How Animators Find Industry Mentors

One question I sometimes get asked by students at Escape Studios is "How Do I Find a Mentor?"  The answer (of course!) is to start with your tutors, and then broaden out from there.  Over the course of a long animation career our Escapees are likely to have many mentors, though very few of these (if any) will be formal mentorship roles; most will be informal, and you might not even realise these people were mentors until many years later.   In my case I have been lucky enough to be mentored by animators such as James Baxter (Road to El Dorado), Andreas Deja (Lion King), Duncan Marjoribanks (Pocahontas) and also Glen Keane, whose notes on planning animation I still refer to today.  But mentorship is, in each and every case, very much what you make of it.

DNEG's Karan Reddy Gives Animation Feedback

Karan Reddy

A warm welcome to DNEG Supervising animator Karan Reddy who has been giving industry feedback today to our Short Course and MA Animation Students at Escape Studios. 

Industry feedback is at the heart of what we do at Escape Studios, part of what we call The Escape Method, a combination of intensive classroom teaching, online tutorials, constructive feedback, industry engagement, and group project work. 

DNEG is a global animation and VFX house, responsible for multiple VFX hits. 

Mock Interviews with Industry Today at Escape

"Interview"by the Animation Workshop

Today at Escape Studios we're running a series of mock interviews with some of our industry partners and mentors, who have kindly offered their time to give our undergraduate students an idea of what a job interview is actually like.

Learning how to survive an interview is an important part of preparing our students for a career in industry.

Escape Studios Animators Visit Cinesite

Animation short course students with tutor Simone Giampaolo

Our Short Course Animation Students are visiting Cinesite today, to get feedback from one of London's leading animation and VFX houses.

Cinesite Head of animation Eamonn Butler will be personally reviewing our students' work, giving them feedback and notes.

The journey of our short course animators is not over. Their first cut of their demo reels will be just that - a first cut, and they will continue to polish and perfect their work as they apply for work in the industry.

Animation Course Starts May 29th

The Niffler - animated at Framestore in London

We're currently taking applications for our next animation short course - three months of intensive training in 3D animation - starting on 29 May 2018.

We're excited to welcome Royce Wesley, a Pixar animator who will be visiting us in London to mentor our trainee animators. 

"Bring Your Own Animation": Monday 22 Jan

Calling all London-based Escapees - "Bring Your Own Animation" is taking place on Monday 22 January, hosted by Kate Gabriel, 3D Artist at MPC.

BYOA is an animation event that takes place every month at a pub in London, generally on a Monday night. This month the event is taking place at The Lukin pub in Fitzrovia.

If you are a student who is working on a shot or an updated reel, bring your work on a USB or hard drive and get feedback from professional animators. You'll also hear the local gossip and find out the word on the street; there is often useful intel like - who is hiring?

Blue Zoo To Mentor Our 2017 Animation Short Course!

QPootle5, by Blue Zoo

We're excited to announce that London animation powerhouse Blue Zoo have agreed to mentor the students participating in our next Animation Short Course, starting in February 2017.

Here at Escape Studios we want to nurture a new generation of animators - and there isn't anyone better than Blue Zoo to help us guide our fresh talent.  Blue Zoo founders Tom Box and Adam Shaw went from being university graduates to owning and running the biggest TV animation co in the UK.