Time Magazine Tells It Like It Is To The VFX World

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1990803-1,00.html
This not-to-miss article from Time on the reality of the VFX industry is a real eye-opener. If I can't find work in London in VFX, I'll just have to move to the West Coast of the States and start at $50k. I bet there are a lot of people who've met me asking themselves why would this American chick want an FX job here? The answer: the USA outsources, too. Salaries are likely comparable with the £ at 1.8% average since the introduction of the Euro and the coinciding recession that followed in the wake of the financial instability that ensued. I'm only interested in working on films, no television or commercials. No games. Just films. I heard at Animex this year that if I did games or television, I would not have the required direction for VFX in film, which is highly specialized. Taking that as a maxim, I'm moving forward with solely film in mind for my career. Entry level salary in the States can't be as good as Time would like me to believe. America is a country that starts you at the lowest common denominator salary and you will have to work 5 years if you want 2 weeks off. However, given the nature of VFX projects moving in cycles...you'll likely have to save it all to survive the lulls and low points when the less experienced aren't needed. It really does pay to freelance these days. I'm learning all about it now while I have the time. I'm planning to freelance between paid film projects in the future. I have to try and be competitive somehow and this is a very competitive industry.

Summer Workin'

This summer I've made my first commercial site for a local Caribbean takeaway: Connie's Nine Mile. The site can be fund at www.9mile.co.uk . It's via Wix.com, so it was fun to assemble and get creative with. I threw in a Reggae music player, because when you walk in the restaurant there's usually Caribbean radio. The food there is amazingly good and I'm new to Caribbean food. I don't usually eat fish dishes, but you can't go wrong there. I'm serious, really amazing stuff. It's impressive, it's been around 6 years and has been catering regularly for a number of events, they deliver, they're halal, they have a great menu and now it's on the web!

Notes from Animex 2010

Wanted to go to Animex, but couldn't? Look no further! I filled an entire diary will notes and created this spiffy PDF with In Design for my classmates that couldn't go this year. Have a look, you might learn something useful. There's a lot of good advice from the recruiters in the animation, games and VFX industries around the world. Think of it like a Siggraph for students! Plus, there were a lot of comments about recent films and we had a sneak peek at How To Train Your Dragon before it was finished!

This was reduced down to 13 pages and only covers the animation/vfx/film oriented side of the event. I attended the full event and enjoyed the games side of things as well.

Showreel

Finally, at long last, I have made a little time to breathe in the mire of my projects and produced a short showreel. There are some sequences that will be replacing others by the end of the summer. I'm redoing some coursework to be as cool and sazzy as possible for it. Feel free to have a look!