Industry Events
Blue Zoo (STUDIO VISIT)
Tuesday 11th October 2022
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We visited Blue Zoo studios in north London for a special tour and presentation from one of the founders. It was a really interesting and informative visit. Even though the target audience of Blue Zoo isn't the type I want to work with in my role, it was still a good presentation to hear in terms of pipelines and experiences in the industry.
Blue Zoo is a 22 year old studio and is one of the UK's leading animation studio with a staff of 300 + people. They debuted with their animation "Blue Cow" for the CBeebies launch. Their aim is to produce joyful and compelling stories. They longform content such as kids shows and short form like advertising and experimental films.
They also have several departments such as 2D/3D, licencing and IP development. They use Maya, Adobe, Blender and ToonBoom in their creation pipeline. According to them it takes 3 weeks for 1 minute of animation.
During the presentation I learned more about their process in the storyboard and Pre-Vis area when they spoke about how they make the Animatics. They used a program called PanelForge, and it is done all in house. They use a mix of 2D and 3D to create a rough block out of the environment and characters then they draw on top. This is really interesting because it is similar to my own process of combining 3D environments with my handmade drawings.
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When it comes to the animation process, they said that they spend time on key poses/storyboard poses and start in stepped for the first pass. You can animate to the camera and do rough blocking on parts that aren't seen.
The Newman Arms: Bring Your Own Animation (INDUSTRT EVENT)
Wednesday 26th October 2022
This industry event consisted of of a big meet up of Animators working in different environments giving feedback to each other. Even though the Animators there were more into polished Animation rather than my Pre Vis role, I still attended so I could get advice and tips about the pre visualization process. I met with Chester Sampson who previously worked at Illumination, Jellyfish and Blue Zoo as a character animator and in Pre Visualisation Artist. We spoke about what is expected in that role and what sort of pipelines there are. I learned from him about how I should take into account certain limitations when doing pre vis for live action projects. In real life projects I would have to take into account what camera gear is available and what camera movements are possible in real life. Whilst in a Animation context, there are camera angles that can be done due to being in a artificial environments where I can control more and have more liberties for movement.
FrameStore (STUDIO VISIT)
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Tuesday 15th November 2022
We were very fortunate to visit Framestore. It was very exciting to see a feature and episodic level studio at work. We got a tour around common areas and the work levels where the Animators are. We were also shown a presentation about Framestore, its origins and work. We got to see a pre vis workflow from Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness. That was really useful to see since I'm aiming for a previs career. Framestore was created in 1986 in Soho. It brought VFX to the forefront in the UK. They have 4 studios worldwide. Usually the studio has around 20 films going on at one time in production . Film is Framestore's largest footprint and they do all kinds of Genres. We were informed that Framestore makes a big effort for training and career development, they give a mentor and have external resources for practise. It was a great insight into more industry level activities and what it would be like working there.
Keyframe Studios (INDUSTRY EVENT)
Tuesday 7th February 2023
We had the Animation Director and Founder of Keyframe Studios, Asa Movshovitz, come talk to us about his history in the Animation industry and what Keyframe Studios specializes in. This was a quite informative talk as he spoke about his experiences in the industry and what we would expect. Things like experiencing disappointment at projects that don't get picked up or working with difficult clients. It was a honest talk and I appreciated it. He spoke about how the landscape had changed from Brexit and Covid.
Asa mentioned that before Brexit the UK people used to have to compete with EU people. There is a lobby group (ANIMATION UK) that advocates for more EU workers.
COVID and WFH was a huge change for the industry. Now you can apply in lots of places worldwide. But not being in person can be harder because you can't feed off the creativity from your co-workers. He recommended that we go into the studio, make an appearance, make yourself known.