Bucks Animators Go to Blue GFX

Blue GFX

Last week Bucks New University students went to the Blue GFX Expo in London – a massive annual visual effects event sponsored by Autodesk, and a great opportunity to find out about the latest developments in our industry. There were presentations about Autodesk Maya, 3D Studio Max, a chance to try out the latest Cintique tablets, and best of all a talk by Framestore about the work they did on Gravity, a film that looks and feels like a live action movie, but is entirely animated. OK, George Clooney and Sandra Bullock were real – but the rest is CG magic.

Nomad Games

I went to a fascinating lecture by Don Whiteford of Nomad Games, who talked about how his company got started – an excellent introduction to the challenges of starting up a small games business and adapting to new technology and changing markets. They created Talisman – now a 30 year old game, and he talked about how business need “not just one product, but something that gets updated and can be rolled out over time, with expansions and extensions” to the existing game. He also explained that here in the UK, Creative Skillset will fund creative salaries at 50% for a year – hugely useful for a start-up company short on cash.

Autodesk Maya

Graham Bell of Autodesk introduced some of the latest features of Autodesk Maya, including how to use their hair tools to create realistic fur and grooming for CG animals and creatures.

Overall, the event was a huge success, and a great way for students and lecturers alike to catch up on new developments in our business.

Blue Zoo

To see more about Blue GFX 2013, see this post about the use of Maya's latest hair and fur tools, read about how Blue Zoo revealed the secrets of making a new animated TV series, find out about how Frame Store did the title sequence for Skyfall, and learn about how graduates can get a job with Blue Zoo, the UK's largest indie TV animation company.

---Alex

For more on the experience of studying at Bucks New University, come and visit us at one of our Open Days,  take a virtual tour of one of our animation studios, check out what our students think of our course, and see why we're ranked in the top 12 creative universities in the UK. Find out why we're giving free laptops to all our students, and why we give all our students free access to videos at Lynda.com. Also, see what financial assistance might be available to you. Learn which is better for animation, a PC or a Mac? Get hold of a copy of a map so you can find your way around campus, and learn about motion capture at Bucks.