Friday 26 March 2010

Project Pitch for Wrexham in Bloom

This is the pitch idea I had for working on the Wrexham in Bloom project as part of my PDP, the concept behind the pitch was a flash based game, similar to games like puzzle bobble, aimed at young school children, years 5 & 6 of local schools, in which the more points they earn while playing the game the more information they learn about the importance of recycling and the local environment, and for every 100,000 points they could earn money off vouchers for local leisure centres or be exchanged for iTunes downloads.


When I presented this I presented it with a friend Kyle's Blog and the rest of the second years, who had their own concepts for this project, to the members of Wrexham council, the head of corporate marketing section, three members from the recycling team. One of the main issues that they had was with the corporate and the promotional aspects to the work, in terms of what they could and couldn't put out into circulation. The members of the council were overwhelmed by the range of work created since the initial project delivery six weeks ago, and where completely positive with the overall response to the project by the students.

One of the points that was raised by the council was relating to costings for the project, physical cost to the council i.e. how much would it cost to have an A1 vinyl produce.

Generic points; when we were working with characters they had massive problems getting the current one "Recycle with Michael" because they already have the Wrexham 'W',




they are therefore very keen to make sure that anything they do is with in their corporate guide lines, and were we as students are suggesting characters to be the head of a brand they said that it would be massively problematic as they don't want the council split into different sections with the characters as a figurehead, therefore in order to get the body of work that I am looking for to get a good mark I have to completely ignore what the council are saying as the feedback they are giving is very council based and therefore limited to what they can see, no surprise there as councils never like to give money way, so I am therefore going to concentrate on the work as it is for my portfolio.

Monday 15 March 2010

New video for animation V2

opinions, comments and thoughts all are welcome even bad ones

new video for animation

well I have done the rough cut of the video for my animation for comms and media, it's not the best but it is only the rough cut version I still have to do the dialog and edit it to make the timings work.


Friday 12 March 2010

London Industrial visit, March 2010

Day One.

Arrived in London today, 8th March 2010, after leaving Wrexham at 8am, and after resting for a little while and getting my room sorted out I partook in the atmosphere of the West end, with Gemma Morris and Ying Yau and one of Ying's friends, who acted as a sort of unofficial tour guide as she lives's down in London.

As I very rarely come to London, I welcomed having some one around my own age, and with similar interests to show me around the West end of London, mainly the tube stations and China town. I am looking forward to tomorrow, 9th March 2010, as I am going to visit the companies Double Negative in the morning and in the afternoon Picasso Pictures. I'm not sure what to expect from these companies as I was not expecting t
o be going to see these companies so I have not really looked at them till the Friday before we came down.


Day Two.

Well started today by going to Double Negative where they showed us around there studio's and showed us a show real of the current work and talked abut work they are doing as well as ways to get into the film and animation industry, but due to a Non Disclosure Agreement I have signed I can not go into much detail, other than to list the new movies that are due out this year, such as Ironman 2, Sherlock Holmes and Hot Fuzz.

I then had some time to kill before I had to be at Picasso Pictures so I walked along Oxford street window shopping and looking for other animation houses.

In the afternoon I visited Picasso Pictures where they showed us around the studio, which was a bit on the cramped side, but they were working on some new Direct Line T.V. adverts.

If had to sum up what I all of the visits today would be to learn the following two programs, Adobe Flash and Autodesk Maya. I then rounded the day off with a trip round to the local public house with some of the second and third years from animation.

Day Three.

This was the most informative day as I started the day by going to 12foot6 where they showed us a selection of work on the show real they have for this year, including Dog Judo, which I had seen a few of on Youtube.

This was followed up by a walk to Cartoon Network to talk with a few members of the development team, on the way there I called into Nickelodeon and Sony to find out if they had in anyone in the development team that had five minutes to give a short tour, I was unsuccessful however I did get the e-mails for the people to contact in future. I then went to Cartoon Network where they showed us a selection of work and tips on pitching to a green light council.


In all I highly enjoyed the this visit to London as I have seen how the pro's work and the standards that they set for others to work in the industry, and plan to build on it in October when I go back for the animation expo over halloween weekend.

Thursday 11 March 2010

back from London

back from London full report tomorrow

Wednesday 3 March 2010

Creative Futures Week 2010, well 3 days

Day one: Entrepreneurship Day

This was taken up by a number of seminars by the team from the careers section and guest speakers form the field of business. The first talk we had was from a practicing graphics designer while informative I feel that this section of the day was aimed, with a laser, at the graphics section of the art school than the rest of us, next came the worst part of the day a role play game called "Xing". I mean what a waste of time and money to produce, sure we need to how to start a business, but using something that is clearly designed and aimed at 15 - 17 year olds PLEASE !

The day ended with a double hit of "Pitching" and "Self Branding". The pitching was interesting but not as informative as I would have liked, compared to last years anyway, but the self branding talk was very informative as it made me realised how important the Internet is when going for new jobs or after potential clients.

I look forward to day two; Employability Day, as there are some interesting sessions scheduled that I plan to attend, including one on portfolio and CV writing for the artist.

Day Two: Employability Day

Well today I woke up in a positive mood for this was the one day of the week I was looking forward to, but what a surprise it was a big let down, I mean the first speaker just talked about how he used to be in a wheelchair and that he had worked for NASA.

This was followed up by a session with Thoughtful, on what an employer or client looks for in a CV and portfolio. I found this extremely useful, especially some key points such as:

  1. Find out which studio you want to work for - do your homework, who they are, what they do and why you should work for them.
  2. Start a dialog today - make contacts, make a list of five or six potential employers and send them an e-mail citing that you find their work inspiring.
  3. When the time is right send a short professional e-mail - with a PDF attachment with five to seven samples but no larger than 5Mb.
  4. If you don't get a reply with in 3 - 5 days give them a ring - do not just wait around for them to contact you be phone.
  5. Prepare an A3 size book style portfolio with 10 to 12 pieces of work, with attention to detail being paramount.
  6. Prepare for a 30 minute interview - but be aware it may only last 15 minutes, when you go in it is a nice idea to enquire as to how much time they have.
  7. Don't over stay your welcome - I know it seems dumb to mention that but when you are done pack up and go.
  8. Thank-you e-mail at the end - even if you don't get the job as it is always nice to stay in contact.
  9. never NEVER EVER give up.
After the session I asked if they would scan my folder as I have the up coming London trip post on London trip next week, they said it was fine but as I am on an Animation course I should think about investing in the iPad when they come out as it would allow me to show my work more effectively.

Day three: Ask the Expert Day

This day was devoted to talks from experts, I started the day off with a talk from Tomfoolery Pictures about how to start a production company and not die trying, this session was aimed at the Creative Lens Media course, CLM, however I found it useful as it has introduced ideas of where I can start to display my work, and whys of making a name for my self in the animation industry as well as screen agencies in the local area. I then followed this up with a session by Chris Woodworth from TT games on stepping into the animation and computer games industry. This was interesting as it gave me further tips on how to get a job and what to do once I have a been employed, plus some interesting tips on what to put into my portfolio; Life Drawing - form and movement work, Character Sheets and some storyboards, but not to go more than 10 pages maximum and to have my contact details on both my DVD show reel and on the bottom of the sleeves with my work in.

He also gave me a collection of useful websites for animation:
  • http://www.cgsocity.org
  • http://www.creativecrash.com - this is useful for models and rigged characters for use in Maya and they are free
  • http://www.animationmeat.com - useful for tips on animating
  • http://www.imageineanimation.net - is like the facebook for animation
  • http://www.animationmentor.com - has useful tips and advice and if you sign up you can get resource information from the pro's in Hollywood
After lunch I partook in two sessions, the first was A life in design and the Arts - your creative carer paths, these session's were interesting, despite the technical probes they had with the DVD and the Internet connection, as they reinforced the importance of not giving up and making contacts with people in the industry.