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HelloWinter posted:Hey guys!! I don't know if you remember me, but a few months ago I asked some general questions about interviews. Since then I couldn't discuss about the project but now that it's public knowledge, I can feel free to post about it. I just wanted to give a huge thanks to you guys for the valuable stuff that's been passed on in this thread. I was a college dropout so it was a miracle that I managed to get my foot in the door regardless. Holy gently caress brother, good job! Learn everything you can, and work real hard!
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Oct 15, 2016 21:37
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HelloWinter posted:Hey guys!! I don't know if you remember me, but a few months ago I asked some general questions about interviews. Since then I couldn't discuss about the project but now that it's public knowledge, I can feel free to post about it. I just wanted to give a huge thanks to you guys for the valuable stuff that's been passed on in this thread. I was a college dropout so it was a miracle that I managed to get my foot in the door regardless. Very nice! The show looks pretty good so far, I'm looking forward to it
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Oct 16, 2016 00:11
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Congrats. I love seeing people from this thread succeed. It gives me hope to keep pitching!
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Oct 16, 2016 01:48
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Good stuff! That's a Nelvana show, correct? They still have some good projects these days and apparently their animation quotas are closer to 150 frames per day instead of 300 like all the other Canadian TV studios.
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Oct 17, 2016 04:10
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Awesome!! Congrats. 
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Oct 17, 2016 16:13
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Thanks guys!! I'll make sure not to disappoint. I've already done leaps and bounds in terms of improvement. When I first got there I didn't know a gosh darn thing about Toon Boom. I'm still wrestling with the program, but I fare much better nowadays!Ccs posted:Good stuff! That's a Nelvana show, correct? They still have some good projects these days and apparently their animation quotas are closer to 150 frames per day instead of 300 like all the other Canadian TV studios.
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Oct 17, 2016 23:12
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30 seconds per week is still low in the Canadian industry. I'm at 45 seconds per week, and if you work at Bardel, their quotas are between 60 and 75 seconds per week. But no one at Bardel goes home before 11 PM, even though they do probably make $1000 more than me per month. The lowest I heard of was 20 seconds a week on the How to Train Your Dragon TV series, but that had closer to feature quality animation, so the hours were long. Ccs fucked around with this message at 03:42 on Oct 18, 2016 |
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Oct 18, 2016 03:39
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Holy poo poo it's been forever since I posted in CC. Just felt like dropping by at 2:30 AM to see what's up around here. I also started a Vine account for quick 6 second animations set to some beats I like. Mostly for practice, getting over stuff I'm not good at, and learning more about Toon Boom Harmony and trying to build a pipeline for myself. All the stuff on it will be done in Harmony. At least for the time being. I'd like to learn Cinema 4D one of these days. https://vine.co/u/1396087289356136448 Ccs posted:30 seconds per week is still low in the Canadian industry. I'm at 45 seconds per week, and if you work at Bardel, their quotas are between 60 and 75 seconds per week. But no one at Bardel goes home before 11 PM, even though they do probably make $1000 more than me per month. I've heard a lot of bad things about Bardel. A friend of a friend is a former Bardel animator who moved to another industry. I'm kinda hoping he goes on my other friend's podcast to whistleblow. He's not being pressured though. When I was at Titmouse the first time, 300 frames per week always seemed to be the magic number. They'd try for more, try for less, but it kept settling at 300.
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Oct 20, 2016 10:38
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livingfruitvirus posted:Holy poo poo it's been forever since I posted in CC. Just felt like dropping by at 2:30 AM to see what's up around here. I also started a Vine account for quick 6 second animations set to some beats I like. Mostly for practice, getting over stuff I'm not good at, and learning more about Toon Boom Harmony and trying to build a pipeline for myself. All the stuff on it will be done in Harmony. At least for the time being. I'd like to learn Cinema 4D one of these days. hey, dude. that's, uh, quite the list of credits under your name!
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Oct 20, 2016 11:54
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livingfruitvirus posted:I've heard a lot of bad things about Bardel. A friend of a friend is a former Bardel animator who moved to another industry. I'm kinda hoping he goes on my other friend's podcast to whistleblow. He's not being pressured though. When I was at Titmouse the first time, 300 frames per week always seemed to be the magic number. They'd try for more, try for less, but it kept settling at 300. Yeah. I also have a friend at Bardel but he used to work in India so to him conditions at Bardel are actually a slight improvement. He says half the crew usually take 4 months off per year to recover from the work hours though, since working a full 12 months at 70-80 hour weeks is really bad for your health. They do have a core team of "survivors" that work all year round and have learned to deal with the conditions though I don't know how many years it ends up taking off their life.
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Oct 21, 2016 00:15
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bitmap posted:hey, dude. that's, uh, quite the list of credits under your name! It's been a busy 8 years! I just wrapped on a new show called Big Mouth. It should debut next summer on Netflix. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Mouth_(TV_series)
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Oct 21, 2016 11:11
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Hobby project , fun making a character and animation for a contest https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hAAzO559s04
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Oct 23, 2016 23:09
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moonraker posted:Hobby project , fun making a character and animation for a contest I think the rendering style is kinda cool but your camera moves and framing and very abrupt and confusing.
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Oct 24, 2016 23:58
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Thanks for the feedback Ccs , agreed the camera work and transitions have lots of room for improvement. Will need to learn a bit more about the best way to go about it. On a seprate note i wanted to share the below video , a surreal artwork a guy made on his own useing Terragen, Lightwave, Hitfilm Pro and Sony Vegas Pro. Its great whats possible on your home PC these days https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9VoVhdlI70 http://hitfilm.com/forum/discussion/41647/last-lights-short-film
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Oct 26, 2016 00:08
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So Frederator has apparently been bought by the Canadian studio Rainmaker, and is forming a new company called "Wow Unlimited", who will probably be competing with Corus and DHX as major Canadian content producers. I've also heard Bravest Warriors is going to start up production again, but moving to Corus in Toronto from New York.
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Oct 26, 2016 23:19
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I had the grand pleasure and privilege to work with the moth collective on this https://www.theguardian.com/woodland-trust-64-million-trees/video/2016/oct/28/the-need-for-trees-follow-the-lifecycle-of-a-tree-video
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Nov 8, 2016 11:18
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Bitmap your stuff is inspirational man, I love it. Do you have any process videos or do you ever stream? I'd be really interested in watching you work.
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Nov 13, 2016 15:44
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Communist Toast posted:Bitmap your stuff is inspirational man, I love it. Do you have any process videos or do you ever stream? I'd be really interested in watching you work. Thankyou! I'm actually working on a blog to teach everyone how to animate. I'm navigating obtaining permission to show the entire process of a cartoon network spot I've been labouring over for a few months, which is rendering out right now. I'll post it all here as soon as I'm allowed to!
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Nov 13, 2016 21:38
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bitmap posted:Thankyou! Ohh juicy stuff man, looking forward to it. Anyways I just downloaded TVpaint after a long hiatus from animating. This program is soooo much better than flash holy poo poo. Here's a silly thing I'm making to distract myself from my Loop de Loop project. 
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Nov 15, 2016 18:34
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An animatic for this months Loop de Loop, criticism is very appreciated. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTyRG-UlJfA I'm a little worried it doesn't loop very well since everything doesn't reset at the end.
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Nov 16, 2016 16:39
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Communist Toast posted:An animatic for this months Loop de Loop, criticism is very appreciated. looks good, lot of cool framing. It'll be fun to edit and gently caress around with the timing. That said...think you can finish it? It's pretty ambitious for a loop! In regard to the looping, that's the important part- reckon you could merge some of the final shots? like, he goes "MWA!" with his fingers in the same shot as the order printing, which with a cut in the middle becomes the first shot again? Just a thought.
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Nov 16, 2016 20:09
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bitmap posted:looks good, lot of cool framing. It'll be fun to edit and gently caress around with the timing. That said...think you can finish it? It's pretty ambitious for a loop! I see what you mean by merging shots, I definitely could see that adding some more continuity. My biggest concern was that the stuff was not showed being put away (the cream cheese, pan and tobiko). Though I suppose that could have happened when the camera is not on the chef now that I think about it... As for finishing it, it beats me. I have a bad habit of taking on projects and then ballooning them out to unmanageable proportions, this is no exception. Thanks for the tips though man!
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Nov 16, 2016 23:16
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HelloWinter posted:Hey guys!! I don't know if you remember me, but a few months ago I asked some general questions about interviews. Since then I couldn't discuss about the project but now that it's public knowledge, I can feel free to post about it. I just wanted to give a huge thanks to you guys for the valuable stuff that's been passed on in this thread. I was a college dropout so it was a miracle that I managed to get my foot in the door regardless. So, two and a half months have passed since I got recruited for this show. The project itself is a blast to work on. When you catch a glimpse of what the writers, voice actors, and designers are doing and have completed thus far, you can just tell the work oozes with fun and delight. As an animator, this kind of project (as my first entry to the industry) is like a dream. ... Well, I'd like to say that, but... I got called in last Monday alongside another coworker, who couldn't meet the quota for the first episode's deadline either. We were given another chance, mind you with more strict supervision from now on, which is understandable. The animation supervisor is well known across my coworkers to employ fear tactics whenever our performance isn't up to par, regardless if you pulled off 20+ hours of uncompensated overtime (not including weekend hours). I talked with a few higher ups within the company about this problem just yesterday, mentioning to them that we were heavily considering switching departments or companies altogether if this is going to keep up. They both suggested to just try to stick with the job, because "it'll look good on your portfolio". I woke up this morning to go to work and I couldn't physically get up. Thankfully I had my laptop beside me so I emailed the supervisor that I couldn't make it in today. I slept another 5 hours to recoup. It's sad to think that my first exposure to the animation industry is to be kicked on the ground and punished, even if you've technically improved more than twice as much in a short span of time. Some of us did start this job with prior experience with Toonboom, but a few of us literally started from scratch (in my case, straight out of school) and in my opinion we do put in the effort to learn. I think of myself as a quick learner, before I embarked into animation I was studying computer science/engineering at a university with advanced credentials in mathematics. Knowing how to work smart is a thing my brain is naturally wired to do. And yet, I think the biggest fault in this project is, undoubtedly, the lack of proper budgeting and putting more workload on the few they hire. Anyway, we've had an episode launch on Monday and instead of a five week quota, they're going to start reducing it to four weeks. Because of holidays they've extended this episode to a six-week period, but it's a general consensus between us animators that we will go to work right after boxing day, and keep working, just to try to catch a glimmer of hope that we will be able to improve on our speed without sacrificing the quality that they yearn for for this series.
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Dec 15, 2016 00:00
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HelloWinter posted:So, two and a half months have passed since I got recruited for this show. The project itself is a blast to work on. When you catch a glimpse of what the writers, voice actors, and designers are doing and have completed thus far, you can just tell the work oozes with fun and delight. As an animator, this kind of project (as my first entry to the industry) is like a dream. Jesus. Thanks for being so candid about your experience.
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Dec 15, 2016 00:29
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HelloWinter posted:So, two and a half months have passed since I got recruited for this show. The project itself is a blast to work on. When you catch a glimpse of what the writers, voice actors, and designers are doing and have completed thus far, you can just tell the work oozes with fun and delight. As an animator, this kind of project (as my first entry to the industry) is like a dream. I've heard similar stories from other animators I know. It makes me pretty happy that I do all my cartooning for fun on the side and my 9-5 is more motion graphics/design stuff. That sounds brutal.
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Dec 15, 2016 01:25
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I was brought in to work on a show I won't name over the holidays one year, with unpaid overtime every day, where I and other artists had to do layout, animation and shadowing (so three jobs for the price of one), for three 22-minute episodes, with a deadline of one month. And then almost immediately after the holidays, after having done what we were asked which was loving impossible, we were kicked off the project. They brought me back a couple years later for a project that ran out of money and stopped paying everyone so we all stopped working and then it took months to get the money we were owed The moral is, independent/freelance animation only for me anymore The 7th Guest fucked around with this message at 02:50 on Dec 15, 2016 |
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Dec 15, 2016 02:48
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Quest For Glory II posted:I was brought in to work on a show I won't name Name names!
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Dec 15, 2016 02:51
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I'd rather not but they were a NY non-union studio. they made a living undercutting every other buyer and then passing that onto the employees. some good dang artists made it out of there although you wouldn't know it from the quality of the studio's final products That's not really an unusual story in the non-union world though
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Dec 15, 2016 03:27
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HelloWinter posted:I got called in last Monday alongside another coworker, who couldn't meet the quota for the first episode's deadline either. We were given another chance, mind you with more strict supervision from now on, which is understandable. The animation supervisor is well known across my coworkers to employ fear tactics whenever our performance isn't up to par, regardless if you pulled off 20+ hours of uncompensated overtime (not including weekend hours). I talked with a few higher ups within the company about this problem just yesterday, mentioning to them that we were heavily considering switching departments or companies altogether if this is going to keep up. They both suggested to just try to stick with the job, because "it'll look good on your portfolio". Every studio in Canada right now is going through this because of demands to match the speed of Asia, and also because of the amount of work happening in Canada right now and the inability to recruit experienced crew. If you have a background in comp-sci/math, I would go back to school to learn VFX and concentrate on Houdini, because it will get you a job in this field with much better working conditions and compensation. I'm an animator on 3d shows and we also have the same issues with hours and hours of unpaid overtime, late deliveries, not enough crew, etc. etc. But VFX studios usually do pay overtime and will feed you if you stay late. Another thing new entrants to animation don't really realize is that their compensation will basically stay flat throughout their career of working on TV projects. You'll probably be hired for around 30 k a year, and at a senior or lead level you'll be making maybe 40 k CAD a year. Supervisors or Animation Directors probably make around 50k. I have friends who talk about how they look forward to later in their careers making more money and being able to buy a lot more stuff and I'm like "Save now, because this industry boom could stop in the next couple of years, and your compensation isn't going to increase much from this point." If you budget and really like animation and get more efficient as you work then you'll be okay long term, but most people seem to burn out before hitting 30. Whereas experienced Houdini and VFX people in Vancouver right now are getting 80k+ in a lot of cases, some guys are even getting paid close to 200k. At your young age you may be thinking "but I like drawing! I like cartoons! I want to do that, not do water simulation!" But if you think you have the knack for the math behind Houdini and you have a passion for making visuals, think about it. Because it will probably put you in a much better financial situation and quality of life situation later on. Just try to avoid working for MPC. Ccs fucked around with this message at 03:49 on Dec 15, 2016 |
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Dec 15, 2016 03:36
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christ I'm glad I'm a freelancer
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Dec 15, 2016 14:42
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Would any of you who've worked in the industry and had bad experiences ever do an interview about it? I could mess with your voices or something if you wanted to hide your identity or just do a written interview that I'll read in VO.
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Dec 15, 2016 20:46
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If the studio I'm at ever kicks me out I'll gladly go on record about some of the poo poo I've seen. I don't want to mess with my current relatively comfortable job though. It's better than a lot of other places. Studios in Vancouver are already getting paranoid about animators speaking out, since Sausage Party exposed a lot of bullshit going on with unpaid overtime. There are pushes for unionizing now in Vancouver, which is making studios really worried and causing managements to try to diversify into Quebec, Toronto, and further east, to try to show artists in Vancouver that they are expendable. But the talent is stretched so thin that as they try to keep their satellite studios open and busy with work, they risk pissing off major clients who are unhappy with the quality they get back. It's possible their American clients will get fed up with them and bring the work back to California and New York. But it's hard for them to argue with the prices that Canadian studios are charging these days, since the combination of a low dollar and tax incentives make Canadians cheaper to hire than Indian or Chinese artists in many cases. Ccs fucked around with this message at 23:21 on Dec 15, 2016 |
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Dec 15, 2016 23:19
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Man, it's nuts that this stuff still happens. I read about it happening in the 80s and 90s a lot, but it clearly hasn't gotten much better.
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Dec 16, 2016 00:53
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This has been a constant in the animation industry since its inception. Fleischer Studios moved to Florida from NYC in the 1930s to avoid hostility from a studio strike and take advantage of tax structures. Animation producers have shifted work between Canada, India, Japan, China, Korea, and the US for years depending on where they could get a balance between quality and cost. In the end it leads to animators lives being harder. There have been a few Golden Ages. I work with some guys who remember getting paid crazy money in the early days of CGI in Vancouver, or while working on video games in London. But for the most part TV and game animation is labor intensive and not a well paying gig, and every location goes through a boom and bust cycle.
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Dec 16, 2016 02:26
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Happy 2017 Trash Bros https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUqllMbsbCU
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Jan 5, 2017 15:16
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Hello again. I'd like some feedback on this WIP for the January 11 Second Club. I'm trying to decide whether I want to do another pass on this and make it cleaner/tighter. On the one hand, it's very messy and loose and the wiggly lines are distracting. On the other hand, I don't want to kill the sketchiness too much or deaden it. What do y'all think I should do? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJKqMFy_1XM
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Jan 9, 2017 16:19
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Neon Noodle posted:Hello again. I'd like some feedback on this WIP for the January 11 Second Club. I'm trying to decide whether I want to do another pass on this and make it cleaner/tighter. On the one hand, it's very messy and loose and the wiggly lines are distracting. On the other hand, I don't want to kill the sketchiness too much or deaden it. What do y'all think I should do? HELLO NOODLE I get what you're doing, and looseness is frequently an asset in animation that people bash their heads against thirty comp tricks or post effects to even emulate. In this case and also pertaining to the racoon you posted above I feel like the manic feel of the linework is stealing a lot from readability and the strength of the poses. More succinctly, it robs the work of what I describe to students as "intent". Consider the shot of the dame taking a draw on her cigarette. It is ostensibly a simple action. She says something, acting into her cigarette and rolling her hand, puts the cigarette in her mouth and takes her hand away. I can see your thinking here- the change the direction of her attention to her hand, herself, and then to the bear. The "drag" on her lips as she takes her hand away. The "pop" in her expression as she does, receding into her final pose. All good, stuff that I would aim for too. Problem is, a lot of this gets lost without someone going looking for it- because of the overall "writhing" of the work it is never clear which points your attention is meant to flow between, where you intend the eye the be lead. In addition to the effect on the intent the sketchy feel (on the hair particularly, and in the lovely hand poses) obfuscates the forms you are describing. The next action where she waves out the match is much more readable! I like it. The only suggestion I have is that the arc of motion on her looking to the right of screen seem interrupted somewhere in the middle. rearrange some of the spacing and I think it'll feel a lot snappier and more polished. Generally I would recommend a tighter linework boil between clearly selected, readable poses. Sometimes I get carried away with a gnarly, scratchy aesthetic, only to find my choices have confused the audience.
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Jan 9, 2017 22:37
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bitmap posted:helpful things Learning process... 
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Jan 9, 2017 22:45
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While I don't consider myself an animator (I'm an illustrator), I've been asked to animate some bits and pieces over the last few years. I took a few hours today to make a 'showreel' of sorts. It's mostly for myself but I thought it might be of interest here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fIZmqGgLHwU Mostly everything was animated in Photoshop then edited in Final Cut. I'm sure there are better ways of doing things but I usually need to turn stuff around quickly so stick with what I know. I've recently been using Procreate on an iPad for the drawings. It's a really quick for making lines boil. Any feedback would be appreciated. While I'm posing, I also made this thing for a little record company to share on social media at Christmas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgUUZj9syw0 The sound is horrible (I only had a couple of days to make it or I'd have asked one of the musicians to help me out) but I'm really happy with how it turned out. I've wanted to try parallax backgrounds for ages and I figured snow was a good way to cut down on drawing time.
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Jan 15, 2017 23:56
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Tenterhooks posted:While I don't consider myself an animator could have fooled me
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