“Big things have small beginnings”, was an idea acknowledged in Ridley Scott’s Prometheus, released earlier this year. And for us, this statement couldn’t be more true. Taking the art of visual effects as a prime example, the spectacular CG you see on screens today was born from the most basic of concepts, and the people who created those effects invested significant time and energy to become the talented artists they are today. Every creative talent has to start out somewhere, and with the right levels of care and determination, it can evolve into something magnificent.

Adam Esat explains, that like many other video games industry professionals, his first source of inspiration came as a child, playing the likes of The Legend of Zelda, Metal Gear Solid and Pokémon.

To mark Escape's 10 year anniversary we decided to give the office a new look. Some of you who have been to our office may remember the funky brown and orange colour scheme gracing our office walls and the old layout of the desks next to our Reception area. Over the past few weeks the Escape office has dramatically changed and now we have a fresh, chic and very cool colour scheme of metallics and white. We've opened up a new area for our main office space and moved the Tech team into their very own area. There are more changes to come - we've got big ideas for the uninhabited space next to the Reception area plus some trendy furniture is arriving from our LA office.

Or wanted to be able to say, ‘I did that’, when watching a film and seeing a huge, breath taking explosion? Then maybe you should start to think about pursuing a career in Visual Effects. At Escape Studios, we want to make those first steps into the industry as easy as possible whilst providing you with the tools to succeed. Our Visual Effects Production course will not only give you the skills to progress in the exciting world of Film Visual Effects, but will also show you how to make an impressive show reel (which results in many of our students securing jobs once they have finished.)

It has been brought to our attention that Visual Effects facility Union VFX have recently collaborated with award winning director Danny Boyle on a couple of projects.

Success stories about our escapees are always a pleasure to write up. What's even better though is the opportunity to write another, on the same person, just a year later! Mark Pascoe recently answered some questions for us, explaining his journey from studying Sports Science at University to working on the VFX for an Emmy nominated TV Show for the Discovery channel.

Today is a very exciting day for a lot of people here at Escape Studios. Yes, today marks the end of course for a few of our classes (Visual Effects Production and Visual Effects Animation Professional). And to celebrate this graduation day, we thought we’d give a little preview of what we do as a Bon Voyage for our escapees.

We’ve just had some exciting news from the lovely people at Creative Skillset. The creative industries’ sector skills council are currently running a pilot scheme for short courses that provide training in areas such as TV, film, radio, interactive media, animation, computer graphics, facilities, photo imaging, publishing, advertising and fashion & textiles. By making training in these areas more readily available, they hope to open up these industries and create a more diverse pool of talent right here in the UK. And we’re delighted to play a part in that ambition.

Having previously worked in the games industry and studied Computer Games Art at degree level, Ewan Armstrong wanted to broaden his skill set to make the transition into film and TV media. Ewan made the decision to study at Escape because he saw an opportunity to fill the gaps in his knowledge on production rendering techniques, camera tracking and compositing, all while being in an environment closely linked to the VFX industry.

Well, what a day Thursday was! As part of the Visual Effects Animation Professional TD course, we created our own motion capture studio here at Escape!