A day in Pierre’s life....

A question that often seems to come back is...

“What do you do exactly??”

When people find out that you draw for a living... they are often curious as to what exactly it is that you do on a day to day basis.

So I thought I could share my routine to try to answer that question for some of the people out there.


7:00 AM

I wake up.

Somehow... I no longer need my alarm clock... I usually wake by myself around that time for some reason.

I wake up... take a shower... skip breakfast... and it is time to go.

8:00 AM

Around the time I leave for work.

9:00 AM

Around the time I arrive at the studio.

9:10 AM

I check my various e-mail accounts.

Nowadays, in this digital age... even an old dinosaur like me works using a computer. Heck I can’t recall the last time I used my drawing table at the studio.

So I need to check if I got an e-mail by the director/project manager/etc. And since we work with people from elsewhere in Canada like Toronto, and heck we are also working with a studio from South Africa, that is what we use to communicate with them. And I use e-mail to communicate not only with people outside of the studio/country... but even those who work less then 20 feet away from me.

Eons ago.... I would simply talk to people, or if people weren’t at their desk, I would leave a post-it note at their desk... or they would leave a post-it note at my desk.

No longer.

Now we use the almighty e-mail.

Heck even to tell something to people next to me I send them an e-mail.

“Why?” Says you?

Very simple...

They may be busy with someone else.... or just busy working. So instead of disturbing them... I just send them an e-mail.

In the past, just telling them something like let’s say “Storyboard 16B is ready.”... it would happen sometimes that someone would fail to remember that you actually did tell them. Very frustrating when someone tells you “You did not tell me 16B was ready!” , and you DID tell them. Well now.... no chances of that happening.... you can just show them your “sent mail” and tell them “See that e-mail??.... I DID tell you”.

So I read/answer my e-mails up to 9:30 AM-10:00 AM.

9:30 AM-10:00 AM.

I either continue what I was doing the day before... or I look in the FTP if something new came in.

What something new??

Essentially, I look for comments made by either the director or the broadcaster, and I fix the storyboard according to their comments.

Also I look if there is a new animatic.

An animatic is essentially the storyboard that was shot frame by frame, and where the timing for the episode was roughly worked out.

Part of my job is also to fix the storyboard so that if any changes were made in the animatic, the storyboard needs to be fixed to match with the FINAL version of the animatic.

It can be a time consuming task where sometimes you need to check the animatic frame by frame.

Some days... it can be exhausting. Checking one animatic is..... okay. But if you need to check two... or even worse.... three animatics in the same day... not fun. Usually you will try to spread them throughout the week... but sometimes you can have a rush when you need to check multiple animatics in one day. Luckily... it is only a once in a while occasion.

12:00 PM

Lunch time.

I usually go to a bagel place with a co-worker.

1:00 PM

Back to work from lunch.

I make a quick check to see if I got some new e-mails during lunch. Then I get back to work on whatever that I was doing.

3:00 PM

Break time.

We used to go out for about 15 minutes in a small park in front of the studio.

But now with the colder weather... I just go to the “cafe” downstairs to get a diet Pepsi, and I drink it while surfing the NET for about 15 minutes.

5:30 PM

Time to go.

6:30 PM- 7:00 PM

Usually the time I get home if I go home straight after work.

But too often, I will go shopping downtown (which reminds me... I should go get Dragon Age tonight ;)). So I too often get home around 8:00 PM or later.

What do I do once I get home??

Have supper... and IF there is some time left... I will do some drawing for our FBU comics... or I will write one of them silly Blogs. ;)

Although lately I got a new computer, so some of my free time has been spent trying to install various programs on my new machine, or trying to get stuff like my old scanner/printer to actually work with my new machine.

10:00 PM- 12:00 PM

Time to go to bed... tomorrow will be another day. ;)

I try to go to bed at 10:00 PM.... but wayyy too often... I go to bed wayyy too late.

So now you know how boring my routine is. ;)

Until next time.