Applying to Study Animation at Bucks? What Should Go in Your Portfolio?

Life drawing - excellent training for animators

One of the most common questions we get asked by students applying for the Animation and Visual Effects course here at Bucks is: What should go into my portfolio? The answer is - a bit of everything. Drawings, Painting, Life drawing, sketches, scribbles. But most especially - 3D digital artwork.

How Can You Tell if Our Course is For You?

free 3D software

A career in animation and visual effects is not for everyone. A lot of what we do day to day involves solving software problems, trying to make stuff work on a PC or a Mac, and cursing our computer when it doesn't. Being a digital artist isn't for everyone. One way of finding out if this is something you would like to do for a career is to do a couple of tutorials online. A great place to start is with the 3D software Blender - it's completely free, and there are many free tutorials out there to get you started.

Should Artists Ever Work For Free?

Scofield Entertainment

Should artists work for free? This is a knotty problem and a subject on which people tend to have strong feelings. Students and graduates do of course often work for free, taking work experience, unpaid jobs or internships which do not pay actual money, but which offer training in the industry and real-world experience of what the world of work is like.

The trouble is, there are many people out there looking for a free lunch. The trick with working for free is to ask yourself what the benefit will be to you, and whether or not it's likely to be worth it in the end. In this very funny 2009 video by Scofield Entertainment, some film-makers have cooked up a very entertaining satire on on the "Work For Free" culture of much digital media today.

Bucks Animation featured in Digital Arts Magazine

We're famous! Today's edition of Digital Arts Magazine online has run a piece all about our new course at Bucks, focusing specifically on our revolutionary technique of "flipping the classroom", inspired by the work of American educator and entrepreneur Salman Khan. Click here to read all about it. We're at Computer World too!