Loose Moose - London Visit

loosemoose.com

Took a trip own to London yesterday for a portfolio visit with Loose Moose on Oxford Road in London. Arranged with Charlotte Blacker (Production Assistant) to come in to have a chat with Glen (Executive Producer) about my portfolio.

So i got buzzed in and grabbed a cup of tea and sat down with Glen. I talked to him about where i'm up to on my course and my interests, and he told me all about their latest work they are doing for a client in Italy, using models and shooting them in stop-frame animation. This was why there was dozens of models all over the studio and some lovely handmade settings ready for animating.

So as Glen uploaded my work i took him through my work from my 2nd year, starting off with the Feelgood Frogs. Glen was a very honest about how he saw y work and was critical in terms of how professional my work comes across and how i can improve it. He told me that the animation as a whole needs more action involved and is much too slow. The fact it was 40 seconds of very subtle action doesnt grab your attention and keep you interested in it. A 10 second animation full of action would be better to see as apposed to 40 seconds of slow animation. I disagree with this to some extent but agree that the animation can be more eye catching and involve more movement to keep you interested and bring more life to the characters. I would be interested in re creating my frogs for a 3rd time now i am more experienced with Flash and see where it can get me, and condense the time and pay more attention to the finer details of animation principles.

Then i showed him the Groovy Peas short experiment which went down more of a hit, however he liked it up to the part when to multicolored character was introduced, where he said i had 'chickened out' with the final scene. As all other characters stop moving and become lifeless, and more attention could be payed to make the movements more spontaneous. He talked to me about a project they had done in the past where they animated a 2D character of the rapper 'Coolio,' describing how they payed attention to the soundtrack and drew their inspiration for movements from the soundtrack. Exaggerating the characters expressions and taking time over each movement. It was inspiring to talk about how they carried out this project and appreciated his honesty towards this piece.

The Masterchef piece got a very interesting reaction, and Glen said it was my strongest piece, and complimented me with my modeling techniques and the camera movement. Before i showed my work i told him where i want to work towards in the 2D animation areas and my passion for animating with Flash and After Effects, however he told me my Maya work was much more interesting and shows potential. Something he said towards the end of the talk was that the Flash industry may be a narrow area to get a career in and may be a difficult area to get in. In a way this took me by surprise because it contradicts what i have been told at 'We Are Seventeen' last year, where i was told 3D is a difficult career to aim for...so im a bit confused to say the least!
Glen encouraged me to keep up with developing my Maya skills and continue to produce work like this.

I showed Glen my final project so far and described how i'm carrying it out technically. I'm unsure about the reaction i got from this piece, as he didn't approach it critically. So i got the impression that i may have to bring my piece together visually to a much further extent in order to explain my directions more easily, and open up some more questioning.

In honesty i felt the visit didn't go down as well as i was hoping and didn't feel that i was introducing Glen to anything that grabbed his attention or exciting him. The attitude to the approach to my work was very much different to that of Design By Day, and seemed more formal.

Im very glad of this experience! I've learned a lot and its made me open my eyes to the professional standards of work and the steps i can to take in order to progress. Also understanding the differences between companies in terms of standards of work. Overall Glen was pleased with my portfolio and Charlotte asked me to keep her posted when my short film is finished.