Alumni Panel 2023

Alumni Panel 2023

blog post by Cait Burnett

As we welcomed in 2023, we also welcomed back some of our animation alumni! As we continue with our hybrid learning approach following covid we virtually welcomed:

Lucy Gatenby – Props Designer and 2D rigger at Blue-Zoo
Olly Skillman-Wilson – Environment Artist at Hinterland Games
Adam Taylor – Animator – Chicken Run 2, Wendell and Wild, Pinocchio

It was Lucy Gatenby who kicked us off with her vibrant portfolio. Lucy graduated in 2020 and directed the Student BAFTA-nominated, 3rd-year short film ‘Case Closed’. She described her experiences of transitioning from studio work to home working during the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, and emphasised how important it is to back up your files! Thankfully she did that, but due to circumstances, many students within her cohort dropped off the project or communication was lost; she was left with a smaller, yet very determined team who strove to get the project finished on time. Thankfully it was, and went on to be nominated for several awards.

This really opened up the doors of the industry for Lucy following her graduation, leading to power meetings with industry professionals and being approached by the BBC. She was given the opportunity to animate a poem depicting a community supporting each other during times of hardship, and after approaching her ‘Case Closed’ team, they worked to a 5-week deadline, and the film went straight to broadcast.

Following the broadcast of the short film Lucy and her producer were interviewed about the project by the BBC, and the project allowed her to determine what areas she wanted to specialise in – definitely 2D she thought, but was unsure, as her previous directing experience allowed her to cover a multitude of areas. She applied for a role at Blue Zoo studios and started her role there in 2020 as a ‘Scene Builder Artist’, working on ‘It’s Pony’, a TV series airing on Nickelodeon. During this role she realised wanted to go into backgrounds and to progress further in rigging. Lucy taught herself how to use the software ‘Toon Boom’ and then moved up to a junior rigging role in which she had to organise assets for navigations and manage the creation of new assets.

At end of her previous role, Lucy was offered an opportunity to composite on ‘Millie and Lou’, a YouTube web series, as a 2D compositor for 3 months. Following the completion of ‘Millie and Lou’ she applied, through their career website, to be a prop build artist back at Blue Zoo, working on an animated version of the popular, action-packed children’s book – Super Tato. Lucy moved to Brighton for the role as Blue Zoo merged to create the new production company Brighton Zoo, where Lucy is still working on Super Tato.

Following up on Lucy’s relatable experience through the covid pandemic, we heard from Adam Taylor. Adam was part of the 2013 cohort and has had a slightly unconventional route into his animation career, having first completed an MA in Illustration Authorial Practice. Adam was working as a children’s book illustrator/author, but became hooked after attempting some Stop-motion and realised he wanted to see his book characters come to life. He got to work, and was essentially self-taught, learning how to use basic puppets with steel armatures, and 3 months later had his first film.

Following a rejection from Aardman, Adam went on to gain an apprenticeship at LAIKA during their project, ‘The Missing Link’, through various industry contacts and mentors he’d made during his time at Falmouth. Following the completion of the film he went on to do some small studio commercial work, travelling all over the states. He finally got a call to work on the project, ‘Wendell and Wild’, joining as an assistant animator. They wanted him as a full animator but alas he didn’t have enough feature film experience. A lot of his responsibilities were for effects such as blow torch fire, and developing water effects. When Covid hit he was sent puppets to test at home in his garage, then got his first shots and kept going till the end of the project. ‘Pinocchio’ was in production at the time, and Adam was called by the producer on ‘Pinocchio’ on the Monday after he finished on Wendell and Wild and was asked to start straight away. Due to testing positive for Covid, he got some fortuitous rest at home, before he started working on Pinocchio for a further 3 months.

Then he got the dream call for Aardman to work on ‘Chicken Run 2’, where he has been since.

Adam shared some words of wisdom and various smaller projects he worked on during his time at Falmouth, such as a local band asking for animation for a music video, inspired by Terry Gillian of Monty Python fame. Small cut-outs became full sized wooden animal totems; puppets that still feature in the Falmouth animation studios today!

His most well-known project during his time on the course was ‘The Hair Hungry Heaver’. Adam built the puppets himself and the majority of sets and props, and directed the 2D and the stop motion, learning to use rigs and camera moves and lighting, showing just how much you can really teach yourself. Adam concluded his presentation by sharing a few words of wisdom from industry professionals and mentors he’s met along the way.

Olly Skillman-Wilson concluded the guests of our panel. Olly, a 2012 graduate, during his time on the course directed a 3D short film called ‘Kernel’. He noted the good bonds he made on this project and how a lot of the bonds he made during his time on the course have stuck with him.

Following his graduation, Olly completed some work experience at Aardman after contacting their CG department, working on a commission to create an online game for the CBeebies website, aimed at children.

Olly’s first fully-fledged job at Aardman was still in the CG department but working on commercials, where he learnt a variety of skills but expressed an interest in lighting. During the evenings whilst working on web games at Aardman, he started to freelance on game development for Unity, and eventually made the jump into games full-time at Big Robot game studio, working remotely. Following a 2-3 years gap he became a freelancer, learning how to freelance, to work with various art styles and genres whilst working out the admin side of things too. In his free time he learnt new substance designers and software such as Blender.

He went on to search for the next big thing, working with a proper team and found that at Annapurna. The biggest lesson of this role, as it was a mainly an all-US Based team, there were many time zones, which meant meetings at all times of the day. Olly got burnt out and took a lot of recovery time after the project, and his pro tip when working with different time zones is that documentation and communication is majorly important, so make sure to track what you are doing.

Currently Olly has been working at ‘Hinterland’, on and off over the last year, and will soon be starting as an environment artist, which he felt it was a nice fit for him as there is a good culture there. He is currently developing an, as-yet, unannounced project, but unfortunately wasn’t able to say much more about it.

Where to find work recommendations:

OLLY – https://www.workwithindies.com

ADAM – Stopmotion is almost all word-of-mouth, direct message everyone in stop motion on Instagram offers a lunch or coffee

LUCY – Animation Spreadsheet with all the jobs going all over the globe in animation also follow Twitter accounts and put your notifications on

https://www.broadcast.magazine.co.uk/

https://www.workwithindies.com

https://jobs.motionographer.com/

https://www.artstation.com/jobs/all

https://remotegamejobs.com

TOON BOOM COURSE: https://learn.toonboom.com/courses/harmony-premium-kick-start

CASE CLOSED: https://youtu.be/DCKv6ohKiLw

KERNEL: https://player.vimeo.com/video/542234923