My interview at Cartoon Network

Soooooo! Today was a pretty big day for me. About two weeks ago I went to a university reunion with my friend Steven, here I was introduced by my teacher to an ex-student who did the same course as me. I was told she worked at Cartoon Network and they were looking for Junior Motion graphics designers. Whey. She passed on my work and within days I got an email from the senior designer asking for my CV. 

"No. Damn. Way." I thought to myself. I went home adjusted my cv to look super schmexy and bam it was gone. A day later I got another email inviting me to an interview. Interview was today. And well I don't even know what just happened. 

I personally feel like I didn't get the job due to my work being a bit too "filmic" but that's just me, in no way did they hint that in the interview. 

I was introduced to the senior designer and creative director. I was pretty much shitting myself but trying to look like I was pretty confident. 

They asked me about my background and were very heavily interested in my experience. Quite frankly they were more interested in my experience than my actual reel which I found odd but it must make sense to them. I began to explain my projects individually one by one to both of them and Yeh it was going okay. Until! 

I was suddenly asked "can you show us stuff you're particularly happy with in terms of typography?" 

Shit. Type and Adeel just don't go. Well it's more that I haven't completely learnt about it and not fully mastered. I literally only had two pieces of work that consisted of any sort of type and it just looked so bad and not up to par with my actual design work. 

They both watched my short film RED and were pretty impressed with the shots. The creative director said I have an eye for VFX and shots to which in my head I died a little. That was nice. Also! If you're reading this The Effect, Cartoon Network have seen the music video I did for you guys. Love me. LOL. 

Being my first professional interview it was a pretty interesting experience. I crapped myself the whole way through but I'm glad it's done and now I'm awaiting my results. If I don't get in, I'll just try harder next time.

Pray for me. 

Stay Caffeinated.

Adeel

Why I left visual effects for Indie Film Making

For a long time now I've been trying to get into the doors of visual effects. I remember deciding that I wanted to be a compositor two years ago and I'm not too sure why I chose this. I guess I was pretty good at it, a way to make a buck as they say. I made it my life goal to become a VFX supervisor in the future and even attended a full blown VFX course at Escape Studios. 

Two months after having completed the course I suddenly decided, nope... Visual effects aren't for me. Instead, I've decided to pursue a career in motion graphics and advertising. 

So why'd I make this choice so suddenly and abruptly? Well because I love indie film making way too much. Wait what? You love indie film making so you quit VFX and went to motion graphics? How does that make any sense? 

Okay, let me essssplain. I like to create, I love to create... I love to create things from scratch and make them look beautiful, I love meaning and I love story. I feel like with my compositing career I would have constantly done jobs FOR people, for countless hours and made things look the way they want it to look. And yes the same can be said about motion graphics but it's that ability to completely create something that is yours, your design and just being able to present that as your own ability. 

I've always loved deeper meanings incorporated with animation. I realised not too long ago that I wanted to make films, not a few shots for someone else to create their dream or vision. I wanna go out with my camera and film something, bring it home and edit the way I want. I feel like with motion graphics I can teach myself abstract ways of constructing meaning through beautiful imagery. I can use animation and design to tell a story one day. 

That's what design is isn't it? Conveying something to an audience using abstract imagery. 

That's not to say VFX take away from film or meaning, not at all... In fact I believe it gives a lot to film. I'm just way to brainwashed with this idea of creating meaning through weird shapes and animated imagery. 

I mean there's something so rewarding about coming up with several different ways to make one statement. Making a statement through beautiful pieces of art. 

I live off of indie cinema and watching movies like 'The Fountain', Eternal Sunshine, Her, Vanilla Sky, A Scanner Darkly and Half Nelson to name a few. It's movies like these that stray me away from Hollywood and into a world that exists only in my mind. A place where I can create anything without pleasing audiences, a place where I make things for myself using the tools I know to construct, hey if I need VFX to tell a story I will use VFX to tell a story. I just don't think I belong there at the moment. 

I just wanna make poems in the form of imagery and sound, I wanna make worlds that people can relate to in some way. I want people to feel and understand, I'd like to convey emotion from something that essentially cannot be touched or manipulated in any way. Most of all I want to create because it's what I do and keeps me going, going a motion graphics route will allow me to play around with aspects like colour, sound, shapes in order to construct a story in a stylistic way one day. I will one day create a film that has a meaning to every single shot. I want to be able to select stylistic pieces that construct together to form something more than a pack of heroes killing giant aliens from the sky.

Yes working in motion graphics won't get me making stories, but hey we've all got to make a living somehow and at least it'll teach me to make something absolutely spectacular in the future, using both design and meaning which I promise I will do one day. I'm gonna make something amazing. No matter what job I'm pulling at work, I'll always be a film maker.

Stay Caffeinated Guys. 

Adeel.