London Industrial Trip

Tuesday 9th March 2010

The Illuminated Film Company

The Illuminated film company are mostly freelance. They are currently working on the TV series 'The little Princess'. They have worked on animations such as 'The Snowman, Father Christmas and The very hungry caterpillar'. The director of 'The little Princess', Ed Foster showed us around the studio and talked to us about their company and gave us some great advice. He told us that storyboard artists get paid up to £1000 per storyboard sheet. Some of them work from home to finish their work on time. The animators have to produce around 1000 frames in a week. The scripts for the animations have to be approved by channel 5 before they begin production.

The animators have to stick to the same style as everyone else. You're animating cant stand out from the rest, it has to stay the same.

Ed Foster explained to us that for a good portfolio take out work which is not relevant to the company you are applying for. Adapt you're style to match the companies style as you have more of a chance getting a job with them. Make a blog of you're portfolio, its the best way to send you're work to companies. DVD's can sometimes get lost or ignored. Learning software packages is a great way to get into the industry. Good timing is important in animation and being able to adapt you're styles. Its good to have experience already on you're CV. keep it brief and include personality its a great way to be remembered.

i enjoyed visiting this company and found the advice Ed Foster gave us very useful. He spent a lot of time with us going threw our portfolios and did not rush threw them he gave us all individual advice. He like my designs and the color i use. He said that i should include different styles in my portfolio and show were these designs came from like including some sketches. Overall we spent about 2 hours or more in this studio and i would deffinitly consider this company in the future.

Blue Zoo Productions

Back in 2008 this was a small company just starting out, were they did adverting and tried to pitch a 3D animation and were interested in 2D animators. Its amazing to see how much this company has changed from visiting them again. They are now interested in working in the software Maya were they have learnt to develop a 2D animated look using a cut out technique. So instead of looking for 2D animators they are now looking for 3D animators.

They said the best way to show you're work instead of mailing it in the post is to email a link of you're work. This is easier for them to quickly look at it. They look for flexible artists which can draw different styles. You are likely to have more work and stay in the industry for longer if you do. they do take on work experience but don't take on runners because the studio is only small and they have no need in them.

This company has progressed a lot since i last visited them. My impressions this time was not so enthusiastic. They didn't seem overly keen to have us there. I understand that they are busy but they were also busy the last time we saw them and they were very keen on seeing us. I think it would have been better if we had a lecture company us.

Wednesday 10th March 2010

Prime Focus

Prime Focus is one of the largest post production companies in the UK. Specialising in special effects. The company began in India. They worked on music videos and Hollywood movies such as 'Avatar, Harry Potter and stardust'. They use CGI as it is cost effective and great for situations that are hard to shoot. they use software such as Kratatoa Render for particle effects, Fluid Simulation, Crystal Managment System, Spore Manipulation, Camera re-projection and the new Stereo Depth extraction.

They told us the best way to get into special effects is to start editing and focusing on what you're into . Using different 3D packages is important. They also gave us advice that you need to no what's coming next or next year involving animation or special effects just so you are up to date with what's going on. How to react to customers and push the boundaries with you're work.

We went to Prime Focus instead of going to 3 Mills studio. They gave us some good advice and showed us some brilliant visual effects they have done. It was worth going to this company even if you are not interested in visual effects it gives you an idea of how they do it and what software they are currently using.

Collingwood O'Hare Entertainment Ltd

Animated TV series such as 'Yoko! Jamamoko! Toto! Dennis the menace and Oscars Orchestra'. They are currently working on the American TV series 'The cat in the hat'. They produce all the sound editing, storyboard and all the post production work in house. They have a Tree house company in Canada where animation is sent. The latest animations have been produced in Flash and cell-action. The scripts are produced before the animation. They mainly produce animations for pre school children and are currently are pitching an idea to Disney for a children's TV series called 'Ribbit Rabbit Robbot'.

The advise they gave us is that Drawing keeps you in work and if you have strong skills you will always be wanted within the industry. Teamwork is important in animation and the ability to multitask. Artists also need to be able to critisize themselves to improve. Its also good to specialize in you're prefered area within animation, then you can focus on developing you're skills. The best way to get a good final year animation is to keep it short and focus on animating it well.

I enjoyed visiting Collingwood. I like the simple designs they use for their animations especially for the one they are currently working on. He gave us lots of advice which will help during my animation process.

Companies I'm going to visit in London

Today we had a short briefing of the different companies we are going to look at in London and how to get to them (there is going to be a lot of traveling to the companies). We will be going to four companies these are;

• The Illuminated Films company- illuminatedfilms
• Blue Zoo Productions Ltd- bluezoo
• 3 Mills Studio- 3mills
• Collingwood O'Hare Entertainment Ltd- collingwoodohare

We will be arriving at the Hotel Bayswater, on Monday 8th March at around 1pm and then we will have to wait around for a couple of hours untill the rooms are all sorted out. The rest of the evening is for us to do what ever we please weather thats going to look at where the companies are or going to see some galleries which will go towards our personal development files.

Tuesday 9th March-11am

We will be going to the company Illuminated Film company. From looking at their website i found out that they produced an animated series based on the Eric Carle books 'THE VERY HUNGRY CATERPILLAR'. They also produced the movie 'CHRISTMAS CAROL' and a half hour animation called 'WAR GAME'. They are currently working on 'Buddy & Elvis' an animation of a cat and a dog for a television series. Looking at the company so far they seem interesting and they have won a lot of awards for their animations so i hope when we visit this company that will explain more about what they do and what media they use but they seem more traditional hand drawn animation.

In the afternoon we will be visiting the company Blue Zoo Productions Ltd. I have actually seen this company previously in the first year when we had the London trip. i have to say from looking at their website they seemed to have grown a lot over the past 2 years since i last visited. Their website seems more up to date that the illuminated films company.

Wednesday 10th March-11am

The first company of the day we will be going to is 3 Mills Studio. This studio looks amazing, the location its in is just beautiful i wasnt expecting it to look like this. 3 mills has massive studios and sets were features like Fanatsic Mr Fox or Tv commercials for tesco are produced. Hopefully when we visit there will be a big production going on that we could have a sneek peek at, well hears hoping.

The last company we will be visiting is Collingwood O'Hare Entertainment Ltd. They are an award winning animation company that to children's television series such as 'Dennis and Gnasher' and 'Yoko! Jakamoko! Toto!' They have also won a BAFTA award for the animated series 'The secret show'. i hope the companies i go to see will help me to decide what i want to do when i finish university and what type of animation to get into either hand drawn or computer games animation.

Current Project

Im currently working on my final year animation Bob and Oscar a public awarness film about leaving animals in a car on a hot day. I first came up with Bob who is based on my Dad, a young chap who lives by himself and has the company of his dog Oscar. I came up with the idea of Bob & Oscar during the 2nd year were i did a short animation to show the relationship of the two characters together. Oscar is left at home while Bob has been out to work, Oscar looks sad because he is missing his owner. While hes sleeping in his bed Bob returns home and Oscar is happy to see him again.

Ive had alot of fun with these two characters. They are simple and are easy to animate. Im currently working on the software Flash but would like to experiment with Maya but i will have to try and get a copy of the program. Ive tried using Maya previously and found it complicated. All i need to do is research and experiment using it. Im in the process of animating Bob & Oscar and experimenting with background designs which ive left abit late it should have been done at the beggining but i want the animation to look nice since its my final animation so i want everything to look perfect.

Creative Futures week

Monday 1st March 10

Day one- Entrpreneurship Day

Promofix Ltd (lecture one)

It was creative futures week this week starting from Monday 1st March, until today Wednesday 3rd March. Creative futures week is mainly about people coming in to give us lectures on how to present yourself weather that's in a CV or in portfolios and also how to get into the industry etc.

Kathryn Holloway was our first speaker of the day and she works in a company called Promofix. She specialises in marketing and graphic design. Her talk was very interesting and i found it very useful as she explained how to get into the industry. She explained that you need to start off small but think big and use your skills to make you stand out. Make sure that you understand social media's and new medias that are available today such as using Twitter or Linked in (social networks).

Kathryn also talked about how she started off in the advertisements business and how she was able to start off her own company. Her is a link to their website which tells you more information about her and what her company does....

http://www.promofix.co.uk

Business Planning (lecture two)

The next lecture was a talk by Garry Greenwood from Venture Wales Ltd. It is an organisation in Wales that gives support to people starting a business or self employment. They are situated at the industrial estate in Wrexham. Hear are some of the points that Garry spoke to us about;

What do you think is a business plan? He explained to us that most businesses fail because they done market or communicate that they have a business. He explained that there are six main sections for business planning which are;

• Introduction/Background
• Market and Competitors
• Marketing Strategy
• Operations. What and how we are doing it.
• Financial Data and forecasts
• Appendices
• Budgeting. Making sure you have enough money coming in to pay the bills.

He went into a lot of detail with us about how not to fail when setting up your own company and how to go about it with getting funding from the bank, how to ask them, what to ask them for. Make sure that you no what the business plan is and go to the bank and tell them about you're idea and get the funding for your idea. Though this lecture was very informative it didn't appeal to me as I'm not looking at making my own company or have any desire in the future to do so. I have to say it was interesting to find out how difficult it is to start up your own company and whats involved in making one. If i ever wanted to start up my own company at least ill no where to get the advice i need to help me. I did write a lot of notes for this lecture but id rather not put all of them in hear as this is mainly on what my opinion is about the lecture and just a brief description of what the lecture was about. Hears a contact details for future reference;

0791 941 7528- Venture Wales Ltd.

http://www.venturewales.com/

Victoria Reynolds (lecture three)

Victoria Reynolds is a Ceramic artist. She did a degree in Fine art Ceramics in Leeds, then went into retail for two years. She wanted to be creative again so she did a temping job and set up her own work space at home. She also did work experience in art galleries were she gained knowledge on how to put up exhibitions and got a lot of contacts in the process. She did alot of voluntary work and workshops at schools. In 2006 she set up a studio at home and got an accountant to help her with her business. Her focus was aimed at schools and she entered gallery openings.

Victoria explained the good points and the bad points of

setting up you're own business such as, how much to charge

customers for her pieces of work and trying not to sell yourself short wtih how much to charge people. Managing the work load, learning to say no to people for certain commissions that she cant do which she had to prioritise to a specific area like aiming at schools. Then in 2009 she was offered a teaching job part time 3 days a week. The rest of her time she worked in her studio and balanced the work load. She even began to consider to mass produce her pottery/ceramic pieces but isn't sure if that's what path she wants to go down as her pieces seem more personal if handmade, they are more unique. Her advise to us is to get a professional portfolio together with good photos of our work. Make sure it is organised well/ well presented. Come across professional, advertise you're work, Networking, emails, go to openings, exhibitions and just get involved. Find you're own balance, stick to what you believe in and keep motivated.

Overall this was a nice lecture even though it wasn't specified in my area, it was still very informative. I particularly found it interesting when she was telling us about how she started off and were she is now. It has taken her awhile to find what she wanted to do and she still is pushing herself to do more. It just goes to show that it takes time to get any where in any work today and to succeed you need to keep on it and push yourself and never give up otherwise you wont succeed in what you want to do in life.

Victoria's contact details;

http://www.victoriareynolds.co.uk/

Applying for Grants- Tracey Simpson (lecture four)

Stiwdio Safle, Based in Cardiff, UK and abroad. Public art commissions, project manage, public art. Basically this talk was about funding and grants. Tracey spoke to us about were we can get grants and funding from and how to come about it. She explained that some funders wont fund certain funds and you are given the amount of funds you ask for, no more than that and you wont get any funding if your project is half way threw. Some funders will grant for individuals and some for just groups. To help with the application process for grants or funding hear are a few tips;

• Check priorities and eligibility for funding, Researching about your contact.
• Check deadline for both release of application and receipt.
• What is the cost, or how much are you wanting for funds.
• Start date, finish date
• Images to present what it is they are funding for.
• Your financial track record.

The list goes on about the project officers may contact you to advise you about eligibility and interviews with the funders or they might visit to see what you are doing or how you're project is going etc...

I didn't find this lecture appealing to me but it was good to find out how to apply for funding or grants if i wanted to do a big project. I thought it was mainly aimed at the design/making side of it then aimed at animators/illustrators for example. I don't think this information would be helpful in the future as i wont be doing any big projects which involves alot of funding, but it could be use full if i want to start up my own business and need some funding to do so, like making an animation studio and if i need the equipment to do so. It was very informative but not what i intend to do after i graduate from uni.

Finance- Shona Hamleton (Lecture 5)

Shona Hambleton is from Tax assist accountants and talked about how to keep the business in check ad your accounts. I wrote alot of notes about this lecture but I'm not going to put it all up on hear because there is just too much to talk about. She talked about money coming into the businesses and money going out, keeping receipts and records of payments, VAT, benefits for us such as fundings etc. She talked about business structure, profits, costs, bank transactions and keep hold of statements and paying slips or credit card statements. Income Tax, corporation Tax. Basically this lecture was mainly aimed at people if they have their own business and it didn't appeal to me.

We then filled in a comment sheet on what we thought of the day and if we had any suggestions that they can do to improve the creative futures week. The lecture i preferred was the first lecture we had with Kathryn Holloway for promofix ltd. I thought she was very professional and informative and i preferred her telling us how she got into graphic design even though its not my preferred field it was still interesting to see how other people have struggled to get were they are today and to see wee she is now in advertising and the company is still growing.

Tuesday 2nd March 10

Day two- Employability Day

Lecture one- Getting a job in design- Chris Ramsden

The first lecture of the day was about a Designer, Chris Ramsden. Chris graduated in 1980 as a Designer. He originaly wanted to do photography and did a foundation degree in London which then he followed onto going into industrial design. He showed us some images of what he designed and all the processestht he went threw to get the design done. He designed wheelchairs, he mainly aimed his designs around the handycapped. He also did some designs for NASA space station and showed us images of what he designed for this which was a box which held experimental bio items from space and also a sleep monitoring box which held the equipment for it.

Currently Chris is looking to create clinical designers for the future as there are no clinical designers available today. Hopefuly these designers will help improve the equipment for the disabled. I think this is a brilliant idea as he is trying to help with the cost of the equipment which will help make affordable equipment for people instead of the expensive equipment available with the NHS today. He explained that Health is a massive design opportunity because everyone at some point will need hospital equipment. The lecture seemed a bit pointless it was just aimed at designers so had no relevance to my field, though i did find it interesting that he was explaining that you can look at anything and it can be redesigned or designed like how he looks at the medical side of design and that there is a lot to design for it.

What does and employer/client want to see: portfolios and CVs- James and Stuart- Thoughtful (Lecture two)

Thoughtful is a small agency in manchester. James and Stuart from Thoughtful spoke to us about different points such as;

• What does and employer want to see in youre portfolio.
• start a dialog to gather contacts.
• Email companies when you have a portfolio together.
• what common mistakes there are in portfolios.
• Portfolio format.
• Bad ideas for a portfolio or presentation.
• What clients look for.
• Research the studios youre applying too.
• Prepare a 30min presentation for the interview.
• Send an email to say thank you to the company for allowing them to interview you etc.
• Dont give up!

These points were very useful and i will use them when im applying to different companies. James and Sturat also showed us quick responses of clients such as Greg Quinton, Adrian Shoug, Michael Johnson, Patric Baglee, Jonathan Baldwin, Paula Scher-Pentagram, Michael Wolff, James Corazzo. They asked them the same question "What advice would you give to a graduate entering the industry. their answers were very helpful, they gave basiclay the same answers as the points above. They also showed us examples of different types of portfolios people had, mainly graphic designers portfolios.

Portfolio and presentation in the digital age- Tessa Elliott (Lecture three)

The next lecture was with Tessa Elliott about digital arts. She talked a bout different digital arts and showed us some of her images and videos of the work she does. this seemed like it was aimed for fine artist or digital media i didnt find this very interesting, though i did like the idea of how they use movement.

contact info: http://surgerydar.co.uk

Wednesday 3rd March 10- Ask the Expert Day

Stepping into the Animation and Computer Games industries- chris Woodworth. (Lecture one)

Now this lecture out of all of them was the best. Chris woodworth from TT Games showed us his showreel of what he has done. It ranged from expressions to some clips of leggo batman and Indiana Jones. Chris gave us some very good advice about what to put in a portfolio such as character sheets, expressions and make sure we have life drawing. I found his talk very interesting and Im even thinking about going into the games industry when i graduate.he gave us usful web adresses;

• http://www.cgsociety.com
• http://www.creativecrash.com -character models
• http://www.animationmeat.com - dialog, dope sheet
• http://www.imagineanimation.net - magazine, networking like facebook
• http://www.animationmentor.com - online animation school

Commercial Storyboards- Nathalie Tayton (lecture two)

The last lecture of the day was with speaker Nathalie Tayton who works in a London production company. She is a freelance storyboard artist who does storyboards for different production companies weather thats to do with advertisments or films. She showed us three storyboards that she did all that are TV advertisments. One is for a Sainsburies ad, 2nd a chewing gum ad and the last a public awarness advert which involved a young girl and a lad, were the young lad was abusing the girl. I liked the quick sketches she did for the storyboard and the style. I like the fact that she does them quickly so they aren't perfect they are sketched out quickly. She somtimes uses colour and bigger boards depending on what the client wants to see. Nathalie advises that we should do life drawing and observational drawings that will help us to improve our skills and clients like to see drawing skills. She mentioned also about making your own website to advertise ourselves by putting our work on their. Her advise was very useful i would have prefered seeing a few more sketches of hers or more storyboards but you have to take in account she is probably very buisy and doesnt have time to show much wrk and we should be grateful that she showed us what she had today.

My overall feedback of this week, this week has been very buisy with going to all these lectures, some were interseting like the games animation and some were not so interesting or didnt have anything to do with what i want to do after i graduate like i went to talk about starting a business and keeping the taxman on side. if i was interested in starting my own compaby or selling my won work this would have been interesting to no what tax i would have to pay etc, but it didn't appeal to me unfortunatly. This is my last Creative futures week and i made sure i made the most of it and i shall do the same when i go down to London to see the different companies we will be visiting.