This morning saw that I get up very early. I chose to park in a remote area near the river which, by the way, was very high due to all the rain the past couple of weeks. The rain died down for the night before I got there, but I made a promise to myself that I would leave the area if it started to rain. Five minutes before 6 AM was my cue to leave. Thankfully I had slept over 8 hours by that point.

I ended up getting to the University of North Georgia (Dahlonega Campus) at about 7:30 AM; way to early for my 11 AM meeting. I stayed dry in the car, parked on the edge of campus, working on some "paperwork" and making some plans for the day. I found a Starbucks on campus and spent an hour there uploading images and yesterday's blog. I then found legitimate visitor parking on campus and arrived at the agreed upon meeting location an hour early. I still had plenty of personal things to do to keep me occupied.

Professors David Clifton and Daniel Johnson spent a good hour with me going over their program and the way the DAT program is currently set up. Animation majors NEED the traditional art skills to be considered for the program at UNG. This is information I knew already and had been reiterated at a few of the other schools I had already visited. I had been advising students to get those foundation courses concurrently with the DAT degree for years. It is great to know I was ahead of my time.

Their program is small like ours, but they have what takes our students onto their next steps in animation. Students will be cross-trained on PCs and MACs, as they should be. They will learn traditional animation as well as 2D and 3D animation. There is a green-screen room (much more spacious than ours), 3D printers galore, and something in the works to use motion capture that is housed in the health field area (I can't remember the specific one). Students are required to learn how to use the WACOM tablets to facilitate workflow. Additionally, they benefit from instructors that have worked in the industry for a number of years.

After I met with them, I headed over to Admissions. I passed my car and noticed I had a ticket. They have this cool e-parking pass system. I transposed the number in my license plate, despite correcting in the web portal, thus the ticket. After speaking to Katie about the admission process, scholarships, etc., I went to where I could hopefully get the ticket nulled. I showed my e-parking pass and explained what happened. They were super nice and took care of it for me.

I headed out, in the sleet, then the snow, then the rain, the backroads toward I-75 north into Tennessee. What a wonderful drive. Farms and forests all around. I travel part of the Trail of Tears. I took a rest at the Tennessee Welcome Center and decided to write this and recharge the laptop for a bit. Since I would be on the highway for some time and probably wouldn't be seeing nearly as much natural beauty, I didn't mind driving a bit at night. I was wrong as the route looked interesting on th GPS. I went from TN back to GA for four miles and back into TN. I thought I saw a big paddleboat ferry on the Tennessee River. The next Welcome Center was on an island in the lake the bridge traversed. I guess it's best I don't make assumptions about routes and try to only travel during daylight.

If I have any luck at all, tomorrow won't be a rainy day. I am getting a little tired of it, truth be told.