Our February 2016 Animation Company Update

It is time for our February 2016 Animation Company Update! It has been a busy month, and I feel like I’m juggling as much as I can to keep the company moving forward.  I don’t want to bore you with every detail, so below you will find updates on the bigger projects and activities I have been working on.

Bink:
The major activity with Bink the last couple weeks is we have been doing a lot of work with the music and sound effects.  On Monday I received the final music underscore from our composer, Carl Johnson.  He did an amazing job of creating different themes, and music for such a short animation.  This episode is only 30 seconds, so introducing the different characters has to happen very quickly.  I’m excited to see how it will work with the other sound effects.

The sound effects are being done by our good friends over at Boom Box Post, and I had a spotting session with the Co-founder Jeff Shiffman last week.  This gave us a chance to look at the short, and talk about what I expect to hear at different parts.  He ask a lot of really great questions, and brought up things I did not even think about before.  This is the awesome part about working with different talented people, they each bring something unique to the project which adds unique layers to the project making it that much better.  I can’t wait to see what he does with the SFX when we meet for final remix on Monday. As a side note, we made it onto their website with their other amazing clients! 😀

I have also started to reach out to the press about writing articles on Bink.  I have heard back from 2 different industry magazines who are interested in doing write-ups about the short.  One actually wants to do a few articles about different aspects of the production process.  I think getting these articles will help in getting the word out to as many people as possible.

We are working on problem solving a few more things in regards to Bink’s fur, but otherwise we are ready to start lighting and rendering the shots.  We are in the final stretch, and I’m very excited about getting to share this short animation and all the hard work of everyone involved.

Project-MMM:
Our client project we are working on is also going really well.  All the models are built and surfaced, and all the characters are rigged.  We are currently finishing up rough layout where we are taking all the assets and composing the different shots with virtual cameras.  This is all done on the computer using software called Maya.  We plan to start animation tomorrow, and hope to have it done in a few weeks.  The quality of this short is more in line with a web-series while with Bink we are aiming more towards feature quality.  This is why we are able to move much quicker on this project then with Bink.  Once we finish the first episode of Project-MMM we plan to move on to the 2nd episode.  I’m hoping we can streamline the process and deliver each subsequent episode quicker then the previous.

LA Society of Creative Professionals:
Last night we had our 8th Society Mixer, and we had a great turn out.  I’m still having a lot of fun with putting these mixers on, and I have met a lot of really amazing people.  I know several people who came to the mixers which through the people they met there lead to them getting jobs, and I have even hired a few people from the mixers.  Last night I witnessed something I would have never imagined I would see.  Someone who has never come to one of the mixers might have got themselves an interview, because someone at the mixer was saying how this person was looking for a job and how amazing this person is to an executive who has been looking to hire someone with skills this mystery person has.  I see this as a sign the mixers are making a real difference in the creative community when people who have not even come to any of the events are benefiting.

Feb_2016_mixer

Marketing & Social Media:
Our Social Media Marketing Coordinator, Brittany Potter has been doing a great job with all of our social media accounts and marketing efforts.  If you follow the company on our different social media sites you may have seen some of her posts.  We have also been doing Talent Spotlights where every other week we highlight one of the extremely talented people we get to work with.  If you want to check them out as well as the other blog posts you can find them on the company’s blog here.

We are preparing for the launch of the first episode of Bink, and as mentioned above the first part involves reaching out to the press.  Once we have the first episode of Bink it will help in our marketing efforts because we can actually show potential clients the quality of work we can do.  I have been holding back a lot of my sales and marketing efforts waiting for the completion of the short.  In July the first episode of Project-MMM will be out, and this will give us another style of animation to showcase on our portfolio.

While the language on my website has been about how we offer animation, VFX, and motion graphics I plan to change it to be more specific.  My focus is high quality 3D animation, so I want my website and marketing to reflect this.  We will still offer those other services to our clients, but it will not be a major part of our brand.  Focusing on our specialty will help us find the clients we can help the most.

Oscar Week: Animated Features:
This evening I’m attending an event to celebrate the nominees for Best Animated Feature Film.  They will be showing clips of each animated movie followed by an onstage discussion with each group of nominated filmmakers. This year’s films are, Anomalies, Boy and the World, Inside Out, Shaun the Sheep Movie, and When Marnie Was There. For more information and trailers, visit: http://oscar.go.com/nominees/animated-feature-film.  I have never been to this event before, so I’m excited to check it out.  I will be sure to share how it goes in next week’s blog post.
This about covers all the major things I have been working on.  I hope you enjoyed reading about all I have going on with the company.  Please feel free to leave a comment below if you ever have any topics you are interested in hearing about.

 

If you have not already, please join me on my journey by subscribing to my blog.  Also, if you have any thoughts or advice I would love to hear what you have to say, so please feel free to leave me any comments below. Otherwise, be sure to stay connected with me on Twitter (@MillerAnimation). Only Time Will Tell.

Experiencing The 43rd Annual Annie Awards for Animation

Eric Karen going to AnnieThis last Saturday evening my wife and I attended the 43rd Annual Annie Awards which was in Royce Hall on the UCLA campus. I could tell you about who won what awards, but you can find that out in many other places like here.  Instead I want to share my experience of attending to the Annie Award show.

I have never been to the Annie Awards, so I figured I would get general admission tickets to check it out before investing in the VIP tickets another year.  Before I was able to get tickets the attorney for Eric Miller Animation Studios, or as he calls it EMAS, said he had two extra VIP tickets and wanted to know if I wanted them.  Free VIP tickets are always a better option, so I quickly said yes.

We had really great seats on the main floor very close to the stage.  I felt a little special since we were closer then most of the people who were actually winning awards.  I kept seeing myself on the video screen as the winners walked by us on their way to accept their awards.  This was a different experience then at the Producers Guild Awards where we are put in the far back corner.

At the Annie Awards

Overall it was a really nice event.  The Champaign reception before the award show was on a really nice outdoor patio.  The hors d’oeuvres were amazing, and my pregnant wife ate at least 5 sliders among other things.  She said the baby was really hungry, and I would not dare argue with her.

The award show was very interesting and I did not feel like it dragged on like we were warned about.  All the acceptance speeches were kept very brief, and it moved along very nicely.  I think it helped they had the presenters presenting several categories instead of introducing new presenters for each category.  This with the short speeches made it go much quicker then years past.

Eric-Karen-Annie-AwardsWhile the average person probably never heard of the people who won at the Annie Awards like the more celebrity winners of the Producers Guild Awards or Academy Awards, I found the Annie’s to be much more interesting since I actually knew some of the people who were nominated.  Many of them included people I have worked with on different movies during my time at DreamWorks Animation.

There also felt to be more excitement in the air, and the people seemed more down to earth.  I might be bias because I love my industry, and the people who are in it.  There are some really awesome, and amazing people in animation.  If you take one of the most talented people at the Annie’s and walk up to them and say hello, I bet they would actually talk to you.  I don’t feel that is the case with all the other people in other areas of entertainment.  I might be wrong, but at least this is the vibe I get.  Animation has really nice, down to earth, and fun loving people.

After the awards show we then got to go to the VIP Dinner and Party.  This was a great opportunity to congratulate the winners, and eat some delicious food.  My one complaint would be they only had a few tables and seats, so majority of the people were left hunting for a ledge to set their plates down on to quickly eat.  Luckily, my attorney was able to score one of the tables, so he invited us to join them.  We spent most of the after party sitting and talking with him and his wife.  I’m extremely impressed with my wife for being able to make it through the entire evening wearing heals while pregnant.

We had a really great time, and I’m looking forward to going again next year.  I plan to try and attend all the award shows in the future.

 

If you have not already, please join me on my journey by subscribing to my blog.  Also, if you have any thoughts or advice I would love to hear what you have to say, so please feel free to leave me any comments below. Otherwise, be sure to stay connected with me on Twitter (@MillerAnimation). Only Time Will Tell.

Award Shows and Shareholder Meetings: The Joys of Animation

On Saturday, January 23rd my wife and I attended the Producers Guild Awards show.  We had a really great time, and I’m glad she was able to come with me this year.  The award for Outstanding Producer of Animated Theatrical Motion Picture went to Inside Out producer Jonas Rivera.  The other nominees included; Anomalisa Producers: Rosa Tran, Duke Johnson, Charlie Kaufman, The Good Dinosaur Producer: Denise Ream, Minions Producers: Chris Meledandri, Janet Healy, and The Peanuts Movie Producers: Craig Schulz, Michael J. Travers.

Eric and Steve MartinoI had a chance before the award show started to talk with Steve Martino the director of The Peanuts Movie.  I have seen him at several other events I have attended in the past, but never had a chance to talk with him.  I found out he is also a fellow Ohioan.  He was born in Dayton, Ohio and went to school at Ohio State University.  He also directed Horton Hears a Who! and Ice Age: Continental Drift which I’m sure you have all heard of. He is a really nice guy, and we had a nice little chat.

Last week we made a lot of progress with both Bink and Project-MMM.  I’m very excited to see them coming together.  I started to work on getting post sound effects, and music underscore started for Bink. With Project-MMM we have all the character models done, and storyboard animatics which I will be presenting to the client either today or tomorrow.  If approved we will be ready to start on animation.

According to my corporation’s By-laws my annual shareholder and director meeting has to fall on Jan 30th each year.  If the date falls on a weekend or holiday it is to be scheduled the next business day.  Well, that happens to be today! Being the founder, Sole Director, President, Secretary, and Treasurer of the corporation it makes for a very “interesting” meeting of talking to myself. The meeting minutes are even stranger to read.  You might ask why I would even have these meetings?  Well, if the IRS ever does an audit they often ask for the minutes to see if the corporation is actually being run like a corporation instead of Sole Proprietorship.  If they can show the company is not being run correctly then the status as an S-corp can have effects on taxes.  I don’t completely understand the details, but what I do know is I have to have these meetings at least once a year.

EMAS Shareholder Meeting

This weekend my wife and I are going to another award show, but this time it is specific to animation.  The Annie Awards is put on by ASIFA which I’m a member of.  This will be my first year going to this award show, so I’m really excited to see what it is about.  Maybe one year I can be a nominee instead of just an attendee.

Well, it is time for me to get back to work.

 

If you have not already, please join me on my journey by subscribing to my blog.  Also, if you have any thoughts or advice I would love to hear what you have to say, so please feel free to leave me any comments below. Otherwise, be sure to stay connected with me on Twitter (@MillerAnimation). Only Time Will Tell.