It’s been pretty busy for Nik since completing his VFX course a few weeks back. After a stint at Atticus Finch and then Framestore he’s now working at legendary post house MPC. We caught up with Nik, sat him down, and asked him what it’s like being the new FX TD on the block.
New mentored courses for long distance learners
Today we’ve launched a brand new set of online mentored learning courses to offer a helping hand to international grads and drive the next wave of computer graphics talent. The twelve-month course offers the same high quality, interactive training experience as our flagship Visual Effects classroom course.
ZBrush - major announcements!
Our friends at Pixologic have done it again... There seems to be no stopping the development team and now Windows and Mac users will unite!
On Monday August 9 ,2010 existing users will be able to upgrade FREE OF CHARGE! Updated versions of all major plugins, and GoZBrush support for Modo, Cinema 4D, 3DSMax and Maya for Windows and Mac systems.
More information about ZBrush 4.0 and its features will be presented closer to launch date.
Competition reminder
It's great to see entries coming through for our Graduate Design Awards. Just a quick reminder you need to upload your show reel to our YouTube channel and then complete your entry by sending your contact details to escapestudios@brands2life.com. We need your name, showreel title, email address, telephone number, year of graduation, university and course attended.
Graduated but still looking for a job?
The BBC recently reported on the struggle faced by graduates to find a job after leaving university. Unemployment amongst grads aged below 24, rose by 25% last year.
Chaos UK Tour
The Chaos team held their very first UK event in London last week demonstrating V-Ray pipelines and some cool new technologies that are yet to be released. It was a fun afternoon with plenty of tips and demos from both Peter Mitev and Vlado Koylazov showing us just how the experts do it in V-Ray.
July’s Free Tutorial – Object Tracking in PFTrack
We have a real treat in store for you with July’s free tutorial; it’s a pretty technical and hands-on, and takes an in-depth look at geometry tracking within PFTrack.
It’s one of the final tutorials taken from our Camera Tracking for VFX Course and explains how the use of geometry can ‘Solve’ the motion of an object, enabling CG elements to interact with live action objects.
More Autodesk Hotfixes
Autodesk have just released a new set of hotfixes for their 3ds Max series of products for you to get stuck into.
CG Graduate Design Awards go live
We’ve launched the CG Graduate Design Awards aimed at uncovering talented uni grads in the UK and US. This is the first international competition of its kind, where we’ll be giving fresh talent, a helping hand into the competitive computer graphics world with our partners The Mill. So, if you’re a student or recent graduate dreaming of breaking into the industry, this is the opportunity for you.
Escape Studios gets a makeover
The eagle eyed amongst you will have seen that we’ve got a slightly different look about us – we’ve got a new website and a new brand. We’re still the same Escape Studios, we’ve just revamped everything to make it more accessible and better connected.
Heard the hype about CityEngine? Free trial now available!
There has been lots of talk about CityEngine recently... and until now you couldn't easily try it out.
Top 8 tips for the perfect show reel
Everyone knows the importance of a well put together show reel, but it's surprising how many there are out there that fail to tick all of the right boxes. Very often a show reel will fail to showcase the breadth of skill of the candidate, or will let itself down with a few issues that are fairly simple to fix. Therefore, we've put together a list of points to help you perfect your show reel and to maximise the impact it has on prospective employers. After much discussion at Escape Studios, plus a fair bit of back and forth on Twitter, we have whittled down the list to these 8 tips:
Final Animation Places!
As many of you will know, we are running our first Animation course with our new tutor Alex Williams starting on July 5th, and we still have a couple of places remaining. If you are interested in learning how to become a professional animator, and want to take advantage of Alex’s expert knowledge, then please get in touch to reserve your place. There are only a couple of weeks to go, so make sure to get in touch straight away!
Exclusive 'Go Pro' Offer for Graduates
Every budding professional needs professional software, so we have devised a brand new promotion to help CG graduates who want to pursue commercial work, get the professional set-up they need. This means you can now upgrade student licences to full commercial versions for half the price, and be on your way to becoming a professional CG artist.
VFX Showreel: Part 2
Last month, we showcased some fantastic work which came off the back of our Visual Effects Course. Seems that everyone really enjoyed it so we thought we'd treat you to another. The quality of work from these guys, especially as it's after just 12 weeks of training, is pretty amazing. Hat's off to them!
A Traveller's Tale: One Games Graduate Journey
Recent Games Course Graduate Adam Esat has just landed a job at prolific Games company Travellers Tales - and we are super pleased for him.
V-Ray for Maya 1.50 SP1 release
Chaos Group have just announced the availability of the new V-Ray for Maya 1.50 SP1, fully compatible with Maya 2011 a free of charge release for all existing customers.
Maxwell Render World Cup Promo
Next Limit have just announced a World Cup inspired promotion which will see Maxwell Render’s price drop, the further Spain progress in the tournament. This is quite an interesting promotion and there is no mistaking Next Limit is supporting their home country, Spain.
Maya Entertainment Creation Suite 2011 Review
If you have not had time to check out the fresh looking Maya 2011, maybe you would like to read a quick review from our friends at AWN.
MAXON Summer Special
MAXON have announced a Summer Special pricing promotion on their CINEMA 4D software. The promo includes three of their top selling software editions: the Broadcast Edition for motion graphics, the Architecture Edition for visualisation, and the Studio Bundle for 3D professionals, all discounted at 50%. There are discounts for upgrades as well, and the MAXON Service Agreement is also available.