Study Task 4 Exit Strategy

BEFORE I GRADUATE

-Careers Appointment

-Identify studios around Guildford that I would like to work at. 

-Draw up a speculative letter draft/ cover letter

-Update my CV, using  https://www.prospects.ac.uk/ and check with careers advisor.

-Register with Creative Access at https://creativeaccess.org.uk/  

-Check opportunities on Screen Skills https://www.screenskills.com/

-Check out graduate schemes at the BBC /Channel 4/ ITV.  

-Improve my socials and have a website ready.

 -Check out journals/websites which focus on race and culture to send my essay to, and then send it

-Sign up job sites.

-Utilise the library as much as possible.

- Apply to internships, such as BlueZoo.

AFTER GRADUATION

-Attend Annecy, network, hand out business cards!

-Use the uni resources for as long as I can until I have to move back home  to improve my practice and portfolio.

-Learn the technical side of Maya 

-Work on strengthening my portfolio.

 -Start properly hunting for jobs in the South/ internships (hopefully get an internship or job!)

-Seek advice on portfolio where I can.

-Don’t lose touch with animation if I have a non industry related job.

-Get any work experience I can/volunteer if I’ve working a non industry related job.

-Obviously earn money regardless of where.

Katie Gascoyne: Blue Zoo

Key take away: There's no 'one way' to get in the industry and there are many nontraditional routes that people can take.

Employability

• Decide if I'm a specialist or a generalist (quality has to be very high for generalists) and specialists are most common in studios (which is where I see myself).

Portfolio

• Apply to the 'right studios', relevant to the work you are showing and want to make.
• PROVE you are right for the job- research the studio.
• Have an 'industry standard portfolio' - research studio artists for reference. 
• Your work should be 80% of what you aspire to be.  

SHOULD BE:

• Clean and Simple
• White backgrounds
• Large Images
• Simple UI

Opportunities and Networking - Do it!

• BYOA
• Festivus
• MAF
• Annecy
• Northwestivus
• Events
• Festivals
• Forums

 Advice for networking! 

1. Pick someone to speak to

2. Have 3 back up questions

3. Take a deep breath

•  Don't underestimate the power of props!

• Time saving in the Katie's short film: Taking expressions from the animatic for reference for the expressions character sheet. 

I asked what it is that they want to see from Background Art vs Vis Dev
BG: Should be high quality, finished stills. Vis Dev: Should show the development and iterations.

I showed Katie some of my work where she kindly gave some feedback, this is what I took from it:

• That my character designs had some charm but that I should include more commercial work, characters that children would love to see!
• An MA is not necessary as a step to learn 3D so long as you are disciplined, that draftsmanship is essential in blocking out sets etc..
• You can include illustrations in a separate folder- this could show extra skills
• After showing my COP final piece she said that the characters were distracting from the detailed BG, Katie said that a BG needs to be 'missing characters' - if they fit together then it's an illustration.