I noticed this cool little project knocking around the web and just couldn't resist sharing it with you.
Reporting Back on HP7 in 3D
Last weeks I wrote about Harry Potter and asked you whether or not you would be watching the last instalment it in 3D (The Harry Potter finale: 2D or 3D?). Many of you replied back through Facebook and on this blog – thanks to all of you who took the time to do so.
Farewell to Potter
It wouldn't be right to let Potter go by and not say a word about it?
Personally I loved it - the early days especially and finally HP7 which was amazing, even in 3D!
And for all our friends in Soho, it's also an end to something which has played a major part in the rise and growth of VFX in the UK. The Industry would have survived and prospered without it but I am not sure it would have had the meteoric rise it did if ILM had not passed the work over to this side of the Atlantic...
Escapee Chris Mulcaster Talks About His Job at Cinesite
Chris Mulcaster is a great example of someone who got to where he wanted to be through hard work and determination. Chris studied our VFX Production course and it gave him all of the skills he needed to secure a job in the VFX Industry. But he didn't just study the course, he poured his heart and soul into it. This is the sort of dedication which pushes you to achieve great things and which sets you apart in a very competitive industry.
Globalisation of the VFX Industry
How VFX artists can seize the opportunities of this changing landscape
Terrence Malick: Visionary Genius or Boring Pseud?
His films certainly divide modern critics and audiences alike, which is perhaps no surprise. In a Hollywood saturated with formulaic product for multiplex audiences, his films are an anomaly, breaking from a conventional narrative and featuring extended, languid shots of the natural world that often serve to emphasise his character's - and therefore Man's - insignificance in the face of events.
Free Maya Tutorial - Creating Realistic Materials
If you want to replicate the complexity of real world objects, you need to create materials that mimic them and this month's free tutorial will show you exactly how to do that. A car body is made up of lots of materials or layers, like metal and paint. If you want to create a rusty car you'll need more materials to create the common signs of deterioration. Many Maya users will be familiar with the 'layered shader' and 'layered texture' nodes. This tutorial asks what happens if you are using the MIA material and rendering in Mental Ray.
Animation Escapee Becomes a Ninja
Another escapee from our Character Animation Course has just secured a position in the games industry. Congratulations to Pedro Cabeleira who began an internship this week at Ninja Theory in Cambridge, working on Cinematics for one of their new games.
My Animation Talk at Annecy
The Animation Festival ‘Annecy’ invited me to give a talk about my career as an animator and to lift the lid on a few Animation Mysteries as well. As much as I love working at Escape Studios, it was great to talk about my life as a freelance animator and some of the jobs that have shaped my career like ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit’ and ‘The Lion King’. It was also nice to see that people were interested in this too!
3D Creative Director at The Mill Comes to Escape
We’re getting pretty excited here at Escape Studios and looking forward to July 12th, when 3D Creative Director at The Mill, Jordi Bares, will be taking part in our special VFX Open Day.
Would You Pay For Your Own Training to Get Ahead?
Would you pay for your own training to get ahead of the competition and secure a better job? Well that’s one of the hot topics in our new Creative Futures Report which launches today.
Online Mentored Student Spotlight: Miska Janhunen
Finland native, Miska Janhunen had been working for his family’s visual design firm as a Webmaster for some time, but he harboured a dream of working in VFX. For years he has been trying to find time and flexibility to study CG. “Because of my location and current situation in life, it felt more or less ‘mission impossible’. Then, in the autumn of 2010, I found Escape Studios’ Online Mentored VFX course and all the pieces fell into place.”
DNeg Snaps up Two VFX Professional Escapees
When I see students go from first day newbies to fully-fledged VFX artists I can’t help but feel that they absolutely deserve it. After weeks of rigorous training learning how to create believable CG, the moment comes when they start looking for a job. And that’s exactly what happened to Pasquale Riefoli and Maria Busco who have both secured jobs at Double Negative!
Zappar: A Total Geek Fest!
I thought it was going to be one of those 'office' moments when a colleague pulled some papers out of his bag and said "you must see this"... He is important, so I paid good attention...!
Escapee Showcase: Ben Revens
As promised here's another escapee reel. This time from Ben Revens, one of our recent VFX graduates. This is a great reel with good examples of work from two of our most popular courses. The violin and tank shots were produced during our 12-week Visual Effects Production course. The more elaborate and advanced staircases shot was produced during our 6-weeks Visual Effects Professional extension which Ben took straight after his VFX Production course.
CWJobs Speaks To Escape Studios About Becoming A VFX Artist
A few weeks back, CWJobs spoke to our Recruitment Manager, Garreth Gaydon about the best way of getting a job in the VFX industry when you're first starting out. The feature which you can read in full here discusses the high demand for jobs in the VFX industry and the kinds of first jobs that will enable you to get your foot in the door and make it as a VFX artist. It’s a tricky industry to enter because it is both highly creative yet technically very demanding which requires a serious amount of skill and creative ability.
An Interesting Google Chrome Experiment With WebGL
The Ro.me site created in association with Google is doing the rounds at Escape Studios at the moment. In fact, you might even have read the story that Miles posted a few days ago.
Escapee Showcase: Roger Serrabassa Vilar
We're very proud of the work we do here at Escape Studios but we probably don't show enough of our students' work. Over the coming months we're going to be featuring much more student work on our website but in the meantime I wanted to start showing some of the reels from our most recent graduates.
Industry Coaching Diary of Compositing Escapee Clement Roland
Some of you may have seen a series posts from students' 'coaching diaries' on our blog recently. For those of you who don't know, some of our students studying our classroom courses are being coached by the industry's biggest post houses; The Mill, Double Negative and Framestore. This week, compositing student Clement Roland shares his experience with us.
