An Awesome Reel from Studio AKA

STUDIO AKA Montage Reel 2015 from STUDIO AKA on Vimeo.

Check out the latest work by STUDIO AKA, a multi-BAFTA winning & Oscar-nominated independent animation studio & production company based in London. This is just the sort of small studio we love to see, boutique houses doing creative and interesting work in animation. Most interestingly, Studio AKA do a mixture of 2D and 3D work, showing that the medium isn't really what matters - it's what you do with it that counts. Animation is all about creating an entertaining and believable performance. We train our students to master these skills so that they can use any software to create great animation.

BAFTA Piccadilly hosts film-making masterclasses on July 11th - for just £6

On Saturday 11 July,  the BAFTA HQ in London at 195 Piccadilly will open its doors to emerging filmmakers for a day of masterclasses and panels with some of the UK’s major film industry organisations. The classes are hosted by industry experts, aimed at helping emerging filmmakers improve their creative and business skills. Best of all, each lecture/masterclass costs just £6 - cheaper than the price of a movie ticket.

Should Freelance Animators Set Up a Limited Company?

A freelancer at work

Part of our job at Bucks is to teach our students to be working professionals, which includes not only the ability to do excellent work at a high level of professional skill,  but also the ability to run a small business and tackle freelance work. Almost all digital artists take on freelance work of one kind or another, and we help our students out by bringing in small commercial projects at our virtual online studio at nano-films.com, giving our students paid experience on live briefs. Being a freelancer involves learning a lot of new business skills, and one of the most common questions asked by students is: "Do I Need to Set Up a Company before I become a freelancer?" The short answer is "no", but it's not quite as simple as that - it all depends on your personal circumstances.

Deadline to submit a feature film project to Cartoon Movie: 26 Nov 2014

Cartoon Movie 2014

The Deadline to submit a feature film project to Cartoon Movie is 26 November 2014. Are you looking for co-producers, financing and distributors for your animated feature film project? If so, you should submit it to Cartoon Movie! If your film gets selected, you will be able to pitch it to almost 1,000 animation and industry professionals from forty countries. Present at Cartoon Movie are 200 buyers, including 120 distributors & sales agents.

Bucks Tutor Alex Williams Introduces his Animated Feature Film: My Haunted House

Alex Williams is Co-Course Leader of Animation & Visual Effects at Bucks New University. He is also working on an independent film project, My Haunted House, which is currently in development, aiming for a 2016 release. We asked him to tell us about the project, and what still needs to be done to bring it to the big screen.

Who Invests in Independent Animated Feature Films?

Photo: Wikipedia

Who invests in independent feature films? And how does the aspiring film-maker find those investors? At the European film finance conference, Closing the Gap, Perrine Hamon of Media Deals, and Thierry Beaugard of Peaceful Fish explained what kind of investors are out there, and how to find them. Any animator who has a dream to make their own independent animated feature film needs to know just a little bit (and possibly more) about the nuts and bolts of movie finance.

Anifest is Back! Deadline: 30th September 2014

 The Canterbury Anifest Short Film Competition returns for 2014. Submissions are now open for animated shorts under ten minutes in length with entry closing on Tuesday 30th September 2014. Entries will then be considered by the Anifest judging panel, which includes Andy Frain, Producer of the cult classic Japanese animated film Ghost in the Shell, and Michael Arias, Director of Tekkonkinkreet.

Timo Vuorensola, director of Iron Sky, explains how to crowd fund your feature film

Timo Vuorensola, director of Iron Sky, gave a lecture at Closing The Gap, a European conference on film financing, explaining how to crowd fund an independent feature film. Iron Sky was initially funded through online sources, and later on secured more conventional funding on the back of the crowd-sourced contributions. Timo explained how he pulled off such an ambitious and successful project by starting an online fan base to help make his film.

Can You Make an Animated Film in a Single Day?

Hold Me Clothes by Evgenia Golubeva

Everyone knows that animation is slow, expensive and time-consuming. However, with a bit of determination and good planning, it is possible to make an animated film in a single day.  Evgenia Golubeva is an animator and film-maker who put together a short film titled "Hold Me Clothes", a stop-motion film written by her and animated in just one day at a film festival in Italy.

Sound designer Scott Benson Explains How to Mix a Movie in 72 Hours, and How Sound Designers can work with Animators at Bucks

Bucks sound design student Scott Benson just recently finished mixing and editing the sound on a feature film  - all done within 72 hours. We asked him how he managed to pull of what looks like an insurmountable task, and also how our animators can get the best out of collaborating with sound designers to make great films here at Bucks.

Miracles and Inspirations by Bucks Graduate Monika Dzikowicz makes the Official Selection of the Festival de Cine de Madrid

Monika Dzikowicz graduated from Bucks last year, and recently completed her short film Miracles and Inspirations, which has been entered in to short film festivals all around the world. Most recently the film has been accepted for the Official Selection at the 23rd Festival de Cine de Madrid, taking place in Spain in October of this year.

Max Howard Teaches our Students How to Produce a Hollywood Movie

Max Howard and Bucks animation students. From left: Felix Deacon, Ellouise Benjamin, James Hatton, Jack Copley, Max Howard, Kalim Momen, Alex Williams, Georgia Nichols, Anton Alfimenko, Ben Gray

Earlier this year Producer Max Howard came to Bucks to talk about how to produce an independent animated film.  He talked in detail about how films get financed, walking our students through all the steps necessary to get a film off the ground and into theatres. With a wealth of experience at major Hollywood Studios, and also with a number of independent animated features under his belt (plus one coming out this year - The Hero of Colour City - there are few producers better qualified to explain how the system actually works.

"Charlie & Yip" wins Best Animation at the British Animation Film Festival

Charlie and Yip

"Charlie & Yip", a short film directed by Bucks animation tutor Alex Williams, and animated by Tumblehead Animation in Denmark, has just won Best Animation at the 2014 British Animation Film Festival. The short was screened on June 8 in London at the Empire Leicester Square, competing with dozens of other shorts in three successive screenings over the course of the day.

Withoutabox - the smart way to get your animated short film noticed

What is Withoutabox? It is the best, simplest and most efficient way to enter your short animated film to the many film festivals currently welcoming submissions all around the globe. Submit your film to Withoutabox.com just once, and you can enter most of the festivals on the planet.

The site allows you to upload your film, fill in some (rather long) forms, and then - hey presto - you can enter film competitions all over the world. Withoutabox is free. As for individual competitions, the fees vary from nothing to quite a bit. It's up to you as to how many you want to enter.

What is Cartoon Forum, exactly? Deadline: 27 May

What is Cartoon Forum? Only Europe's biggest TV pitch-fest for animation. If you have a project in your head that you would like to submit to producers, business angels and broadcasters, Cartoon Forum is the place to be. The deadline to submit your TV project is 27 May. So, you have just under two weeks to sharpen your pencils and polish your pitch.

Hollywood Film Producer Max Howard coming to Bucks on Monday 19th May

Max Howard

Max Howard is a film producer with a huge wealth of experience producing hit Hollywood films for Disney and DreamWorks. He is responsible for classics such as Spirit - Stallion of the Cimarron, Space Jam, and The Iron Giant. He began his career working in London on Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, and now produces independent animated features such as the highly successful Igor. His latest film, the Hero of Colour City, is due out in October 2014. We are very lucky to have Max visit Bucks on 19th May to share the secrets of independent film-making.

Steve Burch Reveals the Mysteries of Producing Animation

Animation Producer Steve Burch

Animation Producer Steve Burch visited Bucks recently to talk to our students about the business of producing animation. It was an excellent talk, well structured and clear, and offered an insight into the challenges of successfully bidding on, winning - and delivering - freelance animation jobs.

Many universities talk about employability; here at Bucks we are trying to deliver on that promise by preparing our students not just to be employees but also entrepreneurs, working from home and in small groups on their own projects, and perhaps - who knows - even building the next big animation studio in the UK.

After all, Blue Zoo was founded by a group of animation graduates fresh from university - why shouldn't our students do the same?

Free lecture on independent Japanese animation on Wednesday 26 March at 6.30pm

Wednesday 26th March

The Japan Foundation in London has invited Nobuaki Doi, animation critic and founder of CALF, the independent Japanese DVD label to give an overview of Japanese independent animation.

Independent Japanese animators are producing innovative works which is often very different from the commercial animation or ‘anime’ style which Japan is so famous for. Showcasing the work of Japanese creators such as Koji Yamamura and Atsushi Wada, Nobuaki Doi will discuss Japanese independent animation as a source of global inspiration as well as exploring what makes Japanese animation among the best in the world.

Sofa.com launches Student Film Competition - with a £3,000 prize

Sofa.com have launched a student animated film competition titled ‘Filmed with Happiness’. Anyone who is studying or working in film making, animation or television is invited to submit a children’s short film based on the theme of "happiness".  The winner gets £3,000 in cash - and the chance to boost your profile with a little help from their PR agency.

Cartoon Movie - pitch your animated film idea

Cartoon Movie is the main international forum for independent film-makers to pitch their animated film ideas to producers, distributors and sales agents. In other words, it's where talent meets money to make great movies. The deadline to pitch an idea in concept is fast approaching - November 22 is the last day for submissions.