#11: December

November was very demanding at work so I didn’t pay enough attention to the magazine. But, there’s progress.

The J Guide

This is the second month of (slowly) working on The J Guide. Vanny has been creating lots of images and I’ve been sending lots of feedback. Tomiwa has been working on the dialogue and is thinking about distribution for the prints. We need to get this done in time for Detty December.

Vanny has been so thoughtful and enthusiastic about this and it makes me really happy. See this message for example:

More likely than not, this is the only story we finish this year.

Nigerian Album Covers

I’ve contracted a writer, Wale Oloworekende, to help Eseosa with the Album Covers story. Fu’ad recommended him and I love his energy. I’ve also asked him to help me figure out how to pay freelance writers (starting with himself). He’s working on this with Fu’ad and I’ll share when they’re done.

Eseosa has also created a list of people we’re interviewing:

• Olusegun Belo-Osagie: This is Eseosa’s dad! He’s been a graphic artist for many years and I’m sure we’ll find a few more older artists (other than Lemi Ghariokwu) after talking to him.
• Ibukunolu Printers: We learnt that this is the most popular printer in Lagos, especially with Fuji and Apala artists. Eseosa and Wale went to Mushin but couldn’t locate them. If you have any information, let us know.
• Duks Arts: He’s done a handful of covers for Olamide and it’ll be really interesting to discuss that relationship.
• Niyi Okeowo: Niyi’s covers for ShowDemCamp and recently Fireboy DML are worth a conversation.
• Funto Coker: She designed The Cavemen’s ROOTS cover and Lady Donli’s Rockstar Parole cover. The two covers are stylistically different and each one really captures the spirit of the artist and music. I love it and I can’t wait to speak.
• Yinka Inker: I don’t know much about them yet. We’ll take some time to study each person, write and discuss profiles before we start interviewing. Also, I met an artist, Tony, who’s excited about album covers and the magazine in general. I’m hoping to speak to him properly this week to improve my direction.

Hanky Panky

“Who starts a new project without completing the existing ones? Really? BUT, I believe in my ability to carry multiple things at once. I’ve done it many times at work. Otherwise, why would I be doing this?”

That’s the speech I gave to myself when I started preparing for a third story, this time an animated film! The film I really want to make is about Owambes but that’ll take some time so I’m starting with a much shorter story.

88 recommended an animator to me, Chukwudi. I’ve spoken to him about it and he sounded excited to work on it. I asked about the process and it looks something like this (simplified):

• Write the script
• Design the characters
• Storyboard
• Animate
• Add sound My goal is to get the script written this year and maybe character design too. The whole thing will probably take a few months to complete but we’ve started sha.