There are two objectives that must be achieved in your first post of this thread:

-Share the tale of how you became an animator.
-Describe your very first animation.

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Introduction to Animation

In the year of 2005, I had been a still artist/illustrator of relatively low skill. At that time, I had been an intense Naruto fan, illustrating fan comics and such. Naruto, Yu Yu Hakusho, and NarutoForums were pretty much the only things that existed for me back then.
One day, I was scrolling along the forums and saw that a guy named Poojipoo had given a link to this animation: http://poojipoo.deviantart.com/art/Naruto-ANIMATION-WIP-ver-2-21287359
I immediately thought: "awesome", and the sketchy look of the whole thing filled me with the desire to dive into this epic extension of illustration. As much as I loved to create and illustrate fight scenes, I thought that it would be awesome if I were to create my own moving animation! I'd known something about animation from some earlier experience with flipbooks, so I grabbed a composition book from my shelf, drew in the corners, and made the characters move when I flipped the pages. I immediately became addicted to animation. Unfortunately, I soon ran out of paper, so I looked to the internet for another method. I saw that he'd animated with a program called "Flash MX 2004", so I got the program and, without any prior instruction, explored it and immediately created a full fight scene that branched off into a series. With Flash MX occupying 3/5ths of the screen and Yu Yu Hakusho eps filling the remaining 2/5ths, the entire area of the room in which the computer resided was filled with explosive surges of Awesome.


The First Opponent

My first animation ever was animated in the lower-right corner of a composition book. The character models looked similar to G-War's rough draft models. Seeing as how I was inexperienced and excited about actually making things move, the characters moved stiffly, but with fluid linear movements. The animation was comprised of one man standing at the bottom of the page, then moving his hand upwards to block another man who had decided to launch himself toward him in a missile-esque fashion. Many small battle animations akin to these took up the other three corners of the book.

My first Flash Animation was deleted...two computer-wipes and one computer-change ago. It ran at 8 fps (because I was adjusting the framerate to match my animation style). It consisted of the 2D-angle rough-draft-men engaging each other in a one-on-one fight. Physics went to hell in exchange for fun as one of the men, who was capable of teleportation, utterly smacked the first warrior around. The tables turned at the end of the battle and the teleporter was out-witted and defeated. This grew into a series called "David the Hunter", with the first battle being David's graduation exam. Every episode, David faced new opponents, from easily-defeated thugs to interdimensional boss-battles. Back then, animation was what kept me alive, seeing as how I was homeschooled and laid eyes on no one except my mother for about a year. tongue face


Newgrounds

Shortly after my first set of animation was set into motion, I desired a fuller set of techniques. David The Hunter had come to a cancellation at episode six, and I ventured out into fullbody. I loved Naruto and Yu Yu Hakusho in the 2005s. I began by animating, at 8 fps, a Naruto vs Sasuke battle. It ended up encompassing a few minutes and ended with a semi-cliffhanger. It was very fun to make, seeing as how I'd finally got the chance to fully release creative juices by making these guys move (as opposed to my fan-comix). Drawing from the inspiration gained from poojipoo's first animation, I completed it and submitted it to Newgrounds, which I found a bit new at the time. The animation was promptly blammed.
I then browsed Newgrounds, seeing tons of then-amazing animations. It was there that I discovered series such as Xiao Xiao, Xin, and all of the Naruto and DBZ fanimations. A storm of inspiration and intimidation slammed into me, and I knew what it took to create a submission that would make it onto Newgrounds. Bam. Fuck.
I then proceeded to create the Sequel of Naruto vs Sasuke animation and a Yu Yu Hakusho animation detailing Yusuke vs Sensui. (I think it's my longest animation to date, with CCT 2 coming in second) These two animations sealed my knighthood into the world of Animation Warriors, and I knew that I'd go somewere with this one day...somewhere great...but only after years of hard training. The Naruto vs Sasuke animations as well as my Yu Yu Hakusho animations were blammed again. I discovered many Newgrounds artists to look up to for their then-awesome action animations that drew me in to addiction. At the time, though...I was too much of a failure to follow suit and create more epicness.


The Epiphany of Easytoon

I'd basically been learning how to do things on my own and not having any other animation friends to interact with, so the training was kind of tough. It was then that I, while browsing NarutoForums in my state of weak and stagnant animator strength, found an Easytoon animation done by an elite: What appeared to be two blue-collar, cubicle workers fought one another after coming to a hostile argument. The fight was obscenely one-sided as the more inhuman-looking worker of the two brutally and fluidly barraged the boss with a flurry of punches, landing 99 of them and finishing it off with a mouth blast that finished him off. The most epic 100-hit combo I'd ever seen in animation went to this Easytoon artist: Yusuke Kozaki, or KYMG. I frantically searched for the black-and-white pixel program that attracted me so much, and found it at a place called StickPage. StickPage was only the first step to the site that I would be frequently inhabiting for years to come: The Easytoon Place. It was here that I met many Easytoon artists, and the site had its own basic system of rank: Beginner, Intermediate, and Veteran. I began as an Intermediate animator.
On this site, I'd met Veteran Easytooners who I fiercely looked up to as the site's best, hoping to become their equals or betters. Such strong members included "sly", "InkThinker", "Jeckos150", and "Bahful". They amazed me with every Easytoonic contribution to the site. They were also quite active and helpful in the community, which has a structure that is vaguely similar to ours. I spent roughly two years as an active Easytoon Place warrior, and during my stay there, I'd grown in strength, sharpened my fluidity skills, obtained a tablet, and discovered the most elite of the Easytoon animators, including my then-favorite animator, the legendary Tatsubon. I'd become considerably stronger than I was than when I first entered the world of animation, and with Sly to look up to as he released awesomeness, I never lost inspiration.


Farewell, Easytoon

I moved into a new apartment IRL. Thanks to this, I lost my internet connection throughout the summer. No television. No video games. Computer that had been freshly restored to factory settings and completely wiped clean of any files that I'd downloaded.
I had a Flash disc and a DVD of Spider-Man 2 and The Incredibles. That was enough.
It was in the period of internet-less life that I'd confined myself within my room and created Rioshu 1 and 2. It would also be the first time that I'd tried the method of rough-animating, then placing a clean layer above that (Rioshu 2). As I regained my internet connection, these two Flash animations were the first to be accepted onto Newgrounds, but with very low scores. I bid Easytoon farewell and went into the process of creating Rioshu 3. Unfortunately, I failed due to another computer wipeout. As I had made so much progress that was lost, I stopped animating for the rest of 2007. I lost much of my artistic spirit and devoted the rest of the year to an Epic game called: GunZ: The Duel.


GunZ

mid-to-end 2007 to early 2008. Epic times. blood-boiling memories. Best gaming experience of my life. Unfortunately, during this time, I think I only ever drew, like, one line on a sheet of paper.


Return to Flash mid-2008

One day, I halted GunZ and drew pictures, unleashing the sudden burst of creativity that I had accumulated while I played and saw 2008 movies that had been unleashed, such as Iron Man and Wanted. It felt nostalgic and grand for my artistic mentality to return. I then decided to do some web searching and re-aquire Flash. I wiped the dust from my sword, re-sharpened it, and resumed! This time, something was different. It appeared that I no longer harbored the lingering feeling of failure and containment, and somehow, my skill had increased to more dynamic proportions! After a 3/5s of a year of inactivity, Hitorio had returned, stronger than before! This is when I unleashed three short test animations onto Newgrounds. Not only did they score higher than the Rioshu series did, but for the first time, I'd actually gotten good comments such as "amazing" and "awesome" from critics on one of my animations! The accomplishment! It was then that I knew that with 2008, my journey to the stars from the land of intermediacy officially begun. I didn't just relinquish GunZ, my favorite game, so easily, though. For the remainder of 2008, I juggled GunZ and animation.


CCT

In mid-early 2009, I'd begun to construct another series entitled CCT, in which all of my custom characters would engage in a large tournament. I animated the first round of this tournament and unleashed it onto Newgrounds, earning me very positive reception. It was after Round 1's release that I'd coincidentially met Akkere on an "animator wanted" thread in order to take up one of his projects. After some discussions, he decided to help me with CCT. Akkere was a writer, and he helped me with much of the writing process. I'd constructed a basic story outline for the entire CCT series, and epicness awaited me in the realm of animation. CCT 2 was released, but due to my mental clouding and fucked-up-ness at that point in time, I added no sound because I was in too foggy a state to find suitable audio. Sounds ghey, but that's how it went.
Despite the better fight scene in the next round, it got a lower score for a lack of sound. I recovered my mentality and spirit sometime afterwards, and I began to construct CCT 3, which was fully colored and featured the best animation of the three to date. It looked like, for me, third time's the turd, since I ran into a single gaping plothole that ruined some of the story's authenticity. Since I could find no way around this single-but-strong problem, I canceled CCT, and I didn't hear from Akkere for a while.


FluidAnims

About a month after CCT died, I ventured over to FluidAnims by way of Terkoiz's advertisement. I found that the site had many animators and a nice, thriving community. I was interested, but what kept me glued to my fucking seat was the RHG system. My god. I was eager to battle and grow stronger. Around the FluidAnims time is the point that I discovered the key to kill boredom forever (an unrelated topic) and where my animator's spirit grew to unstoppable proportions. I became a part of the RHG system, creating a stick character so as to fit in. I fought an opponent in a stick figure RHG and lost because, according to many of the voters, I needed music and my camera was zoomed out too far. sad

(Around this time, I discovered Sakuga MADs and Genga, one of my most treasured and frequently-experienced animation discoveries that I'd ever had. I'd store them on my iPod, watch them on the bus and at school, go over them at home, and more. I also discovered my favorite animator, the God: Yutaka Nakamura)

I quit the stick RHG and contemplated a fullbody RHG. It was then that I discovered the fullbody animation thread. I joined. I learned. I advised. I grew. I met some people that I know now. Among those that stood out and were active - Duo (uninspired, depressing animator), tomvanharmelen (adult, technical, liked realism), Edyrem (Naruto fan, considered the best). I made the FB thread my homeless shelter and stayed there with other animators quite often. I also began to train very effectively. In late October of 2009, I challenged my old Easytoon Place associate Sly to a fullbody RHG battle in order to meet him as an equal. In 2010 The battle was mutually abandoned, but in that RHG battle that I worked on, I'd grown stronger. That RHG battle was one of the best training experiences I'd had. The RHG was dropped, but I continued training and progression.


Psuda

Edyrem created Psuda, the home for Fullbody animators from the far reaches of the interwebs. The training has continued, I have learned and advised even more, and P:E is in active development.