One of my live briefs is to design a flag. This flag will be using in camp sites to locate the tent. This group of people have a special "gps" they use when in are groups. They put their hand up in the 'naked emu' form and find each others hands. So they want to incorporate this on a flag. These men have an army background so are quite patriotic so I decided to use a union jack in the back. I made it slightly faded though to make the hand more visible. I also did a grey and white one to show they can have a 2 tone one whatever colour they want. I am waiting to hear back on their opinions. I have done this in illustrator so that when it comes time to print it shouldn't pixilliate no matter the size of the flag. This one was done at 40 inches x 25 inches. I think the thicker line on the monotone one would also work on the union jack to make it pop. There are simple fixes for when I hear back what they like/dislike but they basically said whatever you make is fine so in my opinion I have two finalised designs.
Here is the flag with the thicker lines. it really does make it pop more.
I still love Blue Zoo and its pretty clear why looking at that awesome showreel. They do a lot of childrens tv work but also some commercial stuff both 2D and 3D. Its in London so not a million miles away.
"Blue-Zoo Productions Ltd. is an award winning UK based computer animation studio. Founded in 2000 by Tom Box, Oli Hyatt, Adam Shaw and Nic Sims, it mainly produces content for TV broadcast. It is most well known for creating the children's animation series Blue Cow as part of the BBC series The Story Makers, and more recently its own children's comedy series Those Scurvy Rascals. As well as producing its own original series, it provides animation services for many other companies."
The company operates from a studio in Soho, London, where they have a team of 12 full-time staff and many freelance animators. It would be pretty cool to work here one day. the job going at the moment is a 2 year contract as a series animation editor.https://jobs.blue-zoo.co.uk/vacancy/details/13/series-animation-editor/ I don't think this is a role i am particularly interested in or qualified for but i am definitely going to keep checking their website.
I also currently follow them on twitter. I love seeing what they're up to. They often post about jobs and even just small jobs like not long ago there was a tweet asking for a junior editor to help out for a few days. That would be cool if i could start like that.I also follow them on instagram as it gives a more visual sense of who they are as a compony. They are having an event soon talking about the compony which would be good to go to but unfortunately i won't be able to make it https://london.siggraph.org/event/blue-zoo-animation-studio/ I would love to go on a studio tour at some point though. It looks like a great studio to work at. I mean ...who wouldn't want surprise breakfast burritos?! I think after my 6 months of learning more stuff, this is where i want to do my internship as they do them every year. one going this summer is a character animator internship working on childrens tv shows...how perfect is that?! but i really need to improve my skills before this so fingers crossed they have the same one next year! its 6 weeks earning £300 a week which is ace as most internships aren't payed. However if i decide i definitely don't want to do 3d then I probably won't go for this. I want to improve my skills all round though so we will see! https://jobs.blue-zoo.co.uk/vacancy/details/20/character-animator-internship/
The 2D in this animation is beautiful. Its not finished and coloured and stuff but i actually really like that about it. the movement is just so good and makes good use of the principles of animation. Her name is Priscila Vertamatti or PriVer origionally from Brazil in 1987, she studied at BFA character animation programme in the Academy of art university in California. This lucky person has interned with both walt disney animation studios AND pixar and managed to land herself a job with Pixar! How amazing is that?! The benefits of studying where the action is i guess! This is the most recent showreel and as you can tell its of a much better quality that goes to show with a bit of practice and training goes a long way.
I completed this game a few months back on xbox one. I thought it was going to be a bit of a kids game but actually it was really good! And actually pretty difficult in places. The storyline is beautiful. Ori gets falls from a tree as a newborn and is found by Naru who raises him. Unfortunately Naru dies and Ori is left alone to fend for himself with lots of dangers in the forest. We control Ori in a beautiful 2D platform game. I mean it is REALLY beautiful. I enjoyed playing this so much as i just enjoyed looking at is and the in between animations showing story are amazing. The ending is so sad and beautiful it makes you really miss playing it and i actually may start it again when i get home! The background in the are B-E-A-utiful! and the characters are so emotive and fluid and without actually talking you know what they're feeling. It won many awards and was nominated for many more. This was designed by Moon studios and published by microsoft. Moon studios is made up from game developers from around the world who quite simply make games whey wish to play themselves. The founder of the company, Thomas Mahler, studied at the school of fine arts in vienna austria.
"He moved to California to work as a Cinematic Artist at Blizzard Entertainment on titles like Starcraft 2. All the while, he worked on small game prototypes of his own on the side.
Thomas decided to leave Blizzard Entertainment to fulfil his passion of making and designing original games. After creating prototypes together with Gennadiy Korol, the two founded Moon Studios GmbH and signed a development and distribution team for Ori and the Blind Forest with Microsoft Games Studios in 2011." Gennadiy Korol came from a more technical background having studied computer science and computer graphics at the University of Tel Aviv in Israel.
"The designers say they were guided by works such as The Lion King and The Iron Giant and that it is a "coming-of-age story".[6] The designers were also heavily influenced by the work of Hayao Miyazaki, particularly with one of the levels "Valley of the Wind," being a nod to Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind.[9][10] The art style is meant to appear hand-drawn, similar to the more recent Rayman titles that utilize Ubisoft's "UbiArt" graphics engine; the game instead uses the Unity engine.[3][6] The game takes place in one large map, rendered at 1080p and 60 frames per second with no visible loading time as the player explores.[3][8] According to Mahler, the game's backgrounds are all individual components, with none duplicated as in other similar titles. As an example, Mahler explained, "You see this tree in the background and this mushroom and this rock? That's the one and only place you'll ever see those assets."
This is such a good idea for a character animation showreel! He first starts out by showing initials drawings then building the rig. Then we see how it all moves and is put together and all the cool features it has and just by playing around with it we see his ability to form great expressions and his understanding of what is needed to be built to make this. Then at the end there is a rendered animation showing his capabilities to actually animate. Judging by the fact its mostly building i would say he is more of a modeller than an animator but definitely has potential to be both. This has made me really want to try and do more 3d stuff! Ive never made my own rig before but I think i would really like to. This video is by Ozgur Aydogdu who i a character technical director at Blue sky studios..okay now that makes sense. This is his website: http://www.ozguraydogdu.com
I managed to find him on linked in and this is what he says
"My aim is to create living, believable CG characters that can help beautiful stories come to life. I am eager to realize my aim by working in high quality projects where I would be able to show and continously develop my artistic and technical skills with an inspiring team. Specialties · Producing body and facial rigs, setups and deformations for biped, quadruped, cartoon characters as well as props and vehicles · MEL, Python & PyMEL scripting, building Auto Rig Systems and Tools Development · Solid understanding of anatomy, form and volume · Problem solving abilites with detail oriented, layered approach and working under pressure in fast-paced, deadline driven environments · Character design, Hard surface and Organic Modeling, Character Animation · Production experience of Maya, Photoshop, After Effects, Premiere, Mudbox, Boujou, PFTrack and Heads UVLayout"
He seems to have done a lot of freelance work before ending up at blue syke studios. I have sent a request to follow him on twitter as it would be interesting to see what he is working on currently.
Pretty much exactly as it sounds, a forensic animator will utilize his or her unique skills to help investigators piece together crime scenes and collate evidence for presentation to a jury.Forensic animators are also used often in insurance and/or liability claims, requiring strong experience in both 3D and 2D animation as well as terragen software in order to recreate real life locations and scenarios.
Forensic Animator Career Path: An already established animator can transfer over to forensic animation via specialist courses, but be warned: your flashy portfolio of superb SFX won’t do you any good since the field calls for technical attention to detail over dramatic embellishments. A criminal record will kill this career dead in the water, too. Usually freelance a forensic animator can charge between $20 -$100 an hour depending on experience. Thats a pretty cool job and definitely not something I had thought of!!
You can’t let fluctuations in the industry and/or economy kill your creativity.
…and you don’t need a job in the animation industry to validate your calling.
The world needs visual stories. Humanity thrives on visual stories.
I think you should draw or tell the stories inside of you even when you aren’t getting paid.
…especially when you aren’t getting paid.
We must distinguish the truth of our internal calling as creative people from all external forces.
However it is not just animation jobs that we can apply for. Being an animator means we are designer, fimographers, sotryboarders, illustrators and much more including for me photography and graphic design. We have a wide skill set and we shouldn't forget it when applying for jobs. Even if we aren't pros at our other skills, a lot of studios are willing to retrain you so you do it the way they want it anyway! Having all of these skills really opens up the freelancing opportunities and i think it would be a good task to refine each skill that we perhaps haven't thought of before.
This is heavily geared towards young children and i think its great with lots of opportunities for making and learning. Something I am interested in myself would be this competition INDIs
Formerly the National Young Filmmakers’ Award, the INDIs is a national film award championing and celebrating the talent of the UK’s young independent filmmakers aged under 25.
Supported by both the IAC and MMBF, the competition is one of the most prestigious awards in the UK, receiving entries from hundreds of young filmmakers. Shortlisted films are screened in front of a jury of professional filmmakers, critics, programmers and writers, who will be on hand to offer advice and support to help launch your filmmakaing careeer. Whether you are a first time filmmaker or have been making movies for years, we want your film!
We will be accepting entries for the 2017 INDIs competition, taking place in 2017, shortly. Please check back for details.
This sounds like something my film would suit so i will check back for details!
From what I have read so far looking at jobs that are available, it seems that companies are looking for people that have a flair for animation, have a very god understanding of the principles of animation and be able to implement them to a high standard, they need to be nice "don't be a dick"-Mike 2016 ;) Good at problem solving, Smaller studios are more likely to employ generalists to this might be something for me to look at as i am quite a generalist at the moment.Drawing talent and humour seem to be quite a popular attribute and it is obvious why.
http://www.animationcareerreview.com/articles/skills-animation-employers-are-looking
I have to be honest, I was thoroughly disappointed. I started off by looking at the showreel on this page. They seem to have done everything I have read not to do! a) its over 3 mins long. b) the music is awful and c) the worst part is they seem to have started with absolutely crap animation that does not show any talent and just makes you cringe. I skipped through a bit and there are a few good pieces but they are heavily surrounded by crap. Unfortunately this made me turn it off and over all i probably watched about 30 seconds. This has really made me realise the importance of a good showreel. I had also intended to read the page but after watching that it makes me think they don't even know what they are talking about. https://nationalcareersservice.direct.gov.uk/advice/planning/jobprofiles/Pages/animator.aspx- this website has some great points on it about what skills animator need and how to get them etc. including : Skills, interests and qualities
To become an animator, you will need to have: creativity and imagination good drawing or modelling skills patience and concentration acting skills to bring characters to life accuracy and attention to detail the ability to take direction good computer skills, preferably including graphics and animation software communication and presentation skills the ability to work under pressure and meet deadlines good teamwork skills.
I think I may go to Manchester animation festival this year. Apparently it was quite good last year though not as good as bradford. It will also give me chance to keep in touch with LCA and see what they're up to if they go again. I thought about entering my short film to this that I did for FMP however it says that only films completed after July will be considered. Never mind though I want to improve my skills before submitting things anyway really. But going to this would help me to network and keep up with the world of animation. This year the dates are november 15,16 and 17 at HOME in manchester. Day 2 looks like it will be interesting. Things i would like to go to include: Making it in Manchester, Master class will becher, how to make friends and animate people, blue zoo keeping and animatic studio animated.The life drawing workshop on day 3 looks like it could be good and I would also like to see BFG!
As the only gathering in the UK of its kind, The idea behind the Childrens Media conference was to create an annual meeting for upcoming professionals to share ideas and network. The conference explores "entertainment and educational experiences available to kids, attracting delegates and speakers from Radio, Television, Film, Interactive Media, Games, Licensing, Toys, Publishing, Museums/Galleries and Live Theatre and the digital education sector. The twelfth conference in 2015 welcomed 1100 delegates from across the children’s industries – and from a range of countries worldwide as the CMC’s international profile grows" So its a pretty big deal and anyone wanted to work in the child entertainment industry should definitely go check it out...so that includes me! This year it will be running from Tuesday 5th July to Thursday 7th July at Showroom Cinema, Paternoster Row, Sheffield S1 2BX UK. Unfortunately to go is pretty expensive but i guess the connections you make will be invaluable. here is the cost i will be looking at: "Under 30s, Self-funded Delegates & Students Rate £240 + VAT. This pass is intended for Under 30s, freelancers, researchers, small Indies (with 2 employees or fewer), and students. A limited number are available, allocated on a first come, first served basis."
I would definitely like to attend this but I think to coincide with my 12 month plan the first 6 months of which being to improve my skills, I will seriously consider this for next year. This will give me chance to improve my portfolio and get some work under my belt and also save some money to pay for it as there will also be travel and hotel costs involved.
HOWEVER... there is also the opportunity to volunteer there. I think that would be very good to get started as you will see what it is all about before the nerve-racking going as a professional. It is a great way to get started and very cost effective as: "The CMC covers travel expenses and provides lunch for volunteers during the conference. As well as a volunteer meal on first the first evening of the conference. We provide a Career Guidance session specifically for our volunteers. How to get into the Industry hints and tips from those involved in children’s media. ^^^^^This would be SO useful!!
Tuesday, 17 May 2016
I love the character animation in this scene of the chipmunk in enchanted. As he can't talk anymore but is used to talking he has to basically play charades to be understood but he still acts so human. I love how he can change his body depending on what he's trying to be. The 3D chipmunk was made in Maya and Furrocious. The visual effects supervisor was Thomas Shelesney. They decided to enhance the facials expressions on Pip by adding eyebrows. I was quite intrigued about how they managed to merge animation and live action so seamlessly so I looked further into it. They were able to make the character look where the animated character would be by using a laser pointer so everyone knew where to look but cleverly isn't seen on camera.
This was a very interesting read all about how they tackled parts of the animation process and more on how they made the audience know where to look as it was more difficult the more people there were and the bigger the space.
James Baxter (a British character animator) was director of animation in this film.
While he was studying at West Surrey College of Art and Design, at the age of 20 he heard about a collaboration between Disney and Richard Williams (who inspired him a lot) He got the opportunity to work on it and very quickly impressed the crew with his abilities at such a young age. By 23 he was animation supervisor for Belle in Beauty and the Beast! Unfortunately this came as quite a shock to the system making him quit for over a year. Disney managed to convince him to come back to work on The lion King. He then moved to dreamworks animation where he worked on the road to eldorado, Shrek 2, Madagascar and others. After this he set up his own studio in California caller Baxter Animation which is where he was employed to do the animation for Enchanted in 2007. Shortly after this he closed his studio and is now back with Dreamworks.
I have tried to locate him on all kinds of social media and found nothing! All i can find are deactivated accounts from his old compony. This is really annoying but ill keep trying. The latest thing I can find that he has worked on it the Croods in 2013.
I did however find an interview from him on the croods and at the end he gave a little advice that is pretty good:
There is also a scene that I can't find on youtube where the step mother is in a pan of boiling water in the kitchen and there are apples floating in it. This is a 2D person in a 3D world. Then she interacts with it and brings the 3D apples into her own world. Like her hand turns 3D to grab the apple then they both go 2D when they are in her world and back to 3D again! and its flawless! It is so impressive.
I used the layout I used for the dvd in OUAN 505 as i did lots of research to come to that conclusion and i feel it worked. I did it on illustrator this time though as it gives a better result for printing. Here is what I ended up with.I actually really like it!
Looking at other animation posters it looks like its mainly some art work from he film with the title on with coming soon or the date on it sometimes with the companies name.
So I took all of this on board for my animation. Here is what I ended up with first but I didn't like it.
So I decided to create more of an interesting image with foreground and background and here is what I came up with:Im still not 100 % sure but I think this is the closest I am for now. I like the imagery I'm just not sure on the type layout.
Unfortunately my imagery doesn't seem to really look good in portrait form so I did a landscape version. I hope that is okay.
I think I actually just came up with something better and its in portrait! I will need portrait for the DVD box. I think it is more engaging. Maybe I could use the previous one for a billboard I think that would work.
So here is the trailer I made for my final project animation. I think I have managed to hint at the storyline without any spoilers. The first time round i basically just did a short version of the animation and I was like oh...people watching that won't want to watch it now cause they'll know what happens...so yeah I think this does the job much better.
I love this trailer! I love how it starts of like its going to be your classic kids animation with a cute story about how the foods love getting chosen and then BOOM its like food massacre! Its so clever i love the thought behind it like if food was alive when we ate it how it would react and the fact that we cut it up and eat it etc is like torturing it! And then they fight back!! I think it is just hilarious and I love animation for being able to show these crazy ideas! You can very much tell it has Seth Rogans input in this story! he said it came from an innocent place, they were talking about how humans project their emotions onto things around them like toys etc but it we did it to food it would be completely "fucked up". There are lots of stereotypical character as in like if there was a french stick of bread he would actually be french etc. As well as this being hilarious and crude and totally out there, it is also said to tackle the issue of whether god exists and troubles with religion. I am so looking forward to this film!! Finally an adult feature animation!
Trailers seem to start off by setting the scene and showing what is wrong or the current situation, then show a peak of the journey that happens because of this and a few obstacles they encounter. They also show a few of the jokes if its supposed to be funny to show the audience that it will be a comedy.
The way its put together seems to be music overplayed that fits the mood of the animation, sometimes changing as the plot unfolds with some dialogue coming through. Text is often used to explain things or show producer and release date. In some cases a voice over is used but when using a lot of dialogue from the film itself they use more text.
My plan for leaving university is probably not your typical plan to start with, as I no longer live with my parents I don’t have them to fall back on while I find my dream job. When I leave university I will need to get a job pretty quickly to pay bills, as I will be living with my boyfriend back in Grantham (we will not be able to survive on his wage alone). Grantham is actually a great place to live, although I am unsure of career prospects in this industry, but there are direct train routes to places like London, Leeds, Nottingham and Manchester, which are all have better prospects in the animation industry, so it would be possible to commute.
The first step of my plan is to sign onto an agency, or find a part time job in a shop or a cafe. This will allow me to help out with bills whilst living in Grantham yet give me time and freedom to search for a good job in industry.
The way I will go about finding a job in industry is by paying close attention to animation jobs on twitter and actively searching online. The online platforms I plan to use vary from Linkedin, and I have updated my page, Guardian Jobs and Reed online.
In the meantime I plan to continue my creative practice, as I am realistic about the quality of my work and do not yet feel it is of a professional standard so do not expect to find a job straight away. One of the ways I plan to do this is by working as a freelance graphic designer at Craven Digital as they have too much work at the moment and have asked for some of my time. This will allow me to develop and hone my design skills and hopefully build up my portfolio whilst I continue to look for design jobs. Ideally I would love a permanent position in a design/animation studio for financial security and to make friends and contacts, however as well as being realistic about the quality of my work I’m also realistic about the industry and I am well aware that a lot of work is freelance rather than contract based. But I have also analysed the benefits of working freelance, because freelance work means you constantly have to hunt for work it means that you are constantly updating yourself on what’s going on in industry. Also because of the time frame I don’t think you would ever get bored working freelance due to the pace of turning around multiple projects and the need to be as productive as possible to get through enough projects in a year to keep the income coming in.
Another part of my twelve month plan is to learn to drive over this period. I believe it will greatly broaden my field of opportunities as I can go wherever for a job with no restrictions and no expensive train fares for last minute interviews. It would also take the stress out of going for interviews, as trains make me anxious if I’ve never been to the destination before. Of course I need money in order to learn to drive. I am expecting a relatively large tax rebate soon so hopefully that will start me off and then I can hopefully pay the rest with the temporary job I have at the time.
Another creative opportunity that I would like to pursue is working with The Journey Man who did the voice over in my final major project. He was very pleased with how the animation turned out and has said that he would be very interested in finding funding to do more projects like this in the future and will be in touch. I am really excited for this and I hope it will come off as I really enjoyed making it. To try and make this a reality I have looked into some possible funding that you can see on my blog, including the women in film grant but I think it would be good to look together to find something that works for us both. I also plan to join funding networks and soon after graduation, delve further into any possible international stories that could be animated and international pots of money that might pay for it. In the meantime I’ll also return to where I first heard the story I animated at a lantern walk in Skipton castle run by the Woodland Trust. I think it would be a good exercise would be to go back to their next one and hear more stories, as this was big inspiration last time. I will also be looking for more events like this around the country.
This project was so great for me, mainly because The Journey Man was such a pleasure to work with and I truly believe combined with the freelance graphic design work, I might actually have a chance of making enough to be a viable income if we can source funding to do more similar projects to extended practice, and that would be a dream lifestyle. I would set myself up an office hopefully in my house and work from home in a more professional environment than a living room possibly expanding into a separate office with the hope of hiring more employees if the project work took off. I think that this would be a lot longer than twelve months down the line though, but I have thought that it would be good to do what Fettle Animation Studio do by taking on recent Grads from Creative Skillset and then half their wage is paid for by them.
Although this plan of action for the future seems to be quite a nice idea on paper, I think personally I am not ready to go straight into industry, and a studio yet. I don’t yet feel confident enough in my work and I think having a six month period after graduating to do freelance work and possibly work with The Journey Man will really improve my portfolio and showreel and hopefully I will then have something I am proud to show to industry. I think that by being employed by a studio of a really high standard there’s lots of pressure to have your work up to that standard and I don’t feel confident that mine is yet. I feel that this confidence could come soon though, as I am improving with everything I do. For example I am extremely pleased with my final major project but a lot of my other work does not meet this standard, and I think in six months I could be where I feel I should be now.
If this isn’t the case in six months, I will review the situation and take an alternate plan of attack of looking around for internships where I will be able to learn new things, get experience and improve my show reel without as much pressure of having to meet the standards of a paid employee on a salary yet with enough to learn more skills so that I could impress them to be at that stage one day. This could also turn into a job if all goes well or at least create a bank of professional contacts that I can reach out to when I am ready to apply for a job. Another benefit of following this plan of attack is that I think it would be a good opportunity to travel out of my comfort zone and work somewhere I have not been before either in the country or internationally, because I know it would only be for a short term it would not be as daunting as say taking a completely new job in a new place. I do also plan to improve my French and Spanish so this may come in handy when applying for international internships.
As for local, national and international networks, I would like to and plan on joining a few storytelling networks. This would be useful for me to source new material for future projects that could be similar to my extended practice. I plan on not limiting myself by only joining those in the UK, I think it would be best to look internationally also to source new foreign material as this is likely to have been portrayed to a UK audience and it would be interesting to make stories of other cultures relate to our culture as the UK grows more multicultural every day. A great example of one of these networks is The International Storytelling Network that host events all around the world. What I like most about the network is that they focus on telling “stories that change the world” meaning the stories told have meaning, message and objective. The best kind of stories. This might also provide a great opportunity to travel myself and meet these storytellers for first hand research from the country of origin. For this I may need to find translators but I know many people who are bilingual in many different languages including Japanese, Spanish, Hindi, Polish, Latvian, Chinese, and many more. I have also looked more locally at Storytelling clubs where you can go to tell or listen to people’s stories. The closest to where I will be based in Grantham is Leicester Guild of Storytelling, Tales at the Watermill (also Leicester) and Fables, Tales & Folklore in Peterborough. There are plenty to go and explore that will give me many contacts which will be useful especially if the work with The Journey Man doesn’t go ahead. - I’ll be able to take my business cards with me and a link to the work I have already created for extended practice to sell my practice.
The main way I will present myself to new contacts is through an online portfolio with a website that I just set up which will show all of my best work. I think this is great as you can just send them a link and everything you wanted to show them or are proud of is right there easily accessible, no pesky folders and having to physically show people, no YouTube links where they can also see things your not proud of. I have set up a Vimeo account for my professional standard work. I think eventually when I have more of a portfolio to show I will switch to Squarespace or possibly pay someone to create a professional website for me if I have the money.
My strategies for contacting people and making links with industry would be mainly on linkedIn, maintaining connections with the alumni group and following the creative network events at LCA and by volunteering at festivals (which would get me in to see the animations with less cost and also allow me to network with the organizers of the festivals who may put me in touch with professionals). This will be useful to reach out to people who I admire and find out how they got where they are and eventually ask for advice which will hopefully steer me in a good direction to a path I want to take.
I do not wish to undertake a masters degree as I feel like I have had enough of being education and I want to start my life now and move forward and I feel very stuck in education right now. I think my portfolio would benefit more from going into industry because I will learn from the professionals around me and I will face more problems that I will have to solve and I think this would really push me into improving. If I did change my mind I would possibly think about a creative masters where I can take some time out to improve my abilities if I needed to.
However I would be more interested in doing some short courses for example in script writing, storytelling, life drawing, and possibly storyboarding. I think all of these things would really benefit my practice.
Another path I could take would be teaching. However I don’t think I would want to go back to university to do this so a way around would be to get into teaching at a higher education level by maybe in a few years proceeding with guest lecturing to build up experience to be hired part time, and then get my PGCE through that so I can teach younger children. I would want to teach animation or art in general.
So to sum up my plan, I would like to take six months to improve my portfolio and become a better, more confident professional. In which time I will be earning money through a job doing whatever I can get with some freelance graphic design on the side, improving my French and Spanish (and learning to drive), and hopefully The Journey Man and I will find some funding and will plan our next venture together.
After the six month period I will reassess where I am at in terms of portfolio. If I feel confident enough in it then I will start applying for jobs in the industry. If I am not at that stage yet then I will apply for internships both in the UK and internationally. If this is the path I take I will think more seriously about doing some short courses alongside like script writing.
Eventually by the end of the twelve months (or if I decide to intern after eighteen months) I hope to either have a full time job with The Journey Man creating our own series for children’s television which would be fantastic, or a job working full time in an animation studio.
To keep up with animation in the future, I will continue to scroll twitter and all the things I follow including studios such as Disney and Blue zoo. I will also read Skwiggly as much as I can including looking at the tutorials on how to better myself and how to find jobs etc. I will also read Animation magazine as it is full of updates from all over the place including a job board which could be very useful. There is also Cartoon brew which i haven't looked at properly but it does look like it would be a good site to follow. There is a list of festivals on there which are all over the world so I think it would be good to keep track of that, I would love to go to an international festival at some point its just the money thats stopping me. Klik! in Amsterdam looks really good and I would love to go. It also happens to be the month of my birthday.
On BJ Crawfords blog I came across this post which is Joseph Meredith teaching at Columbia college in Chicago. It is fantastic! And I actually feel really put out that we didn't learn like this. Such a fundamental task as creating a good walk cycle and we had to learn it ourselves. I feel like I payed £8,500 to learn from youtube which I could have learnt at home. This teacher is amazing and I have learnt so much from it I just wish I found it earlier or our tutors had actually thought us like this. I feel my animation would have been so much stronger if I had more input like this. I now understand more about the numbering systems and how to position things etc. Its all well and good reading animation survival kit but my brain is the kind of brain that needs things fully explaining and giving examples all the way through like this. I am now following his vimeo and twitter and I hope to look through more of his videos and teach myself things properly.
I found this great character design showreel on Vimeo. I just love how old school the animation is like a lot of it is done on paper but it is so real and perfect using all the principles of animation. This is such an inspiration and makes me realise what my animation is missing. I think I would like to try a simple animation and make sure I use all of the principles. I think it would really improve my showreel and I would like to do it when I get chance. I especially like the panda in the second scene. I love the use of weight and gravity and reaction to the wind. I think reaction is a really important part in believing the animation. I also love how that hat moves in the next scene when he takes it off his head. It reminds me very much of classic Disney. As I was inspired so much by this I decided to find out who this animator was.
His name is BJ Crawford and there is not much information about him that I can find. However! He has worked on some really big films! Including Epic and Ice age continental drift. He has worked as a freelance animator and at Blue Sky Studios. Listening to some of the showreel it felt like some was done for 11 second club and I was right! the one with the hat was for it. It shows that even professionals do this and its good practice and improves your portfolio! This was a few years ago now though I wonder if he still enters things.
I sent The Journey Man a link to my animation and he seems really impressed with it! here is what he said: Sam - I have just watched the animation. It's fantastic! I love what you have done with the story - the characterisations, the music, the colours, the fitting together of the vocals - I am very impressed. Thank you so much for getting in touch to invite me to be part of this project. I don't think anything needs to be changed from my perspective. It's a really tight and fun piece of work. I hope you get what you need from this both in regards to your grading and further work. I will put a link to this immediately from my Facebook page and also eventually from my website. However, I would like to talk to you more about some further projects. It might be worth us having a phone conversation some time soon.
I will definitely be back in touch, but for now, let me again say thank you and well done, before I watch the film again :-)
What an awesome response is that!? I was so thrilled to read how happy he was with it and that he still wants to work with me in the future! Its something that i would really love to do as i thoroughly enjoyed this project so to get paid to do something similar again would just be amazing! As for funding he said he would look into it when we first spoke but i think it would be worth looking myself. There is screen yorkshire http://www.screenyorkshire.co.uk/investment/yorkshire-content-fund/ which offers between £10,000 and £500,000 but usually no more than 10% of the total production budget and their investment must be matched on identical terms with an equivalent amount of private sector investment. I believe that means we would have to get the same amount of funding from somewhere else in order for screen yorkshire to give us theirs. But after I leave uni neither of us will be in yorkshire so i don't think we would even qualify. There is something call AIR (animator in residence) where they are basically a museum exhibit being watched develop their idea in bradford museum of photography. When they are done the proposal is sent to channel 4 who usually commission the film. This sounds pretty interesting but I'm not sure it would work as I am collaborating for mine and I don't think he would like to sit in a museum as he actually has a life. On an international level there is the Women in Film Finishing Fund http://womeninfilm.org/film-finishing-fund/ "The Women In Film Finishing Fund gives grants to filmmakers working in both short and long formats, in all genres — narrative, documentary, animated and experimental. To apply for the Finishing Fund, the filmmaker must have completed 90% of principal photography and have a rough cut at the time of application. You do not have to be a Women In Film member to apply, and we encourage applications from around the world." I think i could qualify for this and therefore apply when we had our next project planned/nearly complete. However I think it would be better to get funding from the beginning. Still an idea though, closest one so far! So there are things about its just a case of finding them and makings are we fit the criteria.
I think I really want to trial animate CC as it think it may solve some issues I have with photoshop. For one it think my lifework will be better as a) you can play with the line after you have drawn it and b) its a vector so it won't look bad blown up. I think now they have changed it it will be easier to navigate and I am looking forward to that. There are many features on here that look very interesting including being able to tag a colour and change it throughout the whole composition. That would be SO cool and so much easier!It also has a HTML 5 canvas template which looks super exciting! I am really looking forward to giving this a go!In fact...im going to have a look right now! I decided to use a tutorial as i find this really helps to get the hang of software instead of looking around blindly they actually tell you about stuff. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SD9NbRbhhw it was actually a really good tutorial. great pace and very informative.
Here is what I made! (using his assets)
Overall I think this software has a lot of potential and is actually relatively simple to use with the option to make it more complicated. I think a good step from here would to be to do another tutorial then create my own character and attempt to animate it with no tutorial. I think if i am able to get the hang of it, it will make animating a lot easier for things where you don't have time to animate frame by frame. Its also great for web based things and can create cool looping gifs for websites etc. This is what I would consider low cost animation and a lot of companies may choose to use it so learning it will be of great benefit to me. It also means I can offer clients something more within their budget. I think my FMP would have been done in a lot less time if i had of used this and the lines would be much cleaner. Although i did want it to be frame by frame. I do love how this does your in-betweens for you. Yes I am pleasantly surprised and glad I gave it a go. I will definitely make the most of my free trial.
So Loop de loop are finally open for submissions! The deadline is 29th May so I have just cleaned up my gymnast and made it a gif and submitted! Here is my entry again and proof i submitted :)
Here is my CV after making a few adjustments after talking to mike. Apparently I was underselling my abilities in the skills section buy not saying how competent i was. Hopefully that is better now. I also have changed the email address to be a professional one not the uni one.
I have set up an online portfolio/website/blogger for my professional practice as I thought it would be a good way of showing people what I can do when they ask. I can also put this on my business card so they have somewhere specific to go to. I am actually really pleased with how it turned out. I was thinking of completely designing a website but that would take a lot of time and re learning things and there are some things I have no idea how to do yet and it would also require getting a domain name. So I decided to use my new professional google email and created a blogger but made it look less like a blog and more like a portfolio. Including tabs for all different areas of practice including animation, graphic design, character design, and photography. I also created a vimeo account so that the videos on my website looked more professional and all the same and its a new account so I can just stick to the good pieces of animation. Unfortunately theres a weekly update limit for the free one so I will have to upload more next week and alter it on the website. Heres the link to my new site!! http://elysejackson.blogspot.co.uk
Here is my first attempt at my business card. I went with some texture and the reversed colours and an illustration of myself. I quite like it but I'm not sure if it looks professional? I like how it looks really sleek on one side and then its a bit more fun on the other.
Okay I have decided to go with the textured front and no texture on the back so you can see the words better. I have also decided to just put email website and phone number on the back as it would be an awfully long list with all the social media and it looks cleaner without. Plus if you go on my website all the info is there AND you can find me on most social media with just my name thats on the business card.
My initial thought here was use the red to cover the red like I had read online. so i lined up the cape on the neck with the main part of the red on the old design. luckily this made the other parts hidden too and there was a convinetntly shaped helmet nose in the original work. Unfortunately we agreed the placement was wrong and it need to be further up the arm.
I then made it larger and moved it up but couldn't find a place where it hid things so i flipped the image making the dark shadows of the cape hide the majority with a little spilling over to the abs which I'm hoping will blend with the lines and shading.
Once we decided he was happy with the position I started adding the bits that we had discussed. I sent him a photo of the top half and he was very excited and said he loved it. I didnt really know what to do next so he said he wanted a shield near but not central on the elbow and an immortals face. So i put a detailed shield just above the elbow spilling onto it and wrapping it round the arm and the immortal face wrapping round the forearm. I used photos and merged them together on photoshop for this as he wanted photorealism and tattooists do that from actual photos. It would get really rubbish if they were copying my slightly off copy. This is all he has asked for for now and he is very excited for it. I have suggested he goes for a consult first though to double check it is possible mostly for the coverage as this can be tricky.
I have found lots of nice business cards. A lot of art ones have an illustration on i guess this helps show what the person can do so thats a good idea. I also really like the ones with the reverse colours on each side.I would love to have some texture to it. Here are a collection of business cards that I like.
Here is the flag with the thicker lines. it really does make it pop more.
