Monday, May 13, 2013

Dave Berry talks internships, advertising and jobs


Dave Berry, one of our talented students here at Bucks, recently completed an internship for the advertising company VCCP which, among other projects, did the animated meerkats for "Compare the Market.com". During Dave's time at VCCP he worked on and helped to complete the advertisement for O2 shown above. Here at Bucks we take internships very seriously - placing students in an industry environment is a vital part of learning to become a professional digital artist. We asked Dave to tell us a little about his experience.

Bucks: Tell us about your internship. How did it come about? Did you find it yourself or did the University approach you?

Dave: VCCP contacted the University, requesting an animator for a 2-week internship in London.


Bucks: What did you do, exactly? Just make the tea?

Dave: Not all all. At VCCP I worked alongside two motion graphics designers creating animated 3D assets for their client, O2. I also created some 2D assets in Illustrator, a sound effects library for the commercial, and chose the background music from a royalty free website.

Bucks: Sounds excellent. What would you say you learned from the experience?

Dave: This was my first taste of working within an industry pipeline, and I set myself a goal of understanding how that pipeline works. That is to say, learning who does what, who feeds back to the client and so on. As I was working alongside motion graphics artists, when I came home in the evenings I would open up Digital Tutors and follow some After Effects tutorials in case they needed me to contribute in that area.

Bucks: Nice one - it sounds like you really made the most of it. What was the biggest challenge you faced?

Dave: There were a number of challenges working at VCCP: particularly being a 3D artist in a 2D pipeline. The biggest challenge was creating assets that look 2D: the advert was designed to have a hand-made feel to it. I animated a 3D box unfolding which needed to fit in to the overall 2D look of the project. So the box had to be "toon rendered", to make it look flat.

Bucks: What would you recommend for anyone else doing an internship?

Dave: For others doing an internship, I recommend taking the time to understand the pipeline, and not being afraid to ask questions. Pipeline work can be very intimidating and confusing at first, but your role and what is expected of you becomes much clearer once you understand the whole process.

Bucks: Excellent work! Props to you for going the extra mile to understand the whole pipeline process, and many, many thanks also to VCCP for making it happen. Here at Bucks we hugely appreciate our partnerships with industry and encourage all our students to make strenuous efforts to find an internship that helps you to get invaluable real-world job experience.

---Alex

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