This talk was interesting as it was centered about how to pitch for your projects. the speaker noted good reasons for always continuing to work on personal projects and learn new software if the industry is always changing.

one of his personal projects he noted working on as a child was a project about a story of a group of friends that had special needs, and he mentions how he continually designed different 2d characters throughout his life, and always tries to be inclusive and respectful.
He mentioned how many creators, when starting off projects, benefit from having a planned structure called a proof of concept and pilot. Somewhere similar to how it's useful to plan a previs or an animatic or moodboard or character sheet before trying to bring the idea to life.

He mentioned an enlightening observation about his experience when working on a project where this production team was unfamiliar with the life in east London, and he felt annoyed how creators may sometimes dull down their representations of groups of people from fearing the risk of offending them. He feels this can skew the real-life representations of the characters and how he helped work on creating characters that fit the setting much better. 

This talk was a longer talk which happened in another building.
Philip gave insight into keeping in tune with other softwares and how he feels Maya may actually be on the way out in the industry. And learning softwares such as Procreate, Blender, and Unreal Engine are still just as useful.

I managed to get feedback on my previs animation this time. He said previs-wise its very good. He mentioned potential extra polish on the exit shot where she's leaving the room, as she looks like she could be sneaking from the timing of the movements. I felt this was great advice if I was to continue this project for a better previs readability, but also bring it closer towards a polished animation. He also mentioned making sure to reanalyze and check that it fits the 12 principles of animation to a good degree.
I have started to improve on my previs from before and will make these changes to consider if the previs is of high enough quality to be put in my showreel. Below I show I changed my rig so she wasn't so low to the ground, making her seem quicker as she leaves.

By collaging assets together efficiently and using premade mocap assets from the community online this has widened my view and knowledge and understanding of the practical applications of such tools, aside from just personal projects. the almost 2,500 mocap actions on Mixamo and within Rokoko studio have shown very useful at producing fast game style cinematics utilising a range of movements given by the community. I talk more about my knowledge and new first hand research about mocap with Unreal Engine on my development page.

This session was a bit of a unique one.
we usually have speakers who come in to tell us how it works in the industry and talk about differnt studios and roles.

but we didnt have much in person, watching the proffesionals work, and what their practical workflows are in the moment.

to see how a high level 3d animator goes about their routine of setting up their project and scene, and bringing real reference into maya and how to adjust it with the proper timings to add more expression or impact. To help us understand hius workflow he took us through a personal project of him animating a lion getting up and walking. he showed all the way through from gathering references to polishing and framing the animation. he did this by jumping through different saves of the project so it didnt bore us to much and just get to the useful bits.

Although the class felt they knew these principles that were being demonstrated already, i felt it was good oppotunity to see the practical steps each animator takes, incase we may pick up some beneficial tips. 

I asked questions such as querying why he does not use autokey and also why he priorotises uses a digital pen and not a mouse- which many others do not. he stated that he doesnt like autokey because he has to remmeber to set an initial keyframe at the start of every control, but he acknoledged that once getting into the habit of doing such every project in the long run it may still help. and stated that he uses a pen because he was starting to get wrist strain with a mouse, which i have heard from others who use a mouse for their work. it would be beneficial for me to consider trying differnt method to help reduce my wrist strain for future if i start experiencing RSI or wrist pain.

it also goes to show that staying up to date in the current options of maya and its tools to offer.
I mentioned on the first year of me learning Maya that it was like working in the graph editor is a lot like working in the Matrix and how during this speak he also mentioned he found the same. I went on to ask him a question about whether he uses the motion path in his software as their surely more like a 3D version of working in this "matrix software" but on his version of maya he experiences bad bugginess with motion paths, which i found better luck when upgrading to maya 2025 when i tried it. staying up to date and making use of the tools available provide better chances at efficiency gains when working.

He mentioned how useful the "[" and "]" or "," and "." keys are in maya and when learned how to jump to and from keyframes quikcer it really helps save time rather than sliding your mouse to the next keyframe on the timeline everytime you want to jump to the next pose. i found this resonated with me greatly as i have put together a macro keypad with dials that allows me a very efficient way of scrolling through the timeline, in a very similar way to how DJ's scroll the timeline of their tracks with their wheels.

He mentioned tips such as organising panels and windows within maya. This one i already have mastered as i use multiple monitors to help with all the maya windows, but he went on to talk about how maya doesnt let you bring video into it easily for reference so he reccomended a good tool called KeyframeMP which can easily sync up to you timeline and work as a wondows video player, i feel i will likely purchase this plugin as i use references a lot.

Animation Character Performance SyncSketch Feedback:

Incorporating and making these changes created a much more appealing animation with more defined actions and readability.
I have gone back into my showreel this week and updated these modifications and will update my home page with the improved showreel.

Winder Toby Curtis - industry speaker - Animation and VFX pipeline professional studio workflows

they talked about their different sectors in the creative field they manage

•  automotive

•  episodic

•  and games

They gave useful interview tips such as

•  be honest

•  positive and enthusiastic

•  don't speak badly of others

•  be humble and demonstrate and understanding but don't be arrogant

•  and get there early

 they gave tips on what makes a good application and CV

•  make sure your work is specific to the role you're applying for

•  be clear about your strength software roles

•  cover letters aren't really important

•  the type of project you have worked on the role the duration the type of work the responsibility

•  always have a link to your portfolio or your CV

they gave tips on what makes a good showreel

•  put your best work first

•  1 or 2 primary killer shot or any strong projects you are passionate about

•  it should be specific to the role you are applying

•  be clear about contribution to the shots

•  breakdowns are good for clarity

•  your first show Real should be no longer than 2 minutes

•  don't include work directly from tutorials

•  cut it to music to help with pacing

•  make use of artstation and LinkedIn

"Don't include work directly from tutorials."  This is good advice. I already use many tutorials online and knew already that although it can demonstrate you know the software, it doesn't inherently demonstrate your creativity. Whenever I follow a tutorial, I don't try to follow it exactly the same; I try my own project and use the tutorial as a tool to help elevate my work. It's great to hear that industry advice agrees with this.

they mentioned a great program they have for graduating students called the "level up program" (LUP):

• it is for final year graduates and people with less than 2 years industry experience

•  it is paid full-time permanent position across a variety of disciplines

•  led by our  House of skills and development team, Sam Taylor

•  it lets you train while you work on live projects

•  it's 4 days on projects and 1 day training

•  it's hybrid working. one day you will need to travel for training.

they talked about the culture at their industry

•  they mentioned how it has a flexible working policy 

• it's invested in staff development

•  commitment to diversity and inclusion

•  employee assistance programme

•  paid volunteer days

•  attend several industry events, FMX, develop, etc

•  regular social events

I found this talk very useful and interesting and feel like I may apply for the level-up program when the chance comes around next year as I am very interested in vfx.

Amy states the importance of keeping active and lets us know what to do after we've even wrapped up a job that we have just done work on:

•  send invoice

•  update showreel

•  credit list

•  contact studios 

• update portfolio

A new piece of advice that I hadn't heard before was making sure that when you're doing 2D art and painting in colors, you're using the proper hex codes and not the color picker, as compression from sending files can mess with the precise color, ruining the final image in cases.

Amy mentions extra pointers if your website and showreel are already great:

ASK MYSELF

• What opportunities am I looking for?

• Storyboarding? Animation? Designing?

• Does my reel or portfolio align with those roles?

• Show examples of relevant work.

• Are my website & socials working properly?

• Check images & links are working properly.

Case Study: Save Ralph - Using Animation to Advocate for Veganism and Animal Rights

Humane World for Animals. (2022). Save Ralph nominated for best Public Service & Activism video in the 26th annual Webby Awards. [online] Available at: https://www.humaneworld.org/en/news/save-ralph-nominated-best-public-service-activism-video-26th-annual-webby-awards.

The stop-motion piece is about a rabbit called Ralph that was used for cosmetic animal testing. The rabbit was voiced by Taika Waititi.
Ralph explains in a blunt way how he is frequently blinded, burned, and hurt in the name of humans and product safety.
While the visual style might seem charming and playful at first, it builds on an increasingly bleak narrative and forces the viewer to confront the normalized suffering behind everyday beauty products for these animals. This blend of innocent characters and horror was deliberately chosen to engage audiences emotionally with contrast without using graphic violence.

Humane World for Animals. (2022). Humane Society International’s Save Ralph campaign film wins two prestigious Webby Awards. [online] Available at: https://www.humaneworld.org/en/news/humane-society-internationals-save-ralph-campaign-film-wins-two-prestigious-webby-awards [Accessed 25 Mar. 2025].

Besa, A. (2021). Save Ralph, Stop Animal Testing. [online] Change.org. Available at: https://www.change.org/p/sephora-save-ralph-stop-animal-testing [Accessed 27 Mar. 2025].