You need talent to be as successful as you are and you are obviously very skilful. Aptitude, application, dedication, pride and ownership of your work = employability. Well done; this shines through.
Far out mate, that's the actual dream! Your situation sounds very similar to mine, but there aren't many VFX opportunities in Australia so I've been keeping it as a hobby. But some of you work looks amazing, you have worked on some really interesting stuff. Keep it up!
I didn't know you were doing an apprenticeship. Way to go and congratulations on getting hired. I kind of got the feeling that you were just experimenting like I am trying to get some stuff together for a demo reel. You do have the advantage of youth over me. I have about 30 years on you. :)
Yeah I kept it pretty quiet, I've been busy working! That was what I was doing during college and then I just stumbled across this opportunity so I took it and moved to London 😂
Look, now that’s impressive work! And I agree an apprenticeship is more useful. I have a degree in electronics and computer science. And when I consulted for a TV show I ran into the VFX supervisor as they were also working in their first feature. I saw Nuke there (11 years ago now) and having written software to stack images for fMRI and CT scanners the whole maths behind compositing was a no brainer for me. And even when the show I worked on was done, I kept coming I on my Friday’s and do compositing and mainly mattepaintings. I never went full time into VFX although they did offer me a position as sr compositor. But they pay is bad compared to what I earn as a freelance programmer. But I do bids on shots and work in VFX but mainly as a TD. My former ‘teacher’ drafted me over for a two week mad dash to work on Dunkirk, developing a relative tracker for that nasty aerial shot of the sea, where non of the OTS trackers did a decent enough job to get past the 70mm iMax projection. Since he knew I was a developer and since the TD staff at DNEG was overbooked he hired me to help him. He had a vision but had no idea how to build that. I spend 2 weeks coding for almost 16 hours a day. Through that I got to make a bid for Masters of the Sky (aka the Eight Airforce), where I won the bid to make Dresden and Hamburg as accurate 1944 aerial shots. I asked if they’d digital maps, and I used those with self written software to define what were roads, greenery and buildings. These shapes intruded into svgs, imported them in blender and for the building I just did a random height extrude. And only modeled a handful of recognizable buildings. Because indie 85-90% automatic I could bid relatively low. I just spend 3 weeks at a leisurely pace developing the tools. Then 1 week of doing textures. And the cool thing was that I could ask do other cities, now in a matter of a week. That’s the sort of stuff I love. I’m too lazy to rotoscope :) I get bored doing render pass composites I liked color correction because of the science but now I just can’t be bothered when you have the workflow down, it’s a chore. And that’s frankly what VFX has become. So intend to only do the stuff where I can engineer: I feel that my technical brain lends itself more for finding solutions for problems and methods to automate things. Quietly I still love 2D digital mattepainting. That’s really a laid back artistic, zen thing. But that gets less and less asked for. It’s all full 3D. Except indie films where full 3D would cost too much.
It was called a junior 2D artist apprenticeship. It was run by NextGen but I believe it's now run by someone else. It should be quite easy to find with a bit of googling. It's the only one as far as I know!
None really! They just wanted people that were passionate. Some of the people they hired didnt have much VFX experience at all but were just really creative or great at drawing etc. Just promising artists generally. Then they teach you the VFX later. That's the idea
![CAMPปลิ้น | EP.83[1/2] เปิดแคมป์หลอนต้อนรับ 2 ตัวพ่อแห่งวงการผี!](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/2uPuHYHgwiI/mqdefault.jpg)
Good to hear it's all going so well for you Alfie, your work looks fantastic. Living the dream :)
Thank you Grant! Your blender lessons planted the seed 😉
You need talent to be as successful as you are and you are obviously very skilful. Aptitude, application, dedication, pride and ownership of your work = employability. Well done; this shines through.
Thank you very much! :)
Awesome! Excited to hear what's next for you!
Thanks man!
Congratulations Alfie! Those shots were amazing!
Thank you! :D
Far out mate, that's the actual dream! Your situation sounds very similar to mine, but there aren't many VFX opportunities in Australia so I've been keeping it as a hobby. But some of you work looks amazing, you have worked on some really interesting stuff. Keep it up!
Yeah I'm really happy! Thanks a lot :)
I didn't know you were doing an apprenticeship. Way to go and congratulations on getting hired. I kind of got the feeling that you were just experimenting like I am trying to get some stuff together for a demo reel. You do have the advantage of youth over me. I have about 30 years on you. :)
Yeah I kept it pretty quiet, I've been busy working! That was what I was doing during college and then I just stumbled across this opportunity so I took it and moved to London 😂
Congrats!
In the end it doesn't matter what the test says,
it's more important what you really can do with your skills! :)
Thanks Alex! Totally agree :)
Look, now that’s impressive work!
And I agree an apprenticeship is more useful. I have a degree in electronics and computer science. And when I consulted for a TV show I ran into the VFX supervisor as they were also working in their first feature. I saw Nuke there (11 years ago now) and having written software to stack images for fMRI and CT scanners the whole maths behind compositing was a no brainer for me. And even when the show I worked on was done, I kept coming I on my Friday’s and do compositing and mainly mattepaintings.
I never went full time into VFX although they did offer me a position as sr compositor. But they pay is bad compared to what I earn as a freelance programmer. But I do bids on shots and work in VFX but mainly as a TD. My former ‘teacher’ drafted me over for a two week mad dash to work on Dunkirk, developing a relative tracker for that nasty aerial shot of the sea, where non of the OTS trackers did a decent enough job to get past the 70mm iMax projection. Since he knew I was a developer and since the TD staff at DNEG was overbooked he hired me to help him. He had a vision but had no idea how to build that. I spend 2 weeks coding for almost 16 hours a day.
Through that I got to make a bid for Masters of the Sky (aka the Eight Airforce), where I won the bid to make Dresden and Hamburg as accurate 1944 aerial shots. I asked if they’d digital maps, and I used those with self written software to define what were roads, greenery and buildings. These shapes intruded into svgs, imported them in blender and for the building I just did a random height extrude. And only modeled a handful of recognizable buildings. Because indie 85-90% automatic I could bid relatively low. I just spend 3 weeks at a leisurely pace developing the tools. Then 1 week of doing textures. And the cool thing was that I could ask do other cities, now in a matter of a week.
That’s the sort of stuff I love. I’m too lazy to rotoscope :) I get bored doing render pass composites I liked color correction because of the science but now I just can’t be bothered when you have the workflow down, it’s a chore.
And that’s frankly what VFX has become. So intend to only do the stuff where I can engineer: I feel that my technical brain lends itself more for finding solutions for problems and methods to automate things. Quietly I still love 2D digital mattepainting. That’s really a laid back artistic, zen thing. But that gets less and less asked for. It’s all full 3D. Except indie films where full 3D would cost too much.
It took me longer to read that than to finish the apprenticeship... Interesting stuff though. Sounds like you've had a cool career.
What apprenticeship did you do? In London?
It was called a junior 2D artist apprenticeship. It was run by NextGen but I believe it's now run by someone else. It should be quite easy to find with a bit of googling. It's the only one as far as I know!
But how did you find this apprenticeship position in the first place?
I just found it online by googling VFX jobs in London!
Yo! :D
Did you learn everything from scratch
I knew all the basics before I went in. I'd been mucking about with blender and after effects for a few years before starting to do VFX as a career
@@AlfieVaughan is 2 years enough to start learning basics
Yes definitely
@@AlfieVaughan sorry last question, what were your entry requirements to do the apprenticeship
None really! They just wanted people that were passionate. Some of the people they hired didnt have much VFX experience at all but were just really creative or great at drawing etc. Just promising artists generally. Then they teach you the VFX later. That's the idea