Task 1
Job roles in animation:
Within animation there are many different roles needed to be taken up in order for an animation to be completed successfully, and typically these roles are broken up into production management roles who raises funds for the animation though a publisher or other means, hire workers for the project and who organise the pipeline of the animation effectively in order to organise the workers and to meet a certain deadline. There is also the development roles which mostly applies to writers and concept artists who both create the story within the world and the visuals of the animation. Next up is pre-production, these teams will consist of people who will take the concepts and script from the writers and work our the details of the story, for example creating a storyboard, background images, character designs or even create models if it’s a 3D or Stop motion production. After that it’s then sent of to the main production roles, these people animate the shots, light the environment, compose the shots, give visual effects to the animation etc. essentially the bulk of the actual motion part of the animation. After that we have post-production who take the scenes and stitch them together though editing and give the world in the animation sound with sound designers and finally music composition to aid the narrative and establish character, an example of this being a scary coming out from the shadows would be accompanied by a dark and dreary score, or perhaps a triumphant and grand song would be used with an action scene where the protagonist battles the antagonist at the end of the story.
References:
https://www.screenskills.com/starting-your-career/job-profiles/animation/
Storyboard is essentially the backbone of a film sequence, without it the animators would have a difficult time trying to translate words from a script and directly trying to make a sequence from it and so it is the job of a Storyboarder to take a script from the writers and visualise what that scene might look like in motion, the advantage of this is that the boarders can keep the flow of the story moving seamlessly making sure that nothing from the script is left out, in addition to seeing what sequences work and which ones don’t without investing much time committing to animation work. When a storyboard is then finished it’ll be used by the animators as a guide in order to time out the sequence, show roughly how the characters will be moving and posting the camera for the shot, not only that but in some cases the storyboards may be used as keyframes for some 2D animation sequences, further cutting down the time needed to be invested into animation.
References:
https://www.studiopigeon.com/blog/why-a-storyboard-is-essential-in-developing-an-animated-video/
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Task 2
Beginner / Entry level animation work:
Within animation there are a few roles in which most people first beginning their animation career will take up examples being:
Runners – Who keep the animation project running as smoothly as it can by working closely with the production team within the animation studio, assisting them when needed. They are typically seen as the most junior position of the animation industry, with their responsibilities changing depending on the size of the of the company but they’d still mostly doing administrative work. In some cases where animation work is shipped aboard to different studios the runner would have to make sure that storyboards are scanned and labelled correctly with any required documentation organised before being shipped off.
References:
https://www.screenskills.com/starting-your-career/job-profiles/animation/production-management/runner/
https://www.prospects.ac.uk/job-profiles/runner-broadcasting-film-video
Storyboard Artist – Storyboard artists are there to help visualise what the writers and director put down into the script in order to help give a visual representation of the narrative for the animators to give motion to. Storyboarders produce a number of image panels in order to plan out the shots of the animation and ensure a strong continuity between them. In some cases Storyboarders may be asked to clean up or finish partly finished panels and may be responsible for ensuring the style is suited well for the finished production, in cases where the animation work is being outsourced to a different county, it is extremely important that these storyboards not only are comprehensible in terms of shot progression but also are clean and readable too. In other cases someone may be working as a storyboard revisionist, in which case they will be working under the lead board artist making any changes to the storyboard that the lead board artist or director wants done.
References:
https://www.screenskills.com/starting-your-career/job-profiles/animation/pre-production/storyboard-artist/
https://www.careersinfilm.com/storyboard-artist/
Editing Assistant – The editing assistant is there to support the main editor put all of the shots of the animation together in the correct order. Editing assistants need to keep track of all the different materials coming into the editing department, these may include storyboards, animated scenes, sounds effects, dialogue and the soundtrack of the animation too. In some cases editing assistants may even be asked to make some cuts of the first assembly of the animation. In addition to this they also may be responsible to do more administrative tasks, an example being booking sessions with clients and in-house staff on behalf of the editor, they may also be responsible for exporting and sending off videos for review and pick up sessions, double checking final episodes before they’re shipped off or they could even be asked to update episode projects with any shot length alterations and so on and so forth!
References:
https://www.screenskills.com/starting-your-career/job-profiles/animation/post-production/edit-assistant/
https://g.co/kgs/piUPME
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Task 3:
Artist Research
Marie Lum also known as PuccaNoodles is a Los Angeles based animator and illustrator who studied at Otis College of Art and Design majoring with a BFA in animation.
When doing research on Marie the very first job working with animation though an Animation internship for the mobile game Pig Siren, starting off in June 2013, working on vectors and character animation, props and drawing backgrounds for the mobile app, with this ending in August 2013, though not working within a large scale studio it is the first case where we see Marie Lum working for a company in some capacity. During her time in college however she did have other experiences with freelance work, with studios such as Studio Yotta (Aug 2015 – Present), Trinket Studios (Jul 2015 – Oct 2016), Warner Bros Animation (Jun 2016 – Aug 2016) and Dreamworks TV (Nov 2016 – Present). However after completing her BFA in animation in 2017 she got her first job in house at Cartoon Network in May 2017 working as a Storyboard revisionist and artist, in which she got the opportunity to work on shows such as Craig of the Creek and Infinity Train! This lasted for a few years up until December 2019. It is not fully known how she got her position with Cartoon network, however it can be speculated that she was able to get in contact with them after working with Studio Yotta in doing clean-up work a OK-KO short they were hired to create. We do know however how she got her second position with Cartoon Network and Infinity Train! Roughly 2 years into her work with Storyboard revisions on Craig of the Creek, Marie was contacted to see for an interview for the new Cartoon Network show, Infinity Train, because as it turned out Owen Dennis the creator and showrunner of Infinity Train was actually a fan of her work, so after she finished the interview for the position she got a call saying they’d want her on the team and she immediately jumped to take the position and stayed with them until December 2019.
When researching her work I couldn’t really find much in terms of an up to date showreel, however her website has plenty of her portfolio on showcase for anyone to see! It showcases things such as her own story called Barrowdale Village Plaza about a young baker called Biscoti MacKenna who together with her ragtag group of shopkeepers find themselves traveling across the county to try and solve some kind of Evil Mystery!
In addtion to this you can also see things such as her animation, illustration and storyboarding work, showing both her personal work and professional work she did on show’s such as Craig of the Creek, Infinity Train and Too Loud as well as showing work she did with Studio Yotta and the game Battle Chef Brigade. It provides whoever is on her page the range of her solid art skills and showcases work starting from 2014 up to 2020, looking at the older stuff you can really see how she had improved over the years, starting off with a Animation showreel created in 2014 and ending with a short animation made around the end of 2020. Looking over her animation portfolio her beginning works were fairly simple with run-cycles, motion graphics, 2D VFX etc. however as you look over the rest of her work you can see it gradually getting more complex with more focus on 2D character animation, we can see her animating characters hair flowing in the wind, characters twirling swords and using other melee weapons in action shots, as well as much more refined run cycles, conveying much more emotion and with better timing and spacing when compared to her works in 2014.
For me after looking over her journey it really shows me that I need to be out there trying to get in contact with studios, as well as other artists in order to collaborate and get my work out there and to help push me to improve in my art further. Not only that but do it also to make connections with others who are more skilled than me and ask for help or feedback to further improve my skills (and show what I’ve been doing right or wrong with my work), while also allowing for me to have an easier time getting into the animation industry with having both previous experience in animation work and a means of getting myself in help from insiders!
References:
https://www.otis.edu/news/marie-lum-cartoon-network-storyboard-artist-otis-alum-digital-media-speaker
https://craigofthecreek.fandom.com/wiki/Marie_Lum
http://www.marielumart.com/animation
https://twitter.com/PuccaNoodles?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
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Week 2:
Studio Meala
India Swift
WIP / Need to add Harvard Referencing