Why would a seasoned motion designer participate in Our Fly on the Wall program? Because it offers an experience different than any other studio.
Hear it from Ivan Miguel, an Oakland-based senior Art Director and Motion Designer with over 15 years of experience.
"A big obstacle for many freelance artists who may not have been invited to work at a big studio is wondering if they really know how a large project is handled. They may work on a part of the project but not have the opportunity or time to see the whole picture and meditate about how all the parts come together. The “fly on the wall” program offers a great opportunity to fill those gaps. While several courses for design or animation exist, creative direction (or art direction) is rarely taught and is one of those things you learn over time while developing a project with more people.
Shadowing Hung and the rest of BIEN is like having the opportunity to be in the writer’s room and on the set of a show while making an episode. You can follow everything from how they answer a client’s brief, reshape scripts to be visually more compelling, hire the team according to the needs of the piece and build up the characters, always having in consideration that these aren’t just generic molds but that every decision reflects their uniqueness and background.
An active eye, even with experience in these kinds of rodeos, will find many many tips and tricks to add to their own toolkit, from the way they compose decks so the client understands all of the steps in the process of making an animation, reducing in that way their possible anxiety, to the research and documentation they put together for the artists so they have all the tools at their hands to succeed.
To their way of storing everything in a living Milanote document where anyone on the team can access all the info, without forgetting simple but powerful ways to configure posting and feedback on Slack, reducing the nonsense and making it easy to find each shot and its feedback, or briefing for the animation’s music (a part I always struggle with), or being present in dailies checking the teams work, worries, and progress.
With so much attention to how great the shots look, to how accurate they represent reality, to the characters or the ins and outs of an event, BIEN has a specific perspective on how to approach the process that they aren’t afraid but happy to share with anyone.
In an industry plagued with grey areas and unknowns, being transparent about your process and ideal of how work should be done and what a role should entail and sharing that with an audience of professionals that may not receive mentorship otherwise, is an initiative that I can only applaud."
Check out Ivan's LinkedIn https://buff.ly/3K6w3Lc and his website here https://buff.ly/3K1s4Q9
As we like to say, hire this man!
