#getting work

Hey there.  I’m sorry things haven’t been going well and that you’re reconsidering things.  I can’t say whether or not you’d be making the right decision (that has to be whatever you feel good and comfortable with), but I can try to give you some things to consider WHILE you decide.

Ask yourself why you’re feeling the program is a waste: are all your classes about things that don’t help you achieve the career you want?  Are the lessons less challenging than you need?  Are you not seeing yourself progress the way you’d hoped you would by now?  If you’re sort of nodding at these things, then maaaybe the program isn’t what you need.  Those are really just starting points in assessing.

This is what I’ll say, and it’s the best advice I can give, and I sort of just gave it in another post a second ago: school is not the job.  Let me say it louder for the people in the back: SCHOOL IS NOT THE JOB.  I feel like people say, “I wanna go into animation!” and they somehow end up in any old art school, having been fooled into believing simply going to an art school will give them the passage they need into a job.  But if you go to an art school, you need a program that SPECIFICALLY targets the career you want.  AND MOST IMPORTANTLY: you as the artist need to be making that program suit what you need of it.  No program is perfect.  Mine was not for character design in animation.  It was a skilled and rigorous program - I learned a lot about perspective and material rendering - but I did NOT learn what I now do for a job.  I bridged that gap by looking at what the job entailed (breaking out those animation Art-Of books, writing artists in the industry and getting advice, going places where pros could look at my portfolio and critique it), and I just kept asking, “How do I become THEM?”  Not in a jealous, envious way, but in an analytical, studying-their-method way.  THAT’S the passage.  THAT’S the key.  You have to be able to know when you’re hitting the target right, when your art is reaching the quality of people who already have the jobs.

Hey there!  So, there are a few ways to get in touch with recruiters.  I’ll list them starting from a place least-inside-the-industry to most-inside-the-industry.

1) If you’re starting just from absolute square one - where you have no ability to go anywhere in person and no contacts - go to the websites of the companies you’re interested in and, chances are, there will be a page about recruitment or hiring, with an email address you can use.  These addresses and links always make you think, “Oh yeah, sure, who in the world ever even looks at these?” but I swear to god people actually do.  haha.  Sometimes not as expediently as you’d like, but honestly, they do.  

2) If you have any ability to make it out to a convention, or something like CTN Expo, you can drag your portfolio over to recruiters in person, talk to them, get feedback, and likely get contact information.  

3) If you have any connections inside the industry (friends who are already working in it, teachers who worked in it, friends of teachers who are working in it, haha), ask them if they would feel comfortable sharing recruiting info with you.  This last one is how I do things now that I’ve been working for a bit.  When I decided I wanted to try TV, I realized that I only had recruiting info for feature, so I hit up my friends who had done television for some email addresses.  haha

Once you’re speaking to a recruiter in person, or once you’ve contacted them over email, you want to be respectful and brief, letting them know who you are while being considerate of their time.  Over email, depending on what you want, you can say hello, that you’re writing them with X intention, and you were hoping they might be able to point you in the right direction if they’d be so kind.  When you’re in networking mode, you can offer to take them out for a coffee (your treat) and discuss your portfolio with them.  They’re recruiters - they WANT to know what talent exists out there, so they want to know you, too.  

No, this is a great question, and I don’t get it often.  I think it’s the kind of thing people quietly wonder to themselves (the practical, what-does-your-life-look-like part vs the dream part), but don’t really know if how to ask.  

So, art school - my art school, it’s probably worth specifying - was extremely stressful.  I basically hear the same from anyone who’s ever been to an art school, so that may well just be the name of the game.  haha.  But I can rightfully only speak from my own experience.  It was stressful.  The hours were insane.  Sleep was something you had to actively force yourself to prioritize, and pressure to be “good” was very high.  My school, and particularly my program, were highly selective things, and the expectations for and goals of the students were tip-top.  Many art schools don’t have those standards, and many times their students aren’t as successful after leaving.  It really comes down to the person occupying the seat and how much they’re willing to push.  You go to a first rate school with first rate classes, then chances are they’ve just attracted the pack of individuals who would have been pushing hard anyway.  It’s my strong belief that there are better ways to improve yourself, even to a professional level, without having to engage in the normal art school structure (that typical structure being the thing that drives people bonkers in the first place).  You can read more about my opinions on art schools in my “art school” tag.

Regarding what work is like in the industry itself: I love it.  For me, with what I do, the speed at which I work, and the luck I’ve had, it’s been a night and day difference in terms of stress and scheduling from art school.  Somehow, even though in the working world we’re all playing with real money and real jobs, everyone is so much chiller and more patient.  haha.  Like there’s real understanding and teamwork that doesn’t let you sink when they need you to swim.  I’ve gained so much more confidence in the work place than I ever had in school.  It’s worth noting: this is not always the case (hence the “luck” I mentioned above).  I’ve known people who’ve had bad experiences and stressful situations.  What I’ll say about that, though, is: they got out of them.  The industry is such that if you’re a considerate, hardworking person, you can always find new work.  If you’re having a rough go of it in your current job, you can go find another and change those circumstances.  I’ve worked at three studios so far, and worked in both feature and TV, and all of them have been wonderful to me.  I’ve almost never had to do overtime in 5 years of work (again, let me note, I work oddly fast, haha), everyone has always given me allowance for life changes or needs (I had a baby last year), and basically everyday at work I find moments to play and goof around and just enjoy the people surrounding me.

So that’s sort of how I see things, and why I’m something of a proponent for finding ways to learn and build your portfolio that maybe aren’t as stressful.  haha.  Because the job itself hasn’t been NEARLY as stressful for me.  And truly, I’d hate to think that the only reason I was prepared to work was because I’d been beaten into shape so brutally beforehand.  haha.

Hey there!  So the reason people discuss portfolios so much is because they’re not only the most important thing, they’re basically THE thing.  Commercial art is such a bizarre business, because it operates very differently from normal work.  I don’t know that anyone has ever asked for my resume.  I remember interviewing for my job at WB, everyone wrapping up our time together, and me finally exclaiming, “WILL SOMEONE JUST TAKE THIS RESUME?  I WENT TO THE TROUBLE OF PRINTING SO MANY.” They took one just to make me feel better.  I’m 99% sure it was in a trashcan within 4 minutes.  hahaha.  

You get jobs by creating an appealing portfolio and either contacting recruiters, connecting with other artists, or getting your artwork noticed (which an online presence can help with).  Once you get work from one of those avenues, you continue getting jobs by treating people well, being a hard worker, and using the connections you’ve made along the way.  This is all I’ve done for the past five years, and what I’ve known everyone else there with me to have done.  haha

Hey there!  So, I’m sorry you’re feeling bummed out about how your program is going.  It’s hard to know sometimes what you’ll learn once you’re in.  

So, I can’t tell you “exactly” what you need to know, because, man that would be an enormous list given how MANY jobs exist in animation.  You’d first need to choose what you wanted to do within animation (animating, visual development, storyboarding, character design, layout, modeling, lighting, BLAH BLAH), and start digging up information on specifics from there.

This is what I can tell you: there are MANY different disciplines within animation.  First, figure out what aspect most interests you.  Spoiler: THERE ARE A LOT OF ASPECTS.  I feel like people know “animating” and “character design” and just stop.  haha.  But really look into what goes into it if you don’t have a focused place to start.  

The next piece of advice I can give, and I probably give it frequently, is: look at what is being done at the place you want to work, and make your work look like that.  If your art school is teaching you how to do abstract drawings of fruit bowls or how to design cars, and all you want to do is storyboard, then coming to an interview with a portfolio of cars and fruit bowls will NOT get you that storyboarding job.  I can’t emphasize this enough: school does not equal work.  It doesn’t equal the job market.  You can do well in your particular program, get all A’s, be better than your peers, but if you aren’t as skilled/as good a fit as the people already doing the JOB you want, you will not get that job.  Companies are looking for people who do work like their work.  They want people who understand what that work takes.  

Lastly, I can tell you some specifics about character design to get you started, if that’s the avenue you want to pursue: you have to be able to create a variety of designs based on one character description, you have to understand basic design principles that make a design appealing, you have to be able to rotate a character showing it from different angles and doing different things, and you have to be able to make that character act so that people understand its emotions and motives. 

Thank you so much!

So, I’ve never done cold calls before, but I have just E-mailed studios out of the clear blue, like, “HEY LOOK AT ME.  I LIKE YOU.  I DRAW.  SITE LINK.  OPENINGS?”  It’s more professional than that, haha, but the gist is the same.  I’d think a literal cold call would be much the same.  And I don’t know about “encouraged” by studios, but it’s not something I’ve ever heard anyone say they were against.  And if you’re contacting someone on the recruitment end, that’s no bother - that’s their whole job!  They want to know about you.  I reached out to Disney because I didn’t think I was on their radar, and they immediately put me in their artist pool, looking for a position for me.  I had a job there a few months later.  :)  So contact away!