SEEKING FOR JOB IN LONDON
Despite the experience of making personal short films, my career as an animator started with a job hunting in this summer. To be honest, it’s not a successful shot, for only 2 out of 30 companies replied with intentions for possible future cooperation. However, I surely learnt somethings in day and night collecting information and sending e-mails.
By the beginning of the summer break, I had established a set of profiles, including my animation showreel, personal website, portfolio and CV ( maybe I also need to keep my social media runs, like YouTube and Insgram ). At the same time I’d been submitting previous works to festivals on FilmFreeway and updating awards status.
It was followed by an investigation of animation studios across London, even the remote working studios all over the Europe. I listed the studios with their business, characteristics, representative works, and recruitment information. I was mainly targeting commercial companies that produce traditional 2D animation and motion graphics, and found that there are a lot of studios in London working on advertising and media business, and they are often more short-handed than the studios working on independent art films. Also, there is a greater demand for 3D creatives than 2D. Overall, most of them don’t provide work experience or interns. Seems the path for me to start my career as a full-time student is freelancing.
Some are very detailed, while some never give out what roles they are looking for.
I sent emails to every company I might qualify for, with a link to my portfolio website. (Looking back, I should have attached the files as well, so the recruiter could see the thumbnail instead of skip it.) For those who didn’t post recruitment, I also made a try. Since sometimes I wasn’t sure which specific role they needed, I wrote that I’m willing to do anything, visual development, storyboard, animation, clean up and colouring… I wonder if the results would have been better with a specific area. We all know how that turned out — I spent a month in anxiety waiting for a reply, which technically didn’t give me a job to do.
It feels like in this industry, job opportunities just come randomly only when the projects need in hand. Recommending may be a better way than blind shot, but it’s difficult from the start, especially for someone like me who isn’t good at socializing and networking.
This experience made me skeptical about whether I would be able to survive in London after graduation. I don’t mind where I stay as long as I have a suitable position that allows me to create personal value. But the cost of living in London is so high that it’s hard to imagine myself staying here without a job. Maybe I’ll try again a few months later with more animation works and a stronger portfolio.
LEARNING 3D
Considering there are 3D animations and the demand for 3D technicians everywhere, I’d better learn some 3D skills too, at least get a grasp of how it works. So I spent the rest of days watching self-teaching channels and learnt to use MAYA and Blender. In the end I made a model for my favourite anime character and basic sculpture, skeleton, rigging and skinning.
PICKING UP A JOB RANDOMLY ON SOCIAL MEDIA
It happened suddenly in one day giving up job hunting and surfing the Internet, when I ran across a post of temporary call-up for freelance animators. It was from one of the animation directors I followed on Chinese social media. He’s looking for some helpers to paint material textures for his project coming to end.
I popped up to message him and luckily took this chance. During the following week I was doing some repetitive simple work, drawing texture lines frame by frame. It was slightly different from the roles I expected to, but it was all I could get at first. I worked fast, so they gave me more shots, and pay, as they were rushing for the deadline.
The film has been released, so I can post a picture here. My efficiency makes me able to get the mechanical production work done quickly. But I would prefer more creative areas, like visual development, character design or storyboard.
In addition, I read about the studio’s workflow and management in their guidebook, which I can use in my own projects in the future. And I sent my portfolio to their database for future collaboration.
These above are generally my summer experiences, keeping myself seeking, reading, and learning, most of the time confused. I’ll make research in the next journal on the director I worked with, as the investigation of professional practice.