I was incredibly excited to attend this talk, seeing as Julie the us a producer and I would love to get my foot into a production assistant role.
It was very informative to hear about her experiences and I had a couple of questions regarding her journey, especially knowing she had experience with small as well as major studios.
Listening to Jenny talk about her practice truly made me less anxious. I remembered her from the Sound Workshop from the last project (and because her film My Mother’s Eyes made me cry every time).
She gave us great insight about the festival work she’s done and been recognised for and how helpful that was in her independent art practice. (Considering every single artist speaks about the importance of the festivals, I will definitely make more effort to look into them).
It was very helpful to talk to her about life after graduation, considering she completed the same course, and how to balance doing freelance work and having a day job on the side.
Although Kate’s work wasn’t in the style that I would necessarily look to work in, I still found her general theme and practice interesting. It was really inspiring to learn from her experiences as an LGBTQ+ artist and the struggles that come with distributing her work (i.e. in Eastern Europe, although that seems to be slowly changing now).
Kate spoke about how the festival scene really advanced her career and improved her visibility. She had a chance to travel and take part in various workshops which were fantastic for her work development but also networking.
She has extensive experience working as a freelancer and shared many points that could help us on our own journey. She was even kind enough to give us a look at the contracts she normally sends out and the important details that need to be included (like payment deadline or number of revisions included).
Kate also expressed the importance of balancing personal work with any paid jobs that might not be as enjoyable.
“If Joanna Quinn could spend 10 years making toilet paper commercials to fund her independent projects, maybe you can do one explainer video.”
Today we had the chance to listen about Selom’s experience in the industry so far. He talked to us about individual studios he’s worked for and what went well, what challenged him, and why it ended (I haven’t included notes from that just in case).
It was very kind of Selom to share that insight and give us advice based on his experience so that we could learn from it. He’s also shared a list of ‘tips so far’. It was also sort of encouraging to hear about things that didn’t go to plan – such as not getting on the course straight way or making a mistake on the job.
When he graduated, his financial situation was quite similar to mine – living with a partner and paying a mortgage. This made me a bit less worried whether it was ‘too late’ to enter the industry. So I’m thankful for this.
Neeraja’s work is very captivating and endearing. Her character designs on “Meow or Never” reminded me of Animal Crossing Villagers and the musical side seemed influenced by Disney – which she confirmed.
She also expressed how the festivals really helped her get noticed and how good they were for her as an artist.
It was also good to hear what other skills she found useful in the industry.
“Don’t just sit back and expect things to come to you!”
last month I decided to reach out to Viktoria to better inform my decisions for job and internship hunting. I’m currently looking into production roles, given my broad experience of sculpture, prop making, stop-mo and 2d animation. I think I’m the kind of person who loves to be involved and working with a team.
Victoria got a Production Assistant job at THE LINE – an animation studio I would absolutely love to work with (if it wasn’t already obvious from my previous research).
I’ll be looking to reach out to more individuals once it’s less stressful.