CV!

And this is what I came out with and have been using.




The CV is over 2 pages, with the less necessary information like qualifications on the 2nd page.

I think it is a bit of a shock to absorb at first when looking at it, quite messy but it seems to have been working on a few potential employers so far as I mentioned.

I cannabalised a couple of my other drawings to bring a bit more visual stimulation to the already frothing madness that is this representation of myself. Barking mad maybe?

CV - Ideas and sketches

I know what should be in the CV, and I wanted a handwritten style of text, one page only and something to describe myself.
So I thought that the image that describes me most is a drawing of a dog and that I should just feature a dog eating the text somewhere or saying a little speech bubble.




Whilst doodling I came up with this idea of an angry dog spitting out the text, which I really like as an idea but couldn't get to look right in the sketches so I left it for the simpler model of just writing it out.

There is also an idea I may use as a business card. The back of the dog goes on the back of the envelope, then you open it up to reveal a card with the dog looking at you and it's tail wagging. I think it's a nice example of sequence of image in an unusual form.

CV - Research

Making a cv is something that can be messed up pretty easily judging by any previous attempt I've made at designing one.

So, here are some places I looked for help until I found my inspirational source:

The cv of Animator John Hedley

A cv of another animator from animark:

CURRICULUM VITAE

---

Mark Flynn	Essentials:	Age: 30 Location: Leeds, UK Email: markflynn@animark.net
Skills	Autodesk	Maya 3d Studio Max Character Studio MotionBuilder
	Adobe	Photoshop
	Pixologic	ZBRUSH
	Corel	Painter 7
Titles Released	PS2	Buzz Quiz sports edition (Nov 06) Outrun 2006 : Coast to Coast X-Men 2 Wolverine's Revenge
	PC	Broken Sword 4
	PSX	Treasure Planet Stuart Little 2 Muppet's Monster Adventure Eliminator
Employment	May '06 - Present	Shin'en Multimedia. Muenchen, Germany Title: Freelance Animator/Modeller Role: Modelling and animating main characters and boss's Contract: Not Released yet
	Feb '06 - May '06	Kuju Entertainment Ltd. Sheffield, UK Title: Character Animator Role: Animation on player characters and prize cutscenes Contract: Buzz quiz "Sports Edition"
	Feb '05 - Oct '06	Sumo Digital. Sheffield, UK Title: Character Animator, Concept Artist & Modeller Role: Character Animation for Broken Sword 4, Character Animation & Modelling for Outrun 2, Concept art for demo's Contracts: Broken Sword 4 & Outrun 2006
	Jul '04 - Nov '04	Argonaut. Sheffield, UK Title: Senior Character Animator Role: Character Animation for character and Boss characters Contract: Zorro - not published
	Jan '04 - Jun '04	New Media Collective. Leeds, UK Title: Character Animator, Concept Artist & Modeller Contract: Various web projects
	Nov '03 - Nov '03	R8 Games. Leeds, UK Title: Lead Character Animator Role: Rigging and Animation for all main characters Contract: Criminalympics - not published
	Oct '02 - Jan '03	Genepool. Manchester, UK Title: Character Animator Role: Animation for in game characters Contract: X-Men 2 Wolverine's revenge
	Dec '01 - Oct '03	R8 Games. Leeds, UK Title: Lead Character Animator Role: Rigging and Animation for all main characters & responsible for scheduling and maintaining Animators workload Contract: Criminalympics - not published
	Mar '99 - Jun '01	Magenta Software. Liverpool, UK Title: Lead Character Animator Role: Responsible for all aspects of character creation, including 2d content design, low polygon modelling, texturing and animation, & responsible for scheduling and maintainging animators workload Contracts: Muppet Moster Adeventure, Snoopy Mania, Treasure Planet, Stuart Little 2 & Eliminator
Education	1996 - 1998	Ballyfermot Senior College, Dublin, Ireland Course Title: Multimedia Design Qualification: Diploma in Multimedia Design
	1994 - 1996	Ballyfermot Senior College, Dublin, Ireland Course Title: Classical Animation Qualification: Diploma in Classical Animation

This pdf from the University of Arts in London is very to the point and helpful in exactly what needs to be there in a creative CV.

I like the complete simplicity and white space in this cv from Commercial Venture but the layout of the images is all over the place.

Then there is this cv from copywriter Daniel Headey. The simplicity and layout seem to work well, and although it stretches over far too many pages, the hand written style of it works well for me.


What I've gathered from this research is that CV's should be short and to the point, but also stand out and express the person who is sending them, whilst also being tapered somewhat to their recipient. I would think that a cover letter would be a better place to exactly pin point your audience so I'll take that into account.

It's alot of information to present but what I may need to show are:

name
contact details and address
skills
achievements
qualifications
where i've worked and references
and a description of who I am.

Statement of Intent??

Again, before the CV, there is something else I've noticed I havn't put up here yet.

My statement of intent.

I'll put it up and then analyse where I've gone with what I claimed I was trying to achieve at the time:



I like the '100% dipped in chocolate' thing.

I think all in all, I had a good idea at the beginning of the year by saying I needed to bring up my evidence of development work, which I have. However, I didn't have a strong grasp on what companies I was aiming at were actually wanting from me, and that is a good hands-on knowledge of 3D animation experience, so I didn't know to acquire this. Thankfully, I've learned that now from my experiences with talking to companies and scouring the net for contemporary leading examples of animation studios.
Something I wish I'd taken more of a heedance with is my nostradamus-like omen about not being afraid to contact people who can help me, something that I'm only really in the past month and a half starting to put into practise. Doing this really makes what you're doing something physical. You begin to see and derieve purpose and intention from everything that you do; they become vehicles for your advancement and you gain a keener grip on how to steer it. Mm.. I love me some metaphors.

Reading List

Before I go through the CV, I thought I would try to get my reading list for the year put up.

Artists + Collectives

deviant-art.com in general but in particular, kept watching puncturedscrotom and fealasy, two big influences on me.
eegra.com
seibei
robert carter's site, Crackedhat
Nathan Bedows' blog
The transport tycoon's nds rom homebrew forum
NDSthemes (can post art for nintendo ds backdrops)
conceptart.org
john kricfalusi's blog
newgrounds
andrews-corner
lazy gamer blog
aniboom
Starcraft II concept art
World of Warcraft: Lich King page (The animation on that page is beautiful. Though, it's Blizzard so I wouldn't expect anything less really)
ffconpendium
Bert Simons paper sculptures
pown.alluc.org (This is a good source of gif meme animations, the linked one being one of the best just because it's an incredible bit of hand drawn animation, but others such as this one and this one are eye-poppingly awesome too. This one is also worth a watch even if it is pretty anti-woman so don't listen if you're sensitive. You sissy.)
cereal killers
Fable Concepts from Lionhead
fredgperry videos
dreweurpeo
awn forums
gameartisans
fatheads
shawn barber
control freak's blog
john hedley
animark
Declan Mccullagh
fazoom
mike wieringo
sketchhole
spreadshop
jabberywocky animation
celaction
vgcats
eat22
d-toast
MUGEN
Tado
Jon Burgerman's Blog
lostfish

And the Artists from my Sidebar.

Journals and References

Grafitism
Juxtapose
Computer Arts
The Comics Journal
DRAW!
Association of Illustrators
alluc.org
4colorrebellion
grafiknoise
ektopia
youthoughtwewouldntnotice
a soviet poster a day
grumpy gamer
Axis
viscom breakfast blog! Woo! Represent!
eegra
gimp
character designs
character design blog
fecalface
kotaku
web reference
ultimate-guitar.com (if any tutors can play the song linked then some serious kudos for you)
BBC motion gallery
Channel 4 careers
Mandy.com
Gumtree.com
ign.com
dvdinmypants
artsjobs
1337g33k
baxaart.com
comicworldnews
lulu
manga revolution
illustrator techniques
Cat and dog Midi's
Wavelength
gamingsteve.com
Eye Magazine
Ubu
Wonderland
Design Collector
Elsevier Medical Journals
Creative Review
animate!

And the journals from my sidebar.

Books

Marvel: The zombie Event
Colussus comics
Droop by Bob Selby
Beasts! by Jacob Covey
Dr Simpo's Wacky Rider
Red Colored Elegy by Seiichi Hayashi
Good-Bye by Yoshihiro Tatsumi
Palestine and many other smaller comics by Joe Sacco
Black Hole by Charles Burns
Goodbye Chunky Rice and Blankets by Craig Thompson
Cats by Jeffrey Brown
Ghost stories by M R James
We need to talk about Kevin by Lionel Schriver
Cartoon animation by Preston Blair
The system of objects by Jean Baudrillard
Death 24x a second: Stillness and the moving image by Laura Mulvey
Jacques Lacan by Sean Homer
The animator's survival kit by Richard Williams

Films/Programming

Solstice
Alot of Tex Avery cartoons
*blacksataguni's avatar key-animation
Chuck Jone's Now Hear This
Ralph Bakshi's 'Hey Good Lookin', 'Coonskin', 'Fritz the cat'
Bakshi and Kricfalusi's 'Mighty Mouse'
Ren and Stimpy: Adult Show!
Penn & Teller Bullshit!
Smile
First Person Shooter
History of Videogames
Robot Chicken by Seth Green and Matt Seinriech
Adult Swim
The Day of the Triffids
Flight of the Conchords
House
Family Guy
American Dad
The Simpsons
Alot of documentaries on psychological disorders found in aluc.org's documentary section
Thundercats!
The Indiana Jones trilogy. And that film that came after them.
Them
Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi


Music and Music Videos (I'll just put in stuff I've been influenced by this year)

Primus
Nick Cave (Weeping Song)
Leonard Cohen (Closing Time) Cohen doesn't move enough in videos for the passion of his music
katakana22's Sexytime compilation
The incessant Drum and Bass from next door.
Dethklok
Procul Harem
The Knives
Crowded House (Don't Dream it's over)
TV on the Radio
I am Kloot
Elvis Presley
Elvis Costello
Granddaddy
Liquid Tension Experiment
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
Cyndi Lauper
Night Ranger (Sister Christian) you're motorin'....

Thats enough for the more significant pieces. If I think of anything else, I'll jot it up.

Gettin me some of that thar work experience!: An update (Part 3)

Now I moved onto studios which I'd had no prior contact with so I was glad I warmed up on the earlier ones.
Because most of these studios worked in 3D heavily and with my lack of experience in that field, I wasn't expecting a massively positive feedback, if any. This is quite testing because I have After effects skill and flash skill but I was having a hard time finding anywhere at the moment that uses those programs primarily. Then I decided that that if I have any experience in animation, then it can be put to use by the studios that I've found so far so I shouldn't let these concerns stop me from applying and that I should just apply to the studios that I can find, applying to others as and when I discover them.
That these companies might be more down south is a factor; companies like Seed Animations, Tandem Films, Little Loud and The Brothers McLeod whom I would really like to work with but have no means of spare living expense currently. At this point it occurs to me that I could ask these companies if there is any photoshoping or afftereffects work they need doing from home to free up their time or if they could feed me any of the sort and I promplty send out e-mails asking so:

Work experience from home? Hopeful student

10th May, 2008

From:

"Will Campbell"

Add sender to Contacts

To:

film@sparkandzoom.com

To the Brothers Mcleod

My name is Will Campbell, a 2nd Year student at the Leeds college of Art & Design and I'm contacting you in hopes that you could help me out with some work experience.
Unfortunatly, being a poor student I have little means of travelling to Warwickshire everyday or renting accomodation there so I'm offering my services to you as a home-based assistant.
As it says on my enclosed cv, I have experience with Photoshop, Illustrator, Aftereffects, Flash and a beginners understanding of Maya so perhaps I would be capable of helping you by cleaning up frames you don't have time for or any other projects you can think of.
My number is 07515168340 so please don't hesitate to contact me.

If you click here, this is a link to an animation I worked on for the D&AD competition this may.

Thank you for taking the time to read this and for anything you may be able to offer me,

Regards,

Will Campbell.

I sent similar e-mails out to the other 3 companies, along with my cv (which I'll show later as I want to unveil it in the manner of how it developed). The brothers did actually phone me up to thank me for my e-mail and that they would be in contact soon if anything came up but after 2 waves of chase-up mails, I've not heard anything from the other companies so far.

In an attempt to not end up looking as suave as this in my future, I pressed on.

I then got in contact with two studios who work primarily in 2d drawn animation , the big Dangermouse-producing company Cosgrove Hall who I had been reminded about by one of my clients and their former employee, Tony Garth and Leeds-based social animation studio, Leeds Animation workshop.
These were the mails that I sent after phoning the studios to find out who I was meant to be contacting.

Hopefull Work-experience Student

May 13th, 2008

From:

"Will Campbell"

Add sender to Contacts

To:

info@leedsanimation.org.uk

Hello Ms Hargotes,

My name's Will Campbell and I'm a Visual Communication student from Hartlepool who is in their second year of study at the Leeds College of Art and design.

I'm e-mailing you concerning any possible chances of work placement in your studio on Bayswater row.
I really like your studios animation and drawing style because it has a human edge to it that is difficult to find in the 3D animation studios of today.

In an ideal situation, I would be looking to be able to strengthen my storyboarding and flash/hand drawn animation skills whilst developing an understanding of a professional studio environment. In return I would be very motivated to assist your company in whatever way you felt I could for the time I spent in it.

If you click here, this is a link to a selected page from my blog which features a handdrawn animation I worked on recently but I've had to perspone finishing to finish my other briefs.
If you click here, this is a link to an animation I worked on for the D&AD competition this may.

I would love to discuss the possibility of organising some actual work placement with you, perhaps for a few days or over a week this summer but anything you can offer me is greatly appreciated. My phone number is 07515168340.

Thank you for your time Ms Hargotes,

Will Campbell.

As you can see, I use bits from other e-mails to get myself used to a format in which these mails should be structured.

After a wave of checking up e-mails, I've not heard anything from Leeds Animation studio so I need to phone them up, but I called up cosgroves hall in the past week to ask them if they had recieved my e-mail and that they would be in contact with me soon.
Maybe Cosgrove get off the phone a bit too easily in my calling anxiety but it's all building my confidence and such. Maybe Tony Garth can help me with that situation..

My next set of e-mails went out to companies who I could access easily from Hartlepool or my Leeds home. The companies deal primarily with 3D animation so I've spun the mail to indicate that I would be very keen on learning this skill from them. Those companies are, Back2Front Animation in Stockton, VexFilm in Sheffield, teabag studios in Leeds, moshine in middlesborough and Studio Liddel in Manchester.
Again, I called up each company asking to whom I should be addressing each e-mail when e-mailing through my CV so that I could make each occassion more personal. I was especially keen to get in contact with moshine and Back2Front because they're based very closely to my home up North and I was very impressed by the standard of production, especially considering the studio's location. This is a variation on the e-mail I sent to those particular studios:

Prospective work experience-seeking student

May 17th, 2008

From:

"Will Campbell"

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To:

jobs@b2fanimation.com

Hello Mr Stevens,

My name's Will Campbell and I'm a Visual Communication student from Hartlepool who is in their second year of study at the Leeds College of Art and design.

I'm e-mailing you concerning any possible chances of work placement in your studio in Stockton.Coming from the North East, I've been prepared to look down South for employment possibilities but the sheer caliber of the work that your studio produces suggests this might not be necessary. I was particularly impressed with the 'I like Brains' animation as I'm a fledgling character animator myself.

In an ideal situation, I would be looking to be able to strengthen my storyboarding and flash/hand drawn animation and aftereffects skills whilst developing an understanding of 3D animation as well as an understanding of working in a professional studio environment. In return I would be very motivated to assist your company in whatever way you felt I could for the time I spent in it.

If you click here, this is a link to a selected page from my blog which features a handdrawn animation I worked on recently but I've had to perspone finishing to finish my other briefs.
If you click here, this is a link to an animation I worked on for the D&AD competition this may.

I would love to discuss the possibility of organising some actual work placement with you, perhaps for a few days or over a week this summer but anything you can offer me is greatly appreciated. My phone number is 07515168340.

Thank you for your time Mr Stevens,

Will Campbell.

After a nudging e-mail to back2front, I actually called the studio and asked to be put through to Mr Stevens so that I could talk to him voice to voice but was told he wasn't in. I will persist with asking for his attention.

Phonecalls to Liddel confirmed what I assumed would be a problem in attaining some experience with these companies; they didn't feel like I had the experience necessary to be of any assistance to them and that I should create a full show reel of character animation before contacting them again.
This was a bit disheartening because I do have animation experience but its worrying to know that some studios don't think I'm good enough despite the motivation to learn from them. So, I have something to try and build up over the summer at least.

Finally I am about to make contact with Tim Illingworth of Pure Photography in Pudsey because his company deals with production and video creation as does Masspro, a company that I have two years experience working with so, this could be an opportunity for me to develop my editing and photography skills.

That is as far as I've gotten at this point and probably this semester in terms of attaining work experience. At the least, I have added some contacts to my address book and have some definate visits to studios lined up which I'm very excited about as they could turn into work experience quickly.

Now to show you the cv I've been making and how I came about making it. Then my portfolio and how that is looking.

Gettin me some of that thar work experience!: An update (Part 2)

Before I began to search through every animation studio in the UK, I made a rule that I would only try to get work experience in a place where I would be able to travel to easily over summer either from my rented house in Leeds, or from my home in Hartlepool. Unless I was able to get work which I could do at home and have my travel expenses compensated for, I just don't have the money to spend on more accomodation than I am already.

So I began to Contact potential employers...

I started out with a couple of companies which I believed would be establish a good line of contact with.

The first was Eutechnyx in Gateshead, a games design company. I'm good friends with a programmer who works here and after making a trip up to newcastle to visit him three weeks ago, we discussed plans for me to go back to Newcastle during the summer in June to visit the games studio as he works there. This will be a great opportunity for me to explore the studio and dispel my delusions of how the infrastructure there operates whilst doing my best to get to know the art department. It might not work out to be that great but, it's a start.

The next is Fat City Films in Manchester, a cartoon company owned by Vincent James, a close friend of one of my clients, Tony Garth. I chose to make contact with Vincent because cartoon studio experience is something I'd like a taste of, along with professional experience in storyboarding and character animation AND with Tony as a contact, this seemed like a natural choice. Also, I was able to send him work I'd done on a brief him and Tony created so, good oppotunity to use it.
This is what I sent:

Work experience student hopeful from Tony Garth

4th May, 2008

From:

"Will Campbell"

Add sender to Contacts

To:

info@fatcityfilms.co.uk

Message contains attachments

ron.jpg (350KB), pok.jpg (344KB), storyboard intro.jpg (448KB)

Hi there Mr James, My name is Will Campbell, a 2nd Year student at the Leeds college of Art & Design and I'm contacting you in hopes that you could help me out with some work experience. I would be very interested in earning some professional storyboarding experience and basically tasting what a cartoon studio really is. If I could work on or assist with actually animating that would be fantastic too but I will be very enthusiastic to help you in whatever way you feel I can. I'm a big fan of the playful and bouncy style in which you draw your characters, a source of inspiration certainly for a recent project I've been working on, assigned to me by none other than Mr Tony Garth! -fan fare- As you may be able to tell from the attachments, the project revolved around developing the character 'random ronnie/roger' whom you and Tony came up with for an older internet-viewing audience and thats a little of what I've come up with so far. There's also a storyboard involving his roommate, an evil sock puppet called Neil and his eyeless dog, Pok, so plenty to look at. If you click here, this is a link to a selected page from my blog which features a handdrawn animation I worked on recently but I've had to perspone finishing to finish my other briefs. If you click here, this is a link to an animation I worked on for the D&AD competition this may. Anyway, thank you very much for the time you've taken to read this e-mail and any advice or support you may be able to offer me. Even if I could just visit the studio for a day or even a few hours, I would be very grateful to you. Thank you in advance Mr James, Will Campbell

This is quite an informal e-mail despite me addressing Vincent as Mr James (as I've never met him) because I'm friendly with Tony and as such bring up his name a couple of times to show Vincent that I can be his friend as well. I also include work that shows storyboards and characters that I made specifically using a brief which he wrote so I'm really trying to solidify a link with him. I also gave him some of my animation work to ponder over to strengthen my chances of him taking me on.

Initially I was quite hopeful that this would be a fruitful correspondence but as of today, I've not heard anything back yet. I've sent 3 other e-mails politely asking if he has recieved my first e-mail but still nothing so far. The website lacks a phone number to call Vincent so I've asked Tony for it via e-mail and.. he's also notoriously slow to respond so it could take a while. If I can find Tony's phone number anywhere, I'll get that sorted.

Moving on we have Masspro and Qurios Entertainment, both based in my hometown of Hartlepool. I had already been in contact with both of the companies earlier in the year to attempt to get placements so this was a catch up.

This was the e-mail to Masspro:

Working over the summer

4th May, 2008

From:

"Will Campbell"

Add sender to Contacts

To:

ma09@hotmail.co.uk

Hi Mark, Will here, hope you're doing well up North with everything. I'm sorry that I wasn't able to get through to you in time for easter earlier this year but I'm wondering if at any time between june and early september that I'd be able to get some work experience with you or your colleagues in your animation department. What I would be most interested in would be advancing my skills in 3D modelling/animating in Maya, 3d Studio max or soft image because these are deeply important to someone like myself who fancies a future career in this industry. I would be more than willing to work on any projects you havn't the time to fulfill for free in this area if you could give me a little assistance with the programs in return. Cheers for any help you can give me Mark, Will

As I've kind of expected, based on their treatment of me the last time I dealt with them, I've not heard anything back from the company as of now after 3 extra reminder e-mails.

This mail I sent to Mr Bushnell of Qurious entertainment. It's similar to the one I sent Vincent James but its a bit more formal and I had the initiative to include my phone number in it:

Hartlepool Student follow-up

May 4th, 2008

From:

"Will Campbell"

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To:

nielb@qurios.com

Hi Mr Bushnell,

My name's Will Campbell and I'm a Visual Communication student from Hartlepool who is in their second year of study at the Leeds College of Art and design.

I'm e-mailing you concerning any possible chances of work placement in your studio in church street. In an ideal situation, I would be looking to be able to strengthen my storyboarding and flash/hand drawn animation skills whilst also picking up a developing understanding of 3D animation, all in a professional studio environment. In return I would be very motivated to assist your company in whatever way you felt I could for the time I spent in it.

If you click here, this is a link to a selected page from my blog which features a handdrawn animation I worked on recently but I've had to perspone finishing to finish my other briefs.
If you click here, this is a link to an animation I worked on for the D&AD competition this may.

I would love to discuss the possibility of organising some actual work placement with you, perhaps for a few days or over a week this summer but anything you can offer me is greatly appreciated. My phone number is 07515168340.

Thank you for your time Mr Bushnell,

Will Campbell.

And after a couple of reminder e-mails, on the 20th of May, I got a phone call asking when I would be free to come and look around the studios. I told them from the 8th of June onwards and the 9th was set as the date I will be looking about, discussing opportunities for placement. Success!

Gettin me some of that thar work experience!: An update on how that business is going. (Part I)

After my work experience fell through over easter, I became a bit disheartened with the prospect of looking for help with my career forwarding elsewhere.
It needed doing though.

My first reaction was to look on work finding sites or online classifieds like Mandy.com and Gumtree.com, searching for animation companies who were looking for interns or people to fill work placements.
Sadly this turned up very few results for companies that I'd be interested in working with who were offering part time work in a situation where I'd be able to work without having to lose money on living expenses in the south. Results like this for an unnamed animation company in Birmingham who would want the prospective employee to work from home, making trips to Birmingham from time to time to meet up with the client.


My assumption in this situation would be that the company would pay for travel expenses but I don't know because I didn't follow up the ad. I didn't follow up the ad because I knew with my skill I would be unable to fulfill the employer's requests. I didn't reply to this posting either for reasons below.


I have adequete knowledge in flash, but my understanding of character animation is just starting and would be unable to support a need for walk cycles, perspective and other elements. This was my reasoning at the time for applying but, if I had sent them something I think I could've stood a chance at least.

Anyway, I came to the conclusion that the anxiety I was feeling from not being able to find a suitable, easy enough place to fit myself was because what I was currently searching for was actual work and not work placements. I needed to aim softer and to do this, I needed to start mailing the companies who were offering this work and asking them for placements instead.
I would've been ok with skipping this step and just trying to get the jobs they were offering but then I figured I would continue to hit this wall of not being skilled enough to satisfy any jobs going.

What I want

I took some time to review exactly what it was that I was trying to get out of a placement after the awkward and unsure e-mails that I'd sent to Masspro. I finally came to the conclusion that yes, I can offer these companies my services and what skill I've begun to develop, but ultimately the purpose of me getting one of these placement dealies is for the body I work with to give something to me as well. Some kind of development of skill in a professional context.

This professional context I decided recently is in the field of animation, more specifically character animation and its development and conceptualisation. I don't have the skills for it yet but I would also be interested in working in the art department of the video game industry.

These are the current skills that I have and can demonstrate to some degree when asked instantaneously by a potential work placement:

Drawing (conceptual, anatomical), Photoshop use, Hand-drawn animation, paper marionnette-crafting, book making, word processing, Aftereffects use, Flash use, basic character animation skills, storyboarding, good team working and ideas generation.

Any of these skills would be factors I would be looking to put to use and develop.

Additional skills that I would like to develop would be:

3D animation and modelling, (Maya, Softimage) advanced character animation, a deeper sense of professionalism and experience in a studio enviroment.

Using this information, I was able to start emailing studios about the prospect of me working for them during the summer or soon after.

go go apathy

I accidently found this artist's work whilst google-ing 'kontroll', the Hungarian film about budapest subways and was so glad that I did so. Their work is some beautiful manga-inspired stuff and I will be watching them as they put more pieces out.






Whoever they are, they excell in their colouring and inking for sure. Such well balenced inking.. I will try to contact them to tell them how I feel about their work.

I loves me some Tex Avery

Mmm.... banned cartoons. It is truely a crime against the arts world that these old tex avery cartoons should be restricted from the public eye just because they were made during world war II. Please, do your animation taste buds a favour and watch the cartoon below; they'll thank you for it after they wrap themselves around the bounty of perfectly bouncing and weighted animation inside. I mean, just look at that sexy BLITZ WOLF type! Mmmm... thats good eatin! Plus it's pun-tastic! you don't get writers like that anymore.

Ian Brauner and Clayton Stillwell

Another animator/character designer I've been watching recently is Ian Brauner. His work is very lively like my stuff but he seems to have much more discipline and general 'get up and go'. Probably not addicted to anything. (note to self, switch addiction to drawing).

And a concept artist through and through, Clayton Stillwell. Just.. look at his stuff; it's jaw droppingly eerie.

The cult of Kricfalusi

I would say that 'Ren & Stimpy' was a pretty big influence on me as a person growing up. Alot of other people would say this too and this is never more evident than in John Kricfalusi's blog in which every post he makes is inundulated by literally hundreds of reply posts, each one either praising him or asking for his attention on their own work. So, using this attention Kricfalusi has made it a perogative of his to reschool this generation of artists and animators in the ways in which animation should really be.

So with so many responses to his soap box screechings, it's not suprising that at least a couple of the people who reply sometimes are pretty decent artists. One such artist is Fuzzhound, a true Joe Sacco in the making if there ever was one. His work is awe inspiring in how he's proving that a cartoon style of graphic design can still be put to use brilliantly, completely expanding the horizons of what a cartoonist can do to make some hard cash. I should take a note from his book seriously..




Another such blogger is Nate Sands who fires out work like this in response to Kricfalusi's call to arms when he needs assisstence with operations. Its incredible stuff.




Seriously, why am I not keeping on top of Kricfalusi's blog and responding to it? He could help me so much!

olofsdotter

An illustrator who's work I noticed on the cover of Computer Arts recently is Linn Olofsdotter. What I like about her stuff is how it stretches from goofy doodles to phenominally intricate pattern work all in one image. Really talented artist, though not strictly my cup of tea I go for the use of colour and the dark mood tones she uses.

Hanaharu Naruko is a filth monger.

As much as I enjoy a good picture of a lady with no clothes on, what I enjoy more is the work of an artist who can make such smut into something that is aesthetically pleasing on more than such a base level. And one of those artists is Hanaharu Naruko.
This is a tame example by some of her other pieces standards but alot of her work is just in this beautifully detailed and handpainted style of manga. I think this appreciation for her work is very much on a draftsmans level; i.e, I want to drain out her blood and drink it all in an attempt to steal her skill.

Anyway, check out her site. It's actually pretty porn-free, but some are.. 'getting there' so its very much a case of enter at your own risk.

I can't stop blogger making the text small here and it's for no apparant reason so.. I might be moving to a more .. bug-free blogging system soon.

cubecraft.com

This is a lazy sunday afternoon project if there ever was one. cubecraft features dozens of popular nerdy culture icons but in cut-out cube form so you can litter your abode with the characters you've come to love and hate! Could've done with something like this in my first year when I designed a line of pop out cardboard robots.

Think I'll make a set of video game ones and post some pictures of them..

Quincy's book o' dogs

I found this book in smiths the other day whilst doing my thang (pretty much just bumming about) and the illustrations on the front struck me as being 'me'. The characters are drawn in a bobble headed, curvy manner like I doodle and it's about dogs! My favourite! So yeah, definatly making this purchase (7p on amazon!) as proof that people who draw like me can get paid to do so!

Tubbypaws' Blog

I read about this illustrator's blog from my good friend Siragher and I sure am glad she told me about it cause its the nuts!



Its all about the simple design guys! just keep it simple! -hammers it into his brain-meats-
and some serious illustrator skillz. This highlights a problem of mine; making a final image look presentable and as I'm forming my portfolio at this point, I'm looking over the stuff and realizing just how big a problem this can be. So.. this summer = redo my website + practice illustrator + general image making looking good! gah!

Fireshot

"FireShot is a Firefox extension that creates screenshots of web pages.
Unlike other extensions, this plugin provides a set of editing and annotation tools, which let users quickly modify captures and insert text and graphical annotations. Such functionality will be especially useful for web designers, testers and content reviewers.
It's possible to choose whether entire web page or only visible part of this page should be captured.
Screenshots can be uploaded to server, saved to disk (PNG, GIF, JPEG, BMP), copied to clipboard, e-mailed and sent to external editor for further processing."

So yeah, I downloaded this Fireshot dealie a couple of days ago and it's great for capturing exactly what you want on a website; even catches flash images and stuff that printscreen can miss. I'm not trying to design a website at the moment but I will be this summer so this baby'll do wonders when I'm breaking down sites and such.

Alexandre Désilets

'The song was still a simple demo when the director Patrick Peris came to Alex with his animation project featuring Montreal, Alex and numerous existing species of butterflies. 6 months later and more than 4000 handmade drawings... this splendid video!
Enjoy!'

I found this video floating on the front page of Youtube and was bowled over by the use of scratchy scratchy rotoscoping, 3d graphics and comic style action! The music.. is ok, not really my thing but the video, wow! Very involving stuff. Check it out dudes!

Catch up: Exhibits what I have seen

Ok, I'm going to run through some of the exhibits I've been to since I last posted here.

A Fine Line: Drawings from the Collection.

During a trip into town a few weeks ago I went to this drawing exhibition in the Leeds City Art gallery. I remember enjoying some of the work but with the lack of leaflets about the exhibit or any hard info online, I can't remember who's work was being displayed so.. I can't go into much depth about what I saw, only that I had been. The work was varied, covering anatomical work to cubism but the one piece which sticks with me is that of a map of the globe, drawn onto silver paper using silver pen which meant that you either saw nothing at first glance and ignored the piece or you caught a glimse of what was really there and unintentionally ended up spending a fair amount of time shifting your position in order to properly view what was going on.

Manga exhibit/Urban Gardens: Urbis

I spent the better half of a day getting to and from Manchester and wandering about the city to see an exhibit I'd been told about by a friend at the Urbis. I had missed the D&AD exhibit of previous professional winners by a couple of days but the exhibit on the influential force that is 'Manga culture' was in it's infant weeks of exhibition.

I'll start out by saying that I wasn't impressed with what I saw, especially after spending £14 on a ticket just to find that out.

The unique graphic art-form of Manga is explored through its manifestation in everyday life in the 21^st century at this new exhibition on our first floor.

The exhibition explores Manga’s influence in shaping contemporary culture, with something for everyone, from kids to adults; it offers a whistle stop introduction to Manga for novices as well as plenty to keep hard core fans immersed. Visitors will discover Cute Manga, Action Manga, Manga in Art, Fashion and Design, Manga as communication and Erotic Manga – for over 18s only!

(The blog is STUCK IN ITALICS and now probably bold so.. you'll have to put up with this.. sorry)

So, the passage above is an accurate enough description of what the exhibition was about so I'll try to stick to what my beef with it was.

1. The exhibition gave a broad platter of the influence the 'Manga' explosion has had on the way everyone else works but.. the actual origins or direct influences were thin on the ground. There was alot of end product but little source material or much description at least as to how the transition was made between the two.

2. This lack of information was again evident in how some of the sections like the 'taboo adult' section were described when talking about the original source material; in this case, erotica and pornography but still original source. It seems throughout much more time was spent lavishing over what was created on the inspiration of these sources rather than these all important origins and as a result, you get this hollow feeling to the whole setup. Everything ends up feeling.. isolate and without a real purpose or identity.

3. Speaking of 'hollow work', very annoyingly most of the exhibit seemed to be full of (I hate to use such a term but) plain soulless images from artists like Tado, Kamitora and the makers of the godawful Shakespeare mangas. Especially frustrating was Tado's appearance as the teams work was round every turn, as if they'd sponsered the exhibit or something.
I say soulless because, most of the work that was on display seemed to have been created by artists who like me in my younger days, were fascinated by the beauty and surrealism of manga but didn't understand the culture behind it at all. As a result, you get some very skillfully 'illustrator'd' work like this

but... it feels empty and meaningless as the artist is unable to make use of the symbols and codes which the underlying culture has programmed the original source artists to be able to use. Some of the Tado stuff I admit does work on its own as some kind of bastardisation of french and japanese illustration but work like the shakespeare manga for example, is just inexcusable.



In manga, there are reasons that someone will be dressed in black, as a school girl or why their faces are concealed at any time and someone who just reads mangas without absorbing any of the background culture will only pick up a sketchy idea of why this is and you get this adolescent-appeal-only mess of crap; material that only someone who is just getting into popular manga would like and are probably about 13-15. Again its well drawn, it's just.. a cultural void; capable of holding neither the weight of shakespeare or of centuries of encoded symbols.

4. Which brings me to my last point about the exhbit in that this exhibition doesn't cater to someone who has disgested enough of this western-fumbling of manga and wants to know about the good old stuff or where it came from in any depth. It felt very childish; aimed much at the young pokemon or maybe naruto-watching audience and was ultimately unsatisfying.

I then went upstairs to the second floor and enjoyed an amusing documentary called 'allotment secrets' by Mary Culhane which I've been unable to track down online for you to watch but it's about the hints and tips other allotment-growers give to newbie owners so that they can get a good start on their growing. I like to learn and the quick and digestable manner in which these secrets were presented was amusing. Still.. didn't quite make up for the money I spent to see the exhibit..

After thumbing through Grafitism and some independant illustration journals in a store off picadilly square, I walked into Starbucks to steal some sugar packets for the train ride home, I ran into this beauty of a leaflet and stopped in my tracks.



(I would recommened clicking on this image for bigger.)

I think its the combination of the coffee palette with a simplistic drawing style that makes this image appeal so much to me. And that I found it in a coffee shop was even better; this should have been in the manga-influenced exhibit as a piece of illustration in action rather than the endless stream of Tado work.

Look & Listen Outdoor exhibit


In conjunction with the VJ group look&listen one of my peers Liz Ainge ran a van around at least two points in leeds in a van showing off local VJ talent such as CalTV and myself and my friend Matt's work.


TEH VAN. Or very similar to what it looked like. Just imagine it was a VW mini van with a battery and projector and it becomes a much more accurate image.

It was a chilling (in a good way) experience to see our work up there with about 50 people eagerly paying attention to it and this is definatly something that I would be interested in participating in again. Now to just make something to show for the next one...



(Caltv's bridging vj piece from the night)

Burning Candy: Tek33, cyclops and Sweet toof @ LCAD



On May 16th, James Jessop and his friends 'Sweet Toof' and 'Cyclops' came to our college to unviel their exhibition for us to gawp at. And gawp we did. This exhibit really whet my appetite for graffitism, or its sparked my interest at least as the concept of art out in the open became a reality to me like never before. I really liked the idea of just... doing it. Just going somewhere and knocking a piece up and not caring for authority. REBELS! Though I probably wouldn't take it to such an extreme (being a tepid character and all), I can certainly see myself clambering onto roofs and over fences this summer and painting dogs and tanks everywhere..

As a side note, I found Jessop to be a really.. annoying personality. I loved his work but I kept wanting to just.. pow.. jaw him with his lazy southerner drawl. I'm a very passive aggressive person though.


This was by far my favourite piece of Jessops; really well structured and detailed and a classic subject to work on. Beautiful stuff. This is an unfinished work in the photo by the way, I can't find a finished version of the piece at the moment because it was only unveiled recently.

May Art Week: Lifton three by four

As I walked back from Morrisons just over a week ago, I came upon an exhibit being held in the Leeds Uni campus called Lifton 3x4. There was a free piece of cake ladled into my sweaty mitts so of course I was happy and then I waddled on into the shabby house where all the art were was at.

I ignored quite alot of the work in there because it was centred mainly around nails hammered into wellies and taps. Well, not all of it was but I wasn't in the mood for conceptual art at the time.

So I honed in on the work of Louise Thomas and her postcards based on 'the last Shangri-la'.



Some of the cards were prints of patterns inspired by this asian culture and I bought a few for my textiles friends, but this sample in particular took my interest because its monoprinted and because the layout and contrasts of light are striking to me. Its kind of like a harsh reality version of a postcard you might send home on holiday. (I know.. no one does that anymore).

So yeah, for now that is a good summation of where I've being mincing about in the art world recently. Apart from borders and the library, but I'll get onto that.