A Talk from Chris Luk

Today we had the joy of listening to a hilarious and motivational talk by ex student and designer at Turner Broadcasting, Chris Luk. Coming to the end of the year, it's easy to feel bogged down with lack of sleep, deflated expectations and feeling lost as to which niche you fit in in the industry.

Something I loved about this is that Chris said himself whilst looking back at his show reel that he wasn't the best animator when he graduated but he has still been massively successful. I often feel inferior to peers but he joked about how he was working on a project and agreed to animating something when he had no idea to go about it so spent the night referring to online tutorials to help him through. This definitely resonated well with all of our struggles, it's nice to know that even when you look like you know what you're doing, you actually don't have a clue.
He encouraged us to push ourselves to find internships because you will inevitably make contacts/ friends in the industry; emphasizing that rather than just asking for work, ask for help and advice over a drink and people will be more willing to give you a chance. I think it's common to become very intimidated by the industry, but he insists that once you break through it's actually quite a small world and that so long as you Be Nice and Work Hard, there's no need to be scared.

This talk was great in keeping morale up and giving me the belief that as long as I'm not abhorrently untalented, I can also succeed with hard work.