NewGen Creative – Summer Industry Experience

 Over the course of the summer holidays I worked as part of a team of 3 people under the supervision of company owner Alexander Henderson of NewGen Creative. Alex is not an animator; however, he is a creative running a video production company who presented me with the opportunity to work as an in-house freelance animator and motion designer on a live brief for a client company that go by the name of “North East Chamber of Commerce” NECC for short.

NECC approached the NewGen Team to pitch the concept of creating a Logo Ident for their organisation. They wanted an animation consisting of their logo folding out into the angel of the north. They felt the “Angel” monument signified a tie to their community and felt that this idea was what they wished to pursue and was our starting point for the project’s development.

This live brief allowed me the opportunity to continue my development as an aspiring Industry animator as well as give me experience in the field first hand. My role on the project consisted of working as an Illustrator, Motion designer, and Production manager ensuring that our team of three worked to deadlines as well as co-ordinated with each other, Alex, and the client. I worked as a point of contact for each of these people and devised the visual vision for the concept.

The following Images highlight pieces of the project that I worked on: 

Above highlights extracts from the storyboard which our team pitched to the client. I was the storyboard artist which illustrated and created the script for this PDF document.

Due to the obscurity motion design can provide to a project, it can be hard to accurately convey the intended motion to a client with just a storyboard. To aid in the accurate communication of the concept to the client I created a basic Animatic in Photoshop using the Pen tool. This assisted our team in successfully pitching the idea to the client. 

The client provided a set of colours which related to their branding for the animation to follow. This colour pallet was very limited in its spectrum and as a result made it difficult to envision how best to approach the environment design. As a solution to this problem I spent time creating a geometric colour script thumbnail to inform the Illustrative process. This color script would serve as a point of reference to ensure that the illustration is visually balanced and effective when pushing It’s appeal.

The final Illustration was created as a collaboration between myself and a colleague. I was responsible for the art direction of the environment and Illustrated the majority of the valley from trees to the background hills. My colleague was responsible for designing and creating the assets of the midground buildings, the windmills, clouds, plane, and most importantly the angel of the north. I composited his assets into the final image and added textures to embed the design as one finished piece. The environment was created with the intention of utilising it in a parallax effect and was split in layers to support this. 

This is the final animated logo ident that was delivered to the client. I was responsible for the compositing of the final assets as well as collaborating on the parallax animation of the illustration. The compositing and animation process were created and completed in Adobe After Effects. The logo motion design at the beginning as well as aspect of the parallax was completed by a colleague. 

SWOT Analysis

My time spent working as an In-house freelance animator provided me the opportunity to gain first hand experience into my chosen industry of choice. I feel as a result of this opportunity that I have grown as a creative in ways that I could not learn to develop outside of the field. As a conclusion to this experience I will be critically analysing my experience working on this project to provoke further insight in a self-reflective cycle stimulating higher ability towards my goal of industry standard. 

Strengths

I feel that one of the strongest aspects of my project was the way in which my team communicated and supported each other. Whenever an issue arose a team member was to hand to provide a second opinion as well as offer advice as to how to best overcome these issues. For example, during the Illustration phase I felt I was better able to create the natural aspects of the Illustration to my highest potential than the urban aspects. A colleague of mine felt that they would find it easier to tackle the Urban aspects of Illustration resulting in a design outcome that far extended above the ability of us as individuals.

I felt the flow of the project had a strong impression as a result of clear storyboarding. The concise nature which I had applied to the storyboard resulted in a clear direction for the 3 of us to follow when designing aspects of the animated ident. This is an aspect of my experience that I feel confident in taking into my future productions to improve the quality of my technical execution further than I could previously.

Weaknesses

There were aspects in my experience where I was a direct point of contact to the client, it was the first time I was conveying my design intentions to people outside of my creative field and as a result felt certain barriers in place which hindered my ability to convey my intentions during the storyboarding and concept stages. Although I eventually managed to get on the same page as the client, I feel that these skills still have ways to go before I am ready to fully dedicate my time to the industry I am aiming towards. 

Time scaling was a challenge for me to undertake, although I am confident in my own ability to meet deadlines on time, I found that co-ordinating with team mates would often leave us at different stages from time to time and felt ill-equipped to move on without first synchronising our work ready for the next stage in our creative workflow. I feel that I still need experience in this field before I can confidently say I have reached my goals as a creative. 

Opportunity’s

This summer experience working as a freelance artist has given me a plethora of opportunities to grow as a creative and I am confident that this will propel me into new directions and heights regarding my profession. Specific things that I had the opportunity to learn during this experience are as follows: 

• ·         I gained experience working as part of a creative team.
• ·         I gained experience working in a studio environment on a live brief.
• ·         I gained insight into how the client relationship of a company works.
• ·         I developed and furthered my ability to work independently and interdependently as a creative.
• ·         I gained insight and physical experience working as part of a creative pipeline.
• ·         I worked on a project which will be a credit to my portfolio.
• ·         I developed vital work experience.
• ·         I built industry contacts and relationships.

Another aspect that I feel is vital to mention is that I had the opportunity to learn where my weaknesses still lie. Flaws cannot be identified until tried and tested and because of this experience I am now more aware of what I need to work on to become more suited to work in industry.

Target Action Plan

1. When creating a concept and storyboarding my ideas I feel it is of benefit if I try expressing my idea to multiple people that are not in the creative field. By doing this I will be able to work on my issues regarding idea communication to clients which I discovered through my industry experience. I feel I will be able to measure the success of this project if I have 3 people outside of the creative field that are able to explain my idea back to me clearly using my resources. 

2. I feel to be able to overcome my time scaling regarding working with colleagues that it would benefit me to work on more team-based projects through personal means, for example working on a short film with 1 or more people could be the experience I need to boost this aspect of my skillset. I can measure the success of this action plan by successfully completing a complete project within a proposed deadline period with few time scaling issues.

Conclusion

I feel that my time spent working as a freelance animator has given me the experience I need to grow as a creative. By making the best out of this opportunity I was able to develop a new set of skills that are unique to working on the job. I feel that due to my critical analysis of my summer live brief that I have planned a way to grow from this experience even further pushing myself to new heights that previously was untouched. I am confident this has benefited my future projects.