pre-production for specialist study

Wednesday 6^th May

Preparing for level 6

1. Do I understand what L6 is aiming to achieve and what do I want to achieve?

Level 6 is about being ready to step into the professional world so that I am prepared to work in the industry. I want to get the most from this course as this is my opportunity to find my path in animation and achieve my own way of working and style, also be confident with my presentations is also vital as I need to be ready to sell my work to my clients.

2. How do I achieve this?

By the time I reach L6 I will know which area of animation I want to do. I will have an updated portfolio showing my best work so far and will then fill it through the year with my final projects and life drawings.

For my final project of L5 I will sum up my options and decide which area I work in best and what kind of audience I want to produce animations for; thinking about age groups, TV animation, Feature film animation etc

Through the summer term I hope to be in work experience as this would help me to improve on my skills and prepare me further for working in the professional world.

3. How will work experience help me for L6?

· It will improve my skills in technology; finding short cuts and working to a strict deadline

· It will improve my communicational skills and working as a team member

· It will prepare me for working in a professional company

· It will give me a better idea of the kind of clients I will get and what they would want from me

4. What am I good at?

Skills Audit

GOOD

· Using different techniques and methods - I have always been interested in illustration and what you can achieve with it but animation is that extra bonus for me as this gives me the opportunity to express myself further. By experimenting with different techniques and mark making I can choose the best way of working fitting to the clients brief.

· Patience and determination- when I am working on a project although I may have problems, I am determined to sort the problem and finish my animation.

· Open minded- I find that the more open minded you are the better as it allows you to experiment more and have a wider opinion, there for the more different styles you try and different ways of working; working outside of your comfort zone and working to a clients opinion and not your own.

AVERAGE

· Drawing- my drawing is getting better and as I have been going to life drawing classes it gives me great practise and gets me used to the human anatomy.

· Using animation to communicate to an audience- my communicational skills are improving and I have a better understanding of how to work to a clients brief and how to communicate to a certain age audience i.e. I feel I achieved a good result in the Motion graphics project as I researched on what the audience would want to see and how I could use this to communicate to them.

· Animating a Character- I feel I am also improving with animating a character and showing expression i.e. for the New media project I chose to recreate an animation of the hare and the tortoise. I feel I succeeded with the movement of the characters and also the movement and expressions showed the characters personality.

· Modelling/making-

· Observation- my observation is improving as when I watch advertisements/animations/films I am more aware of the techniques and methods used, the programs used and also what they are communicating is also clearer as I am becoming more aware of how to communicate to a certain audience.

· Thoughts process- I am improving on my thoughts process and showing this to my audience in a presentation; where I get my inspiration, my developments, problems that I encounter and how I solve them etc.

NO GOOD

· Reading/understanding- It takes me a few attempts sometimes when reading the brief, I have to read it over again until it sinks in what is being asked.

· Another problem that I have found is I feel that I am a slow learner in the technical side of the tutorials/workshops; I struggle to keep up with the class as we learn about the new programs that we are using. If I am still unsure of the tutorial I will look up tutorials and practise.

My vocabulary is also lacking as I sometimes find it hard to describe and explain my work. This is a big problem for me when it comes down to presentations.

· I also need to do more artist research as I am also lacking knowledge of the popular/successful animators and artists.

5. Skills audience

I feel my best area is motion graphics as this is how I can express myself to the most of my ability. I also like CG animation but I need to do a lot of practising to reach a high standard for working in the professional industry. I think that motion graphics is an area of animation where I can go wild and use as much different media and techniques as I like/need and this is how I enjoy working.