Monday 2 May 2016

The Importance and Value of Transferable Skills

These are pointers that you should develop in the Games, Animation and VFX industry. These "transferable Skills" are impeccable when working with others and trying to find solutions to meet the clients need, while still getting deadlines on time.  Each value of the skills vary, however they are all necessary to gain any influence and recommendation for future employment. Not to mention that they all are simple and able to develop in different ways, the responses are just my personal opinions of how to develop each individual skill.

1. Be a Generalist with Specialization
Considering that I already have some experience in: modelling, animation, art, coding, and VFX, and still have a year of education to go. I know a lot of how elements fit together and the order of their importance and which should come first. The way to progress this is to continue doing work in and out of college and choose something that I would like to specialize in.

2. Team Work
The main way that I have developed this skill is doing group projects and sharing information between different members of the class to help them. The next thing I need to do is to participate in Game Jams we have, I only showed up to one to see ow the are done.

3. Be Creative and Efficient
Aside from the obvious (not getting distracted and getting the task you were assigned done on time), it is about thinking about thinking of new solutions and seeing if you can surpass what you were intended to do.

4. Think about the Big Picture
This is about completing what you were set and helping other people on the project. A way to develop this is by considering where in the production line you fall and having knowledge of what the other departments are doing and what you could do to help them.

5. Meet Deadlines
Well this is simple, always meet your deadlines. I have not missed any form of a deadline in any of the group projects. The main way I can develop this skill is working on my solo projects and creating smaller deadlines that is acceptable.

6. The Client's Satisfaction Trumps Everything
This is self explanatory, the way to develop this is by doing projects outside of college for small time clients, or a few projects that come to the college.

7. Respond Well to Criticism
By responding well, it means actually using the criticism in your future work. A good way to improve is by getting criticism from multiple people and multiple sources.

8. Presentation Skills
This is thinking of solutions to problems or having an idea to a problem or thinking of criticising the work to improve it. I have done this a few times, specifically with the VFX shots.

9. Knowledge of Cultural References
The idea of this is to keep up with modern culture, the news and major stories. If you want to improve this, well read more news and look at the current culture of different groups.

10. Observation Skills
This is able to see faults in VFX and animation shots so that they do not snowball out of control. A way of improving this is to look at purposely faulty filming and finding all of the issues and watching normal shots to find faults.

11. Plan
The main thing that I have planned are the models I have made in 3DS Max, as well as drawing drafts of art when not under a time limit (example of 10 mins). To improve this I need to plan more things out before I start. Examples can be my animation, before I start I could set the frame rate the objects and position and camera angles.

12. Able to Draw
Everyone is able to draw. I myself, can draw somewhat reliably and have done some drawings with pen and pencil. As well as having experience in art programs including Photoshop and Gimp.

13. Be Productive and Self Motivated
This basically means having constant updates with your team to get your part of the project finished. This is what you need to work well socially. The way I can develop this is by participating in projects (such as Game Jams) more often.

14. Be Confident/Ask Questions
This mainly revolves around the fact that you should speak your mind when you come up with an idea. This is something I need to develop. I get on with my work and have ideas before the project begins, however when the work starts I don't think creatively, the work is what matters, not working around it. A good way to improve this is can be taking a minute to look at the whole project and what you are doing. Think of a way that could improve efficiency and help other members of the team.

15. Know the Language
This is knowing the jargon that the industry uses. A main way to learn this is to just get experience in the industry from multiple companies.

16. Awareness of Cinematography
This is knowledge of how the shot you are using was shot (this is the usage of lighting, lenses, gripping, camera operating, etc...). A way to develop this skill is creating your own shots and writing down everything that the shot varies in a film-sourcing sheet.

17. Maths.
Honestly, Maths is one of my favourite subjects. The main way to improve this is to improve implementing more maths into coding, not relying on the in-game software.

18. Computer Literacy
This means having the knowledge of both hardware and software on all forms of computers. The way I can improve this is by, looking at my own computer, instructions that go with it and having a look at  tutorials to create my own computer and having explanations for certain programs that I can/will use.

19. Film Theory
This is knowing what film theory is, how it is used and wast you can do about it. If you know what it is, the best way to develop this is by getting experience in how it is used.

20. Knowledge of VFX History
This can be summarised by saying the more you know about the industry you are going into, the better. As time goes on, ways you can improve knowledge is by keeping up with recent news and looking more closely at certain stories from the industry in the past, seeing what you can learn from the successes and failures of the industry.

21. Knowledge of Editing
This is the technical knowledge of editing footage and shots.  A way to develop this skill is by constantly editing and changing different sets of shots and getting some for of criticism for the final result to help to improve the work.

22. Unique Style and Vision
This is making sure that you can stand out compared to your competition. A way to improve this skill is by creating your own style and vision based off of different inspirations.

23. Understand Optics
This is understanding the quality of the video you are making. This varies on the colour, brightness and frame rate. A real life example of this are the Hobbit films (filmed at double the frame rate, it looked better but made viewers feel nousious). A good way to develop this is to toy around with what settings and options work and what doesn't.

24. Be Innovative
This is the the idea of having unique ideas and styles, so that you will get noticed by more employers. The main way to develop this is to constantly try new ideas and style, to see what will work for you and what will not.

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