What to Do After 12th to Become a VFX Artist?

What to Do After 12th to Become a VFX Artist?

Do you ever wonder what went behind creating the wizards flying on broomsticks in Harry Potter movies or the dragons blowing fire in the Game of Thrones series?

What is that green screen that you see all the time in the ‘behind-the-scenes’ videos of almost all movies and especially fantasy movies? If your curiosities run in that direction, becoming a VFX Artist could be your calling. Career choices after the 12th can be very hard to make, partly because there are too many fields to choose from. If a creative job excites you, or if you want to associate with the film industry, then the field of Visual Effects (VFX) is the one for you.

So, without further delay, let’s look at all things you must do to become a VFX Artist!

1.    Know your traits:
The first step in making a career choice is whether your personality traits match the requirements of the job. The traits that are suitable for a VFX Artist include:
•    Creativity- A creative mind is the most important trait that a VFX artist must-have. Imagination is the first step to becoming an artist.
•    Knack for design- Having an eye for colour combinations, a visual sense of what looks attractive on-screen and attention to detail are important in this job.
•    Basic understanding of physics and computers- VFX includes playing with motion graphics, vectors, velocity, angles, lighting and many of those words you heard in a Physics class. A basic understanding of these technical concepts creates a stronger foundation.
•    Teamwork- At the end of the day, VFX is a collaborative effort with various people working on the same project. It goes a long way to be a team player and coordinate properly with your teammates and colleagues.
•    Sticking to deadlines- The VFX industry usually works on a tight schedule, so as a VFX Artist, you will always be expected to complete your tasks within the deadlines given to you.

2.    Enroll yourself on a VFX course from a reputed institute:
You can join one of the top institutes for VFX right after your 12th. You can do full-time certificate courses in VFX along with your graduation.

3.    Sharpen your technical skills:
This will be the most important aspect of your journey. While you’re taking a course, make sure to learn these software’s:

•    Adobe Photoshop
•    Autodesk MAYA
•    Adobe After Effects
•    Houdini
•    Adobe Premiere Pro
•    Nuke
•    ZBrush
•    Mocha
Coding skills can be a huge add-on for a VFX artist. Python is the most widely used language in VFX and gaming.

4.    Take up independent projects while you’re studying
It is important to have an impressive portfolio to increase your chances of getting placed in a top VFX company. Work as a freelance VFX Artist and start your own independent projects. They will not only give you practical experience but also build up your portfolio.

The biggest advantage of choosing this field is its flexibility. If you’re passionate about visual effects and computer graphics, it doesn’t matter whether you’re a 12th pass-out or a college drop-out. The only thing an employer would be looking for in you is your skillset. With placement assistance, you will have a higher chance of landing a job immediately after the successful completion of your course.

So, choose the institute that offers career-oriented training in VFX, expert guidance and placement assistance to help you accomplish your career goals. Go ahead, take the first step ahead towards your dream career. All the best!
Career In VFX: How To Begin

Career In VFX: How To Begin

Career In VFX: How To Begin

You’ve made up your mind to be a VFX artist and wondering how and where to begin from? Getting into the business of Animation & VFX requires humongous efforts and perseverance. But a career in this domain can be extremely fulfilling, exciting and rewarding when you have received the right training and guidance for it. Choosing the right institute and career course for your training will help you with the appropriate resources required to build a rewarding career in this field.

Here are some of the starting steps for you to follow:

1) Choose a software
With loads of new software and updates coming regularly, it could be overwhelming to narrow down your choice to a few. However, it’s extremely important to get a grasp on the one that you can are comfortable with. Check out the trial versions of the ones you think you can work with. For beginners, Blender is recommended which is an open-source free software.

2) Self Learning
Watch a bunch of tutorials and repeat them. Start with the basic effects namely Fire, Water Clouds/smoke, Explosions, Lightning in both 2D and 3D. These are common tasks for every VFX artist and the main aim here is to get the hang of it. The more you experiment, the easier it will be to adapt to your skills. It is recommended to start with the basics like colour theory, composition and modeling and not directly approach specifics like rotoscopy and texturing. Once you have mastered the fundamentals, try and figure out what you enjoy the most and specialise in it. While big-budget projects have the visual effects tasks broken up as specific jobs, indie studios or freelancing would need you to move around these roles quite often.

3) Enroll in a course
One of the major factors for getting into a top-notch VFX company is an impressive CV and a job-ready skillset. Learning online from the available tutorials will provide you with a basic idea but a career-oriented course in VFX will help you learn from the experts and work in a studio-like environment. In the era of cut-throat competition, training from a well-reputed animation and VFX institute will secure and ease your access to the industry. Needless to mention that a career course would also help you with the technical and soft skills required to make your mark as a skilled VFX Artist.

4) Demo reel
Show-reels are a culmination of your best works that you could highlight in your profile or while freelancing. Make sure that throughout your training, you keep working towards honing your craft so that your demo reel is impressive and diverse. Don’t forget to keep improving your reel on a regular basis.

5) Learn coding
Artists who know coding are the most sought after by major studios in recent times. Coding could be lifesaving in automating parameters that usually take much longer when done manually. Python is the most commonly used coding language but you could just learn any of the scripts. Although coding is not mandatory for this profile, it will give you a competitive edge over your peers.

As a VFX Artist one can get into the gaming industry, production houses and media and advertising with ease however it takes consistent hard work and relevant work experience to get recognized.

The demand for skilled VFX Artists is constantly on the rise. You can enroll in a course that provides expert training and guidance on the latest software and techniques so that you can develop the skills that the topmost recruiters are looking for. With placement assistance, you will have higher chance of landing a job immediately after the successful completion of your course.

Begin your career in the dynamic and very rewarding filmmaking industry on the right note. All the best!

Blue Screen Vs Green Screen: Explained

Blue Screen Vs Green Screen: Explained

As an aspiring VFX Artist, you must have seen tons of behind-the-scenes footage of movies that use advanced VFX techniques to create fascinating visuals for the audience. Something common in all of them is the usage of blue and green screens. Sci-fi, period and fantasy genre movies use them all the time. Before we dive into it further, first let’s understand the concept of chroma keying. It is the process of shooting video on a solid colour backdrop which is later replaced by the required footage or CGI. It isn’t strictly a post-production process as shooting on a screen on set is the first part of the entire workflow.

But why only blue or green? Blue and green are on the opposite ends of the color spectrum. Red and orange which correspond to the skin tones, so by using blue or green you have lesser unwanted effects when keying a person on screen.

Should you choose the blue or the green screen for chroma key compositing? This essentially depends on the lighting of scene to be shot. If it’s a daytime background, then green in the ideal choice as it blends seamlessly. Blue as you’d have guessed is best for replicating nighttime. Apart from that the choice actually isn’t that simple.

Blue is a higher frequency colour than green and thus gives a more distinct keyed image with greater contrast.

The blue screen is also the most common choice of the compositor as it has less depth than green screen and so it does not stand out in the real world. The blue screen can be created using silk or fine fabric coated with an emulsion of fine particles of a light reflecting material. Most people like to use velvet for this purpose, but fabric such as muslin can also serve as a good option.

Talking about the counterpart, green color is processed the cleanest with the most luminance. The result is that you will be able to pull a clean key with the least amount of noise, and often, without a complicated lighting setup. Conversely, because of green’s brightness, it can also lead to more ‘spill,’ meaning the green color may reflect and bleed over on your on-screen talent. It isn’t that big of a problem and one of the easiest ways to avoid it is to ensure distance between the actor and the screen.
vfx institute

credits: (c)Disney Studios

Now it may seem as though blue is superior to green, which to some extent is right. But it does have its own downsides too. Blue screen will require twice as much light as green screen thus it’s an expensive choice. This difference in luminosity results in less colour spill than green. You would not want your post production to be messy after all.
In conclusion even though blue gets the upper hand, the green screen is still the most popular choice for chroma key compositing since it’s cheaper and has lesser depth with respect to its surface. Nevertheless, you may need to use both screens in various circumstances. The ideal solution is not just one.

Fascinated with the behind-the-scene intricacies about film-making? You can become an integral part of the process too. Get trained in VFX fundamental and advanced techniques at Arena Animation.

Check out the career courses in VFX here and take the first step ahead in your career pursuit.
Dhruvanshi Patel’s Successful Story – Arena Animation to Vancouver, Canada

Dhruvanshi Patel’s Successful Story – Arena Animation to Vancouver, Canada

Successful Canada Visa approvals of Arena Animation Sayajigunj student – Dhruvanshi Patel

Actually, my experience was great at Arena Animation Sayajigunj! They helped me to get my VISA faster than expected.

Right from childhood, I had a profound interest in the field of arts. I made various sketches in different styles like Dot Painting, Charcoal Drawing, Pencil sketching, Watercolor, and Pastels. As I grew up, my interest in this field also matured. I got attracted more towards the art of visual effects in movies. The visual effects in Harry Potter and Avatar blew my mind when I saw the fictional characters and creativity portrayed in the surroundings. All these positive aspects made my interests inclined towards Visual effects.

After my higher secondary education, I decided to opt for the Visual Effects (VFX) stream. Eventually, I enrolled in the VFX program at Arena Animation Sayajigunj  in October 2017.

After completing my first term study in December 2018, I got placed through Arena in January 2019 at Trace VFX Solutions India Pvt. Ltd., Mumbai  To get hands-on experience and gain practical knowledge, I decided to complete my certification in the VFX program after getting some work experience.

During my 1.5 years at Trace, I worked on various Hollywood films and web series like Artemis Fowl, Cats, Snake eyes, Cursed, American Gods, etc., for MR.X, MILL Film, MPC Film & Episodic as a Jr. Matchmove/RotoAnim artist. I received credit on the silver screen for the Hollywood movie Artemis Fowl.  My curiosity about learning VFX in detail increased as I learned more about it in my work life. After leaving my job in July 2020, I continued my VFX program at Arena Animation Sayajigunj and completed it in January 2021. My dedication led me to complete the program earlier by six months.

Now Having done my research, I was very clear about Canada as my chosen country for higher education. I prefer to study in Canada to gain multicultural exposure, high quality of education, latest study modules, and recognition of my degree back in India. Collaboration of  Arena Animation  & Vancouver Centre of Entertainment Arts – Langara College, Canada to help me a lot for my international career. and also I got  A special scholarship of CAD 19,500 as I am an Arena Animation student. And It will be a lot to me. Once again Thank you Arena Animation.

Langara CEA is situated in Vancouver, a hub for Hollywood movies with plenty of studios located alongside the city. The faculty themselves have worked in many Hollywood movies, and what else can be better than getting trained under their supervision.

My main aim is to start up a studio in my hometown, and for that, I need supervision from the best college and experience in studios.

I recommend all students who are Ready to graduate from Canada – Visit Arena Animation Sayajigunj once which is best Vfx Training Institute in Vadodara.

—-Dhruvanshi Patel

 

Career Opportunities for Roto Artists – VFX Film Making Courses

Career Opportunities for Roto Artists – VFX Film Making Courses

Rotoscoping is one of the oldest animation techniques that allows producing realistic footages. Traditionally, animators traced over motion picture footage, frame by frame. In the visual effects industry, the process, even though similar, has a different purpose.

Rotoscoping is mostly used today to create a matte or mask for an element, so that it can be extracted and placed on a different background. It may even be masked out to change colours or any other set of reasons. It is widely used than you may realize. Rotoscoping helps filmmakers create scenes that would otherwise be impossible, challenging, expensive, or dangerous to produce in real life.

Read on, to find out about the industries that employ trained, skilled and certified rotoscoping artists for various job roles.

VFX studios
In bigger VFX companies, rotoscoping artists are sometimes attached to a show along with a Compositor or 2D Lead to direct them on the projects. If not on one show, then their services are used on different shows that the company is in charge of. In smaller companies, the roto artists gain experience by being a Junior Compositor and doing their own roto and prep work along with the compositing work.

Film Production Houses
There are more things than you can imagine that goes into the making of a film. Rotoscoping artist are often required at film production houses. Something as simple as tracing hair on an actor’s head is done by them. Even with the availability of advanced digital technologies, the makers of Guardians of the Galaxy used traditional rotoscoping techniques by using footage of a real racoon called Oreo to bring ‘Rocket’ to life.

Animation Companies
It was the legendary filmmaker Max Fleischer who invented the technique of rotoscope back in 1914 when he animated Popeye The Sailor and Betty the Boop. A few years later, when Disney used the footage to get a sense of a character’s movement, instead of tracing over the live-action footage. Many animators have come up with their own style of rotoscoping through over the years. And is still being used to create a variety of animated assets.

Gaming Companies
Game developer Jordan Mechner of Smoking Car Productions invented digital rotoscoping while creating the adventure game The Last Express. He had even used rotoscoping in his previous game projects Karateka and Prince of Persia. Since then, the gaming industry has always been another important sector where rotoscoping artists can build a career in.

As Rotoscoping continues to be a vital process within the animated and live action film production pipeline, there is huge demand for skilled roto artists. By completing a Vfx Film Making career course and getting the right skills, you can get hired by some of the top companies in the above-mentioned industries. 

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