LAUAN502 - Possible Career Paths

I have been researching possible places I could work in the future. 

1. The Line

The Line is an animation studio based in London. They often make animated advertisement commissions for other company's as well as contributing to projects such as League of Legends animated music videos like 'Giants'. This would be a very suitable place for me as I really enjoy games and having fun with animation, which they seem to be suited to.


2. Cartoon Saloon




Cartoon Saloon seems to be a nice alternative. They are an Irish animation studio based in Kilkenny who create feature length 2D animated films, such as the award winning 'The Breadwinner'. This seems like a place where I could focus on my works rather well.


3. Bluezoo





Bluezoo is a british animation studio based in London. They offer a wide variety of animation formats, such as CG Animation, Stop Motion and 2D animation. If I were to join this studio, I would have to find an area to specialise in, as they seem to offer a variety of positions.


4. Studio Yotta



Studio Yotta is an American internet animation studio that fully focuses on 2D animation. While this option is highly unlikely, I am very interested in the work they produce, and would jump at the offer of a position at this studio.

LAUAN502 - Digital Portfolio

Over the last couple of years I have been building up my art portfolio on twitter. This includes production work, final animations and digital artworks I make in my spare time.

Twitter Link:

https://twitter.com/SalsaberryBoi

LAUAN502 - Competition Submission

Over the past weeks I have decided to change my ideas for my competition submission. Instead of doing something related to Tomatina, I have made a simpler, shorter animation loop for Loopdeloop.


Background:




References:







Final Animation:





Upload on Vimeo:

Guacamole and Chill (Loopdeloop Submission: Mushy) from Rhys Elliott on Vimeo.


What went well:

- Nice use of colours and well drawn models.
- Well made background.
- Nice and fluid animation


What to improve:

- More in between frames to increase fluidity.
- More detail in the backgrounds.

LAUAN502 - LinkedIn Account Set Up

I have been updating my LinkedIn account to further increase my contacts and network in the animation industry.

 







I will be building up my portfolio in order to show my work.

LAUAN502 - Studio Brief 3

For Studio Brief 3 I was in charge of creating a brand logo for our collective group.


I was mainly influenced by 8-bit looking studio logos.



Presentation:




My contribution to the presentation was mostly research and the logo.

LAUAN502 - Studio Brief 3

For my collective presentation, I have been gathering research for our presentation. Specifically, I have been looking at different banks that could be used for our business, as well as pay rates for our collective.

At the beginning I created a list of various things that we would need to consider when making our collective:




Then I began researching what I needed to look at:





After researching this, we have split up the different roles we will be taking when creating the presentation, which can be seen below:





We will be discussing this in further detail in person.

LAUAN502 - Competition Ideas

For my competition assignment I am going to be doing the Loopdeloop competition:



I have decided to do a loopdeloop animation with the theme being tomatoes, specifically tomatoes being used in the Tomatina festival in Spain. I have been researching and making mood boards for this animation.

My original idea was to create an animation of a truck with people throwing tomatoes from the back.



However, I believe this would be too complicated for the amount of time I have, so I am going to create an animation of someone making 'snow angels' in a pool of tomato mush, similar to one of the images on the mood board.

LAUAN502 - Study Task 6

For this study task I will discuss my strengths, weaknesses and what threats I may face for each.

SWOT Analysis Table:



From my own perception and my colleagues perception, I seem to be good at being a team player, good at writing stories, and being friendly with others. However, I seem to be too reserved and solitary sometimes, so it might be a good idea to try and open up and spend time with people more.

I also seem to be good at making backgrounds and characters, as well as editing and using softwares like clip studio and TV paint, however I lack consistency in posting my artworks, which I have addressed in a previous blog post.

To get better at this, I am going to try and collaberate with other people who I'm not too familiar with to try and build some connections and friendships.

LAUAN502 - Study task 5

For this study task I'm required to list the different platforms of social media that I use on a daily basis. I currently use the following for my work:

Twitter:



Deviant Art:




Instagram:

• I use each of these platforms to share my art. While I haven't publicly opened my commissions, I aim to use these platforms to achieve this by creating a brand new commission sheet.

• I have used twitter more than any of these other social media platforms, and have amassed a following of 103 people (somehow) assuming to have followed me because of my artworks that I have posted. Examples of recent artworks:

• I will soon be opening commissions once I have finished most of my uni work. I will be using mostly twitter and Instagram to advertise this.

• However, I may start expanding to other platforms. I want to build a voice acting portfolio so I may offer my services to other university students who may need such. I have already lent my voice to another student group for their animation. I may use websites such as mandy.com to commission voice acting when the time is right.

List of things to do:

- Post art on twitter and Instagram more regularly.

- Open commissions on my profiles.

- Research mandy.com and how to set up an account for commissions.

- Develop my Linkedin account.

- Create a website

- Start making merchandise 

LAUAN502 - Study Task 4

For this study task I was asked to discuss working as a freelance / studio animator and the processes I would take to ensure a prosperous business.

The first thing I need to do is find out an hourly pay rate. In order to do this I should do some calculations from my Cost of Living Calculator.



To do this, I rounded it off to 10,100, divided it by twelve, then by 4, then by 5, then by 8 to find out my hourly rate.



I found that my weekly pay rate should be £210.42. I divided that by 5 for working from monday to friday. I found that I'd be having to work for £42 a week. I found that if I work for 5 hours from those days, I would earn just around minumum wage in the UK, at £8.41. I feel that I should earn more however, so I would place my hourly rate at £9.50 minimum.



I discovered through research that my hourly rate should range somewhere between £15-£20.

I would comfortably put my hourly rate at £15 or £16 as I am still a Junior animator in training. I would charge around the same for my artworks as well. Last year I created a commission sheet, and found it needed updating:

I have also created an invoice for possible contracts and commissions

Contract:







Evaluation: I feel that I've done quite well in constructing my hourly rates, invoice and contract. I feel that there is enough information. However, I feel that I could be more specific in my contract concerning the terms and conditions.

LAUAN502 - Study Task 3

For this study task we were required to create a cost of living with a calculator. Taking everything into account, I have found out the results of the cost of my living. It is a lot higher than I expected.

Cost of Living Calculator:

My total income required comes up to £10,098 per year. A lot higher than I thought.

LAUAN502 - Study Task 2

For this study task we were asked to explain what steps we will take to protect our content.

I have decided to use copyright, as I want my work to be my own and not for others to own. However, I do want to be lenient with how my content is used, such as commentary and even parodies. I believe I can still do this even with copyrighted content, as I will be in control of what I can claim and what I can't. I want to share my work with the world and I want people to be able to share it and add their own thoughts and such in response videos, commentary and parodies, and even make fan art of my stuff. I do NOT want people to repost it however, which is why I will be copyrighting my work.

I will start by adding copyright logo's to my bigger works, such as animation films. Since copyright is automatic in the United Kingdom, this shouldn't be too much of a hassle. If someone were to re post my work I would personally, kindly ask them to remove it if it adds nothing. If they fail to do so, I will contact the law and ask them to help deal with the situation, as it is my work.

LAUAN502 - Study Task 1

For this study task we were required to find 6 possible locations for networking opportunities.

1: Manchester Animation Festival



Manchester Animation Festival is the first Animation Convention that I went to, and thus should be an obvious choice as a place to network. There are many people, studios and animators that come to MAF, meaning there is quite a bit of opportunity to find people and share details and information.

2: Leeds Young Film Festival



Leeds Young Film Festival is an event that takes place from 30th March to 13th April. It hosts an international showing of family friendly, short or feature length films. This could be a potential place to look for networking opportunities as it is conveniently in Leeds.

3: Twitter



Social media is a brilliant place to find networking opportunities, and best of all it doesn't involve travelling. Many artists, film makers and animators use twitter and Instagram. However, since I mostly use Twitter I feel that this would be the best choice to network.


4: Meetup



Meetup is an app used by many to find people with similar interests. This includes art and animation.


5: Artella


Artella | How it Works from Artella on Vimeo.

Artella is a site where you can find others to work with and create projects together. It seems like a very good place to find like minded individuals to network with.


6: Gamescon


Gamescon is a gaming convention where there are bound to be many people looking for artists, animations, coders and even musicians.