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7/22/2005 - Life at the Barnyard...

Hey Howdy Hey,

Well there's been some interesting responses to the Barnyard trailer that is now on-line and playing in theaters. Nothing that those of us working on the film haven't already thought about our selves, what I'm really looking forward to is hearing what kids think. Wish I would have caught the trailer in the theater just to see if the kids were laughing?

Oh well, I guess I'll just wait and see.

So anyways I got my first comment and would like to answer some questions from KirkGuy who can be found in my friends list.

Looks interesting. I’m on a Mac so I could not see the trailer.

Wow, I'll check that out at my place tonight. I have a Mac at home but work on a PC at the studio. Should work though, man bad news if it's not Mac friendly.

What do you do at your company??

Mostly instigate Nerf Wars....but on a busy day I work in the Layout department at Omation on Barnyard which is a 3D Animated Feature. We set up the shots. In doing so we set up the cameras and camera moves, the characters and the 3D environments to match the storyboards. Then we render out the frames and cut them together for the director to get a better idea of continuity. Layout 2 is what we are currently working on and involves alot of camera tweaking and final prepping for the next department who will continue finessing the shot.

What kind of jobs are there in animation?

There are so many jobs in the animation industry that I really don't even know if I could list them all. At this studio alone there's been 3D Character Animation, 3D Clean-Up Animation, Rigging, 3D Layout, Texture Artists, Lighting, Rig-Testers, Modlers, Character Modlers, BG/Mo-Cap Animation, as well in the beginning of the production there where Character Designers, Storyboard Artists and Concept Designers as well there's the management end which would include the IT Dept, Production Assistants, Production Coordinators, Production Management and Line Producer, then there's the big guys like the Producer and the Director, the Director in this case is also the Screen Writer. And that's just for a 3D studio working on a feature, if you try a 2D house or a commercial house there's going to be a wide variety of positions.

I think alot about switching to animation work (currently an Art Director), but I do not know much about what kind of work is out there and what doing that work is like.

It's alot of fun, your able to see something be developed over the course of a few years and then BOOM it's on the BIG screen.

I think it is a field of work that mostly younger people do because it takes alot of hours and the pay is so, so. I could be wrong, I’m sure.

Your right about the long hours, the pay is pretty good or at least it's better than when I was working at StarBucks. But as for it just being younger people you couldn't be more wrong. There is such a wide variety of people who work at our studio, young, old, some with experience and some like myself who are still learning the ropes. Lots of ages and lots of talent!

In looking over your web site I could really see you working on storyboards, have you ever tried your hand at doing any commercial animation or looked into some of the television animation studios?

Thanks for the great questions Kirk!

...i

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7/22/2005 - Untitled Comment

Posted by KirkGuy

Wow, thanks for the great answers Intergalactic.

>>In looking over your web site I could really see you working on storyboards, have you ever tried your hand at doing any commercial animation or looked into some of the television animation studios?

I have thought about it, not sure where these types of companies are and what they are looking for concerning samples of work. I should do some research on it.

Thanks again and have a good weekend, Kirk