Looking into the Animation Industry: Part 1 – Entry Level Positions and Applications

For the next couple of months, I’ll be doing research into the animation industry, looking at what types of roles are available as well as professional practices displayed by studios.

For today, I’d like to start off with entry level roles. I had a chat with my mentor, Paul Nicholson, about entry level positions and getting your foot in the door of the industry. I wasn’t expecting a “one-size-fits-all” answer, and I was right. Depending on what you want to do in the industry, there are different roles for different areas. Because my interest lies in the 2D area, Paul said positions such as colourist or clean-up artist can be typically found as a starting point. Looking at film life style, the role of colourist is defined as someone who fills in the colours for an animation, and will work closely with art directors and film directors to ensure a cohesive colour palette. The role of clean-up artist, as defined by CG Spectrum, is to redraw rough sketches into refined drawings, making sure the animation remains as consistent and on-model to the character designs and keeping a closer eye on volume and proportions.

When I was applying to my MA, I looked into the anime industry since that’s what inspired me to go fo r a career in animation. I have no interest in entering the anime industry (overwork, low pay, exploitative practices etc. isn’t something I find appealing, just look at MAPPA‘s working conditions), I remember hearing about entry level positions such as inbetweening, which is the role of adding frames in between existing key frames to create a smoother animation. Henry Thurlow mentioned how in his early career, his role was inbetweening at Studio Pierrot, and it was a while before he got to key animation. Paul mentioned that inbetweening used to be more common in the UK as an entry-level, but it seems to be a little quieter these days.

I’ve been applying myself to several studios (albeit with no success at this current moment): Picnic Animation, The Line Animation, Mummu, Art&Graft, Golden Wolf to name a few. These vary from just asking for an entry level position or an internship between summer or autumn. I’m very aware that some of these studios prefer 2D rigging, despite my portfolio primarily being frame-by-frame, but I’m still making an effort to apply because it doesn’t hurt to send an email their way. Skills are transferable, and I’m keeping an open mind to whatever experience is available.

When applying, I noticed a lot of studios don’t ask for specific, technical skills or knowledge, but rather more general skills and attitudes. Art&Graft mentions keeping up to date with design, illustration and embrace all forms of animation. Golden Wolf asks for innovation and inspiration, and in one instance asks for pipeline knowledge of Toon Boom Harmony for one of its internships.

Going back to Thurlow for a minute, he used to work at a studio called D’Art Shtajio before becoming a regular at TOEI Animation. In one of the vlogs, he talked with Arthell Isom about their beginnings in the anime industry. They highlight a need to think and imagine characters within a space, having knowledge of even limited backgrounds in order to reach the role of layout artist (how characters and backgrounds will be drawn), as well as a diverse adaptive skill set to not just draw humans, but also machines or objects. There’s some interesting stuff in regards to technical knowledge throughout their vlogs, and I’m likely going to reference them more in the future.

That’s all for now, I’ll probably start looking at networking reading more into the roles within the industry.