that's not a subject for now...
But, I couldn't found that "thing" that would "spoil" me.
Until some time, in an after midnight tv screaning I watched "Spirited Away"
by Hayao Miyazaki. That was it!
I've just found my new beloved hobby!
But in time, in my drawings started showing these elements that I inherited from disability;
Persistence,
patience,
the limits that were beyond what I thought,
the adjastement to a situation to correct a mistake,
the appreciation of time - critical in animation in many aspect -
to put priorities on everything I did,
to readjust with open mind.
Now, I didn't want it to be just a hobby.
I wanted it to be what I'd be doing!
2D animation would be my work!
I started asking, talking with people of animation in Greece.
The design desk was given to me by Panagiotis Rappas.
From Aggelos Rouvas I -as many others too - learned a lot about production.
I've met the living legend Iordanis Ananiadis,
I co-worked with Joan Zhonga and in general I met many peoples of animation, younger and older.
I stared reading, since I didn't study animation.
Then came some participation in festivals,
some first commercials, collaborations in shorts of well known animators,
teaching in schools, backpacks but never resignments,
new steps forward, new adjustments
and today I can say that I belong to the animation sector.
I'm not saying yet that I make a living from animation.
But I am intent to it.
I gave and I give much time,
I laboured and I still labour for it,
because I like it!
No matter how much it tires me, the payback seeing your work
moving, is great!
And it starts getting return from a certain public.
What is the outcome out of all these? And not only for animation!
No difficulty can stop you, if you don't let it stop you.
It can make you change your path to achieve your goal,
but it cannot change your goal.
So, if YOU stop fighting, then you lose the war.
But as long the war goes on and you give your fights,
you have your chances to win and in deed, it's most possible that you'll make it!
Your people will help you win!
As long as you show them that you are determined not to stay back,
that you'll change your path to achieve your goal.
Never go alone! That's a dead in!
Let me and with this;
Animation in Greek means to give soul (not just life) to something.
See you soon again!
Special thanks for their help to;
Filippos Athanasopoulos, Thanasis Gallos,
Panagiotis Georgiopoulos, Olga Karadima
Eleni Keloglou.
Không có nhận xét nào:
Đăng nhận xét