Animation Apprentice Character Reel 2017

Check out our latest Character Animation Reel, featuring work by many of our talented students, some taking our 30 week course, others doing our online MA in animation. Animators aren't just technicians, they are entertainers, and the job of the animator is not just to master the art of character animation, but to craft an interesting and compelling performance. Congratulations to Steve Woodhouse, Victoria Bailey, Jinng Hwee Tan, Joe Gamble and Joris Van Laar on their excellent animation.

Animation Apprentice Masterclass at VIEW 2017

Animation Apprentice is hosting a creature animation masterclass at VIEW, the 18th International VFX & Computer Graphics Conference.

VIEW takes place every year in the beautiful Italian town of Torino (Turin), and we'll be there running a one-day masterclass in Maya on 25th October, demonstrating some cool creature animation techniques.

The class is aimed at complete beginners and requires no prior experience with Maya.

Classic Graph Editor in Maya 2017

New look Graph Editor

Not everyone loves the Maya 2017 interface. In particular, the new-look Graph Editor isn't necessarily as easy to use as the old version (or maybe it's just that I'm getting older and I don't like change).

So, if you want life to stay the same as it used to be - how do you get your Classic Graph Editor back?

Register Now for BlueGFX Expo

Registration is now open for  Blue GFX Expo is taking place in London on 9th November 2017.

We strongly encourage all our students to register now for this excellent free event.

Celebrating Our New MA Graduates

Alexi Balian, Charlie Falconi, Tim Millson, Neil Whitman, Stephen Young. 

Today was Graduation Day at Bucks New University and our new MAs in Animation made a little piece of animation history.

Our first graduating cohort aren't the first animation MAs in the world, but they are the first to get their MA purely online.

And, despite living in far-flung parts of the world, many came to Bucks for the graduation ceremony, for the chance to wear a robe and a silly hat and - at last! - meet up in person for the first time.

KeyFrame MP - Video Playback for Animators

Keyframe MP Overview from Chris Zurbrigg on Vimeo.

KeyFrame MP - Video Playback for Animators - is an excellent video playback tool that we are recommending to all our students.  Unlike most free playback tools (such as Media Player), KeyFrame PM gives you super useful features like scrubbing (with audio), single frame advance - all the stuff you need as an animator to play your work back frame by frame and trouble shoot the mistakes. At $79, KeyFrame MP isn't free, but it's much, much better than most of the free stuff that is out there. And, since Apple has stopped supporting their very useful tool Quick Time Pro, KeyFrame MP now fills a gap in the animator's tool kit.

Tripod for Filming Animation

Photo-R Tripod

One of the best ways to get live-action reference for a piece of animation is to film yourself acting it out, capture the footage on your phone, and then import the footage onto an image plane in Maya.

But how you film yourself acting it out, if it's just you? Someone has to operate the camera, after all. The answer is - you need a tripod. We're recommending this excellent (and inexpensive) tripod, made by Phot-R, for mounting your phone/camera, while you do the performance.

Pose Lib for Maya - Save Your Poses!

Pose Lib - free at http://www.studiolibrary.com

Pose Lib is a great free tool for managing poses and animation in Maya.  It's a super-useful free script for animators; you can use it to record a pose for any object in Maya, meaning that you can build a library of poses for your characters.

To use Pose Lib, download the tool, select your character, hit the "new pose" button, and a pose file is created in the relevant directory, along with the corresponding icon (a .bmp file).

Free Sound at YouTube Sound Effects Channel

Where can you find free sound effects for your animation? Sound design is something that animators at a big studio take for granted - because someone else does it for you.

But when you are creating your own animation, and your own animation demo reel, you need to think (at least a little) about sound effects, and sound design, for your shots. One excellent resource for royalty-free sound effects is the YouTube Sound Effects Channel.

Animation Taster Days Aug 24, Sept 13 & 27

Learn to animate a bird in flight

Want to try computer animation, but not sure if it's right for you? Come along to an Animation Taster Day in London on Monday 24 August, or September 13th and 27th.

Animation Taster Days are all about helping prospective students learn about character and creature animation, and find out what an animator's job is all about.

The classes take place at Escape Studios in Shepherd's Bush, West London. You will work with Autodesk Maya and the Adobe Creative Suite, and you’ll get a hands-on introduction to 3D Animation techniques, all for just £25!  By the end of the day you'll have your own piece of animation uploaded to your YouTube channel.  So, how do you sign up?

Get Ready for Our September Classroom!

The book we recommend for studying animation

What kind of preparation should students do before starting with us in our summer classroom, starting on Monday 4 September?  It's always good to do a little preparation and get a bit of a head start.

Below is a brief list of stuff to get you under way. You don't have to do all of it, but tick off a few of the things on this list and you will be a making a great start on your animation career.

First, here is a short reading list to get you started. We've narrowed it down to just two key books that we recommend for all our students.

Arc the Dragon - New Rig From Josh Sobel

The very talented Josh Sobel, who brought us the excellent Kayla rig, and also the very useful (and free) Bonnie rig, has just released a new rig - "Arc the Dragon", for a very reasonable $18.

Arc is described as "a full quadruped with expressive facial control, intuitive body setup, full picker, pose library and limitless customization."

Alien Covenant Secrets Revealed

I saw the original "Alien" movie by Ridley Scott when I was just 12 years old - far too young really (I was terrified) - but since then I've always been fascinated by this most stylish of horror film franchises.

Framestore VFX Supervisor Stuart Penn (Avatar, The Dark Knight, Iron Man 3, Guardians of the Galaxy.) is about the same age as I am, and clearly could not resist the chance to work on Scott's latest instalment - Alien Covenant.

Penn gave an excellent talk about his work on the film at Escape Studios last thursday - a fascinating insight into how the movie got put together.
 
So, what were the secrets behind this most coveted of VFX roles - working for one of the greatest living film directors on the latest Alien movie?

Find Your Future in London on 9 August

Want a career in creative media, but not sure what route to travel? Get yourself to the "Find Your Future 2017" event in London on 9 August.

If you're interested in working in the creative industries, but not yet ready to commit to any particular area then Find Your Future could be the careers event for you.

Representatives from some of London's top animation and VFX houses will be there (notably Double Negative and Framestore) and - best of all - the event is completely free.

Blue GFX 9 November 2017 - Save The Date!

Save the date! For all our students in the London area, Blue GFX Expo is taking place in Waterloo on 9th November 2017.

Last year speakers included Tom Box from Blue Zoo, one of the UK's biggest TV animation company, Stuart Penn from Framestore, and the folks from Autodesk showing the latest tools.

Our First Online MA Animation Graduates! Yay!

Graduation Day at Buckinghamshire New University

Our very first online MA students will be graduating in September.  Graduation Day at Buckinghamshire New University (our degree-awarding partner) takes place in early September, and we are especially proud to welcome our new MAs in Animation.

Of course, the event is something of a formality - no-one actually has to turn up, but we hope that many students will come and celebrate their achievement - graduating as Masters of Arts on the world's first online MA in Animation. There might even be a celebratory lunch!

And, in a small way, everyone there will be making a little piece of animation history.

Why Does Maya Batch Render Too Dark?

Utah Teapot

Lighting your scene using Autodesk Maya can be a tricky process. You get your lights to look just the way you want them to, and when you render out a single frame, everything looks fine.

But then, when you come to do a Batch Render of your final frames, Maya gives you a very different result - the images look much darker. Which is not what you wanted at all.

So why does Maya do this - and what is the solution?

Stuart Penn Talks Aliens in London on 3 August

Stuart Penn

Framestore VFX Supervisor Stuart Penn will be talking about his work at a free event in London in two weeks, on Thursday 3rd August at 6.30pm.

Events like this are a great way for animators to get a better understanding of the overall VFX pipeline, and how animation fits in to the big picture.

Stuart will be talking about his recent work as VFX supervisor on Ridley Scott’s Alien: Covenant. We encourage all our students to attend - and ask questions. This is a chance to meet a successful industry professional and ask him - how does a student artist break into this field?

Bring Your Own Animation Tonight!

Lukin pub, Fitzrovia

This one is for our animators in the London area: the monthly event "Bring Your Own Animation" is taking place tonight, Monday July 17th.

BYOA is an animation event that takes place every month at a pub in London.  This month the event is taking place at The Lukin pub in Fitzrovia.

If you are a student who is working on a shot or an updated reel (aren't we all?), bring your work on a USB or hard drive and get feedback from professional animators. You'll also hear the local gossip and find out the word on the street. Who is hiring, and what skills are in demand?

11 Second Club Entry by Victoria Bailey

Here at Animation Apprentice we encourage all our students to enter the monthly animation competition known as the 11 Second Club. There are all sorts of reasons to enter, not the least of which is the chance for students' to showcase their skills and get their work noticed. The excellent animation above was done by one of our online MA students, Victoria Bailey, who has created an excellent piece of character animation.  Animators should always think of themselves as actors giving a performance, finding the right mannerisms and gestures to make the shot feel believable.  It's not enough to learn the mechanics of animation - we also have to make our work entertaining and convincing. Many congratulations to Victoria on her excellent work.

VR UK - Today and Tomorrow

VR UK is at Ravensbourne today and tomorrow

The UK Virtual Reality Festival is taking place today and tomorrow, 6th and 7th July, at Ravensbourne in London. Sponsored by the Arts Council and the Lottery Fund, this event looks to be a great opportunity to break into the fastest-growing part of our industry - Virtual Reality.

Want to be an expert in a field that no-one really understands yet? Any of our students in the London area - get yourself to Ravensbourne. For details, follow this link.