Fifteen students from the Faculty of Multimedia and Creativity (FMC) attended an intensive one day workshop at the UK’s premier visual effects academy Escape Studios.
Escape Studios is a world leading visual effects academy providing comprehensive classroom-based courses and global online training in visual effects using computer graphics.
Founded in 2002 by Dominic Davenport, supported by Oscar winning director Ridley Scott (Gladiator, Alien, Thelma & Louise, Black Hawk Down), Escape’s vision was to address the film industry’s lack of educated ‘studio-ready’ talent. Since formation, over 4000 students have graduated, and many are at the very forefront of CG effects.
Since its founding, Escape has produced visual effects and animation for some of Hollywood’s top movies, including Interstellar, World War Z, The Dark Knight, Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix, and The Da Vinci Code.
The one-day intensive one-day workshop was run by Garreth Gaydon, Head of Recruitment at Escape. Mr. Gaydon began the session by giving an overview of Escape’s current projects, accompanied by some raw animation footage from World War Z. This was followed with an examination, including examples, of the differences (and similarities) between 2D and 3D computer animation.
Mr. Gaydon went on to share with the students industry tips that make Escape Studios successful. He also discussed processes used in making visual effects for Hollywood, and gave the students pointers on producing Hollywood standard visual effects. The students were also taught about camera-mapping, which deals with ways of placing a new element (such as an animated object or character) within the existing film frame.
The knowledge gained from the workshop came in handy during the students’ group assignments, in which they had to produce 2 -5 minutes short films for the British Academy of Film & Television Arts (BAFTA). Subject to BAFTA approval, the films stand a chance of being submitted to the British Animation Film Festival, London International Animation Festival, and Encounters Film Festival.
The students said the workshop was very beneficial to them as they had learnt a lot through the workshop and received knowledge on industry expectations and methods of how to produce quality work. They said they and were looking forward to applying the knowledge to their studies and future projects when they joined the industry.
