For this module i have been tasked with coming up with rough ideas and concepts for materials that will help me push my project and my personal brand to potential employers through the use of things such as a new C.V design, Poster mock ups and a business card. To follow up on exploring ways to put my name out there as an animator, I have researched potential career routes and made plans for how to reach the roles I’m aspiring to work as one day after graduation.
Research for my career
Once I graduate university I’d like to try find a job in 3D character and creature animation where i take rigs that have been built by riggers and give realistic life to their movements and behaviour. Ideally I’d like to make it into the games industry as I love videogames and having my work in a game would be a dream come true, as to me videogames feel more alive than a short film or the likes as you’re physically controlling the player and the environment is living alongside you in the form of creatures like horses which you can control, dogs and cats you can pet or other character NPCs you can interact with.
3D Creature Animator
This job role requires animating creatures as suggested which include real life creatures such as common land dwelling animals like dogs, horses or cats, sea life including fish, dolphins, sharks, etc and even as far as the fantastical dragons, fearsome werewolves and everything in-between. If there’s a creature to animate, this is the job for it. Creature animators give realistic and believable locomotion and behaviours to these creatures to make their animations feel as immersive as possible while also keeping them interesting and exaggerating some aspects to give them certain personalities, as with all animator roles, acting plays a huge part here alongside appropriate and efficient references. Team work and communication is also key for this role as you will be working as part of a pipeline and with other departments to help meet deadlines and deliver work to industry standards.
So what are the tasks set out for a 3d creature animator?
According to the website cgspectrum.com, “Creature animators create animations of non-human characters. These could be from the natural world such as animals, reptiles, bugs, dinosaurs, etc., or they could be fantasy, myth, or alien creatures. While these creatures are not human they may sometimes need to be imbued with human traits, in these cases the creature animator must be able to give ‘personality’ to imagined beings while rendering their non-human physical characteristics.” These tasks include:
Taking storyboards done by the storyboard artists and thinking creatively to generate ways to best convey the motions and emotions to the creature on the screen.
Conducting individual research into references of particular creatures for their movements and behavioural habits, how their skin moves over their bones and where weight falls, and sometimes combine different creatures attributes together to create something completely original.
Using motion capture footage to help improve the movements and believability then fixing up that motion capture by tweaking it with your own animations to make the creature more interesting and original or give it the intended personality, as raw motion capture footage can be jarring and not perform as smoothly as its real life counterpart.
Working with 3D models of creatures which have been previously rigged as part of the animation pipeline. Each rig could have slight differences in controls and moveability.
Creating animation to sync with specific audio files such as voice lines, sound effects or music which will require a lot more planning and precise timing. Creature animators will also be required to add sound to their animation files in editing.
Each creature will have its own way of moving whether that be very subtle differences or exaggerated wing movements compared to a normal quadruped walk cycle, this means that the techniques and methods of animating previously used might not be adequate for the next creature.
No matter if you stay working in the same studio, you will have a number of projects to work on which may include style, genre and atmosphere changes so while one project is working with a horrifying creature, you will want to keep some of their movements snappy and erratic and create a lot of anticipation whereas if you’re working on a realistic videogame you’ll need to keep the creatures as close to their real-life counterparts as possible. Always keep this in mind.
Now we know the tasks a 3D creature animator has to fulfil in their job, what requirements are expected to get into the job role?
Since this job role involves creating realistic movement of four-legged creatures you are expected to understand the locomotion of an animal with their timings and weight influences on different skins and their coverages, e.g., scales, feathers, fur, as these can be influenced by forces such as wind, water, how they move and rub against each other, etc. Obviously since this is 3D working with 3D models, you’re going to need to be proficient in 3D software and rigs and know your way around, able to adapt to new tools you’re likely to be given by your team.
As previously mentioned, knowledge of 3D software is a guaranteed must as this is the medium you will be working with the whole time. Bonus software such as editing, pre-production, texturing and games engines will help get you in the run for being hired as it gives you the opportunity to do extra work yourself and easing workload from the team. It also shows you’re interested professionally and dedicated to your practice.
Looking at all of this and being sure i want to start pursuing this job role, I’m aware that i will need to gather more finished animations such as walk cycles, run cycles, and action shots of creatures (and characters), practice more techniques and possibly even look at investing in other courses geared specifically towards creature animation such as Ianimate.com, though that will be a huge dedication as they’re quite pricey at 1,698 quid, which is understandable as they get industry professionals in to teach live workshops and give feedback. Even free options such as YouTube or less pricey sales on sites such as Udemy, Domestika, etc can help me advance my skills. I enjoy animating quadrupeds, though a bit challenging, the end result makes it all worth it to see my creature moving and behaving realistically so I could possibly find something cheaper, I’m happy enough to go in the direction i need to in order to improve my work.
Design process for my branding and promotion
When creating my poster, I first had an initial idea in my mind of using the constellations of the 3 animals as large figures around the smaller star character to symbolise how great powerful things can come from something so small and seemingly useless. I had thought of using a bright coloured nebula in the background with transparent colouring on the animals at low opacity to not overshadow the star too much and drown it out as this would feel more threatening than inspiring. Since the planet is involved in most of the animation, i decided to add it to the poster too but wasn’t sure how to do this at first as i originally had it show its size by being a huge object behind everything but decided it fit better in the corner. It looks transparent here but that’s a mistake on my behalf, I was wanting it to look further away and less visible but still fully opaque which i will have to fix for the final version. Below you can see a few poster iterations i had trying to decide where to place everything, what the background should be like and the eventual decision to tie it all together with stars, then the current design where i moved two of the animals according to feedback.
The title shape idea came from my very first storyboard pass, as I liked the idea of the movement lines of the stars going round the words of the title which i will animate sparkling in the actual short animation. As for the actual wording of the title itself, I was trying to think of something simple and fairly obvious to fit with my light-hearted storybook like genre, which was originally “Within the Stars” but thought that didn’t really roll off the tongue and it was a bit long for such a simplistic animation with too literal of a meaning, so i switched to a shorter version which is my current title, “Within Stars” as it could either stand for the constellations already there, the fact theyre in the sky with stars, or it could be talking about the actual star character.
My C.V. hasn’t really changed much as i didn’t get a placement job and moved straight to final year which only gives me the opportunity to update it with things ive since done for my major project such as modelling the animal characters and rigging one of them -though the bones were already there- and modelling the background props. I have decided however to change the colouring as last year i was told that the colour green might throw some employers off as its more of a sickly colour, so i decided to change it to purple keeping the paler shades and mess around with coloured writing to make it feel more fun and pop easier. My branding is a bit of a tough decision to go along with this as I dont know whether to use my real name or the name i created for myself known as “Leafalu” which can be shortened to Leaf and i already have a unique signature for this name with a leaf design as seen below, though i feel like it’d limit me to light-hearted things as if i put something like a horror out under this name it’d feel a bit misplaced and odd.
Since I’m a little unsure of what name to brand myself under, if either of these at all, ive made two designs for a business card to fit each name and personality i want to convey. I’m not exactly the best designer so they’re both simplistic and a bit underwhelming but this is something i can work on over the next few weeks.
Made in illustrator, I had used a script typeface for the name Leafalu then used the pen curvature tool with stroke options to create the leaf on the start of the L and taper it off at the end. I like the colour purple and pastel colours seem more appealing than saturated colours so i chose a nice shade and decided that white would pop yet kept it to just simple outlines. The stars relate to my major project too so i thought it was a nice subtle touch.
For the LG i used illustrators brush tool with 5pt oval settings and drew the letters with my mouse which converted into vectors I could freely edit and move around.
I’ve been practicing making logos with my two chosen names and using my initials, also starting to learn calligraphy so i can make them look elegant and clean without the use of a computer. I like the little leaf at the start of the L though it fits with the elegancy, and the way letters can intertwine with one another to make a seamless design.
I’m not sure if design decks are mandatory but I dont really completely understand what they are. They seem like a kind of art book to show your progress and i dont really have anything done right now besides the animal models and rigs which took me ages as i couldn’t get my head around how to paint skin weights to get realistic movements, and a planet concept design so I cant exactly make one of these at the minute as i dont have enough material to put in it.
As for promoting my work, I’ve noticed that the easiest way to get your name out there nowadays is making use of social media and the reach you can get through use of appropriate hashtags and topic tagging. Networking to other people in your area politely explaining that you’re making an animation, or have made one and you would like to get your name out there, letting them know exactly who you are, what you do and what you’re hoping to achieve with your degree, as a good word with people can give your potential employers good impressions and show you’re keen to work. Making a website specifically for your work or your project and the behind the scenes could also help generate an audience.
After receiving feedback from tutors, peers and family members, I decided to make my poster in 3D space with the characters and assets I had created for my major project animation. I used photoshop to clean up some lines that were cramped and messy from the contour outline renders, added stars and constellation lines by first going in with a hard brush on in size 14, then using a colour dodge layer above, using a soft brush with a size of 18 as this would make the stars look like they are glowing softly. I only used lines with a thickness of 1 as I thought this nicely complimented my designs and made them seem more elegant with fine lines rather than big heavy lines that might overshadow the characters and draw too much attention. I chose a regal looking font that looks nice and is easily legible, and added some little arcs and stars surrounding it to make it seem more alive. It didn’t quite achieve the effect I was going for like in the 2D concept, but it still looks nice. I chose the white fonts as they contrast well with all the colours in the background, as well as the characters, and made it easier noticed by turning down the opacity of the nebula, planet, and characters individually until I reached the desired look.
For my business cards, I went onto Vistaprint and used their design place to import images I had made in illustrator and arranged them to make a nice background with contrasting white stars and lettering, adding in my contact information, my brand name and of course my profession, added some complimentary clouds and some of my characters to tie it all back to my animation. These photos are a little bad quality and have an unwanted ring around them as Vistaprint wouldn’t let me download my designs, even though i paid for them, so i had to screenshot them.
I then changed it slightly as I want to put my design onto a hoodie, keyring and pen for display to seem more professional, as it shows ive put thought into promotional materials.
As for my display, I am going to put a light purple tablecloth over my half, and I have bought 3 wooden stars i am going to spray paint gold to set my stuff ontop of as this will make it stand out. I have made a cardboard bear and a clay bear to set on my dispay on these stars beside my mug of pens and business card holder. The clay bear is going to be painted like my character, and will hold a business card to show off the back of the design, while the rest sit in a card holder. I have also bought a book I am planning to paint like the one in my animation and give it some turnable pages about made up constellations.
Over all, I am pretty happy with how my designs have turned out, especially my business card and the nebula i created in after effects as seen on my portfolio. I’m not too great at designing so my table wont be anything too special, but i have tried to think of promotional materials to push my brand out there.
As for my career path, I don’t know if its something you usually get on these blogs, but I don’t think I want to pursue animation anymore, as I find it very stressful when the software plays up and things don’t go as planned, taking days to fix. I think I might continue it as a hobby until I get to where i want to be but I think for now I might look into coding apprenticeships, as that is a more logical side of things and will always have a “right” and a “wrong”. However, I did really enjoy this course and the last few years have given me a lot of knowledge and insight needed to continue to grow and learn.