Friday 14 February 2014

Animex week 2014

It's the end of the fifth and last day of the Animex festival here in Teesside, and it's been a jam-packed week! I'm so tired from all that learning!

For those who don't know, Animex is an annual event held at Teesside University, though it's open to everyone. It's centred around animation/film, games and comics, and you can buy a ticket to attend any or all of those event categories. Industry professionals from all over come in to do talks about films/games/comics they've been working on and things they have learned in the industry. There are also networking events where you can talk to the speakers and ask questions or get feedback.

I went to Animex Game, which covered Monday and Tuesday, Animex Talk (the animation and film part), which covered Thursday and Friday, and a masterclass by Ed Hooks for the whole of Wednesday on 'acting for animators'. So it has been pretty full-on for me, being in all day every day! I have come away feeling so inspired, though, and it was good (if not a bit scary in a way) to get away from my work for a week.

I also took advantage of, and thoroughly enjoyed, the two networking evenings, which I didn't do the last two years because I stood around being timid and question-less. My confidence has grown a lot since then, and there were questions I genuinely wanted answered, which helped a great deal:

  • Austin Wintory, a brilliant games score composer, helped me with a method for coming up with appropriate music for my project. He said to find different pieces of music, of different moods, styles and speeds, and just shove them in with an edit of my film to see what effect they have - effectively a sound moodboard. Once I have figured out what styles fit where, I can then go about creating my own (original) music that matches that style or mood.
  • Dan Lund of Walt Disney Animation Studios answered my question on how they keep everything so consistent across a film like Frozen when they have so many people working on it. They have a 'style guide', which was something I'd never heard of, which is a document of pictures and notes that show what characters move in certain ways, including which mouth shapes you should not use for specific characters, and what points in the film call for harsh shapes or soft shapes, etc.
  • Ed Hooks, an acting teacher, I largely corresponded with over email. I sent him the latest cut of my animation for feedback on the flow and story and he gave me some good pointers, highlighting where there were discrepancies and what could be made much stronger and more compelling. I will write about these things as I come to address them, but first I have to plan and work out what I can change realistically in the time I have left.
  • Liam Russell from Framestore described to me what kind of animation work there is in the visual effects industry, as I said I didn't necessarily want to limit myself to feature animation. As I expected, they mostly use creature work, and depending on the job there may be some character work involved (but not very likely). He said that really I just need to make a decision on where I want to be because that will affect what I produce to put on my showreel and the way I work.
  • Shelley Page from DreamWorks and Victoria Long from Double Negative answered my question about how interested they were in 'creative CVs': it isn't worth spending time doing as the showreel should do the talking, and if anything is going to be done to one's CV it should definitely not be full of bright, painful colours or be white text on black so it won't scan properly!

I have a lot to mull over now, especially regarding where I can make my project miles better before I delve into the last stage of animation and commit completely to what I have.

Phew!

Caitlin :)