How to Get a Job in the Animation, Games & VFX Industries

For all our graduates who will soon find themselves seeking work, here is a short video on finding a job - and keeping it - with a special focus on jobs in the Animation and VFX Industry. Remember the 5 key ingredients for finding work:

1. Talent
2. Opportunity
3. Timing
4. Luck 
5. Persistence

Talent is necessary - without this no-one has a chance. But if you've made through 3 years of undergraduate study you will have this, else you would not have made it through the course.

Opportunity means seizing chances in life. Scan the notice boards and look for vacancies. Create your own chances by offering to work for free, or at very low rates. We can't create jobs from thin air but we can hunt down the ones that do exist.

Timing is vital because even the best graduates won't find a job at a company that isn't hiring. Media companies expand and contract according to their projects and their order books. Knowing who is hiring and when is all part of winning the game.

Luck is about being in the right place at the right time. And, of course, making your own luck wherever possible.

Persistence. Of the five, the last is probably the most important. Stick-to-it-ness is vital; don't give up. Keep practicing, working, and getting better at what you love doing, and you will be rewarded.

---Alex