Assistant TD
Assistant technical director (TD) is an entry level job, which concludes the tasks of helping to identify and fixing problems as well as ensuring of providing and supplying everyone in a VFX pipeline with the tools that are needed. They have a great understanding of how the pipeline within VFX works and the various job roles that are there, from stages of pre-production, through shoot, editorial, VFX to grading. They also need to have an understanding of the software used by the artists and be aware of the needs and limitations of various departments in a production. The assistant must gather information across all the departments to learn of their needs. They should be able to design the solution for arisen problems and have some coding skills to create small-scale tools using the established employer workflow requirements. ATDs will be utilising a variety of the industry standard graphical applications, scripting languages and operating systems.
Dealing with minor bug reports is part of their tasks, thus helping the TDs to focus on much bigger problems, for instance rendering errors. The responsibilities that fall on the assistant TDs also include data management, archiving, restoring and tracking data, converting and resizing files where needed; they keep the project on schedule. Other than the pipeline TDS, they work closely with the research and development teams, who design and test any new software.
While undertaking the job, the assistant must have good communication skills, as they should be able to interact well with the variety of staff at different levels and be able to understand their needs and assist accordingly; have a problem-solving mind, think analytically, be able to come up with creative and efficient solutions; have an eye for detail when designing tools and fixing technical issues; have strong knowledge of the pipeline; strong programming and coding skills in Python and C++.
Production Coordinator
The main role of a production coordinator is to aid with the management of the production of the film’s visual effects. They are responsible for the schedule of the production and tasks given to the team. In the project pipeline, the production coordinator start work during pre-production. Working in the production office, their tasks include overseeing what goes on with the phones, photocopier and paperwork when the line producer and production manager are on set, setting up the production office, organising equipment, supplies and staff, coordinating travel, accommodation, work permits and visas for cast and crew, distribution of the shooting schedules, crew and cast lists, scripts and script revisions. During the production stage they should be preparing, updating and distributing crew lists, daily progress reports and script changes, dealing with call sheets and transport requirements, organising couriers and shipping companies. Toward the end of the shoot, the production coordinate helps the production manager to wrap up the production, examples of their tasks include closing accounts with suppliers, returning surplus stock and tying up all loose ends.
The key skills of a production coordinator include knowledge of the filmmaking, as they have to understand the process and need of each department, be organised, as they would have to plan and multi-task a lot, be able to work under pressure, be innovative, be a good communicator, work effectively in a team and know how to budget. They report back to the line producer and production managers. They communicate with all the heads of department and rest of the production department. If the project is big and there is a such possibility, they could delegate tasks and jobs to assistant production coordinators and production runners.
Modelling Artist
A modelling artist creates the models for all the three-dimensional assets required within a project, be it characters, weapons, vehicles, furniture, trees, plant, rocks, animals and so on. Their workflow often starts with a brief drawing from a concept artist or collection of reference materials, such as photographs or line drawing sketches, followed by building a 3D model from that. Firstly, the create a ‘wireframe’, referred to as ‘mesh’ of an object. From that, they should be able to sculpt the object model to the close resemblance of what is intended. Using the digital tools, such as sculpting brushes, physical graphics pen and tablet, they complete their work. They could be specialising in a certain area, depending on the project requirements. Hence there are varieties of a modelling artist: environment, character or vehicles artist.
An environment artist focuses on building the CG world. Their role ca be divided into two parts: asset creation and layout. Both of which require the artist to have a good understanding of lighting and textures. A character artist is someone who makes characters and creatures. Starting with the figure sculpting, where aspects such as topology, UVs, shading are involved, the position of a character modeller is not an entry level position. A vehicle artist would usually work on assets such as cars, spaceships, weapons, robots.
Modelling artist would work at an early stage of the CG and 3D part of the VFX pipeline. After they produce the models, those are further passed on to be animated, given texture and lit. They could be working for a VFX company or be a freelancer. The key skills of a modeller involve the ability to draw, be able to interpret the 2D model and build a 3D model from that, be able to use required software, such as Blender, Maya and ZBrush, be organised and collaborative. They work with the concept artists and pass on their work to the texture artists, riggers or animators.
Texturing Artist
The role of a texturing artist is based around painting surface textures on animated characters, environments and props. Examples of the textures that the artists work on include wrinkles, fur, scales, sweat, mud and sometimes even one that would not be found in real life. In this case the artist would have to invent new textures using their imagination and creativity. Their workflow starts of with a 3D model created by a modelling artist that is usually a plain grey shape, with which they will be further working by adding details onto the surfaces until the model will look like a photograph. Once they are happy with the result, they can ‘bake’ the texture from one surface so that it could be used elsewhere.
Texturing artist could work for VFX company or studio or be a freelancer. A set of skills that they should be good at include having an artistic eye and understanding of form, colour and texture, recognise what makes an image appear realistic in terms of light, colour, composition and perspective, be good at photography, have a knowledge of VFX programs they will be working in, be organised and collaborative. The software that a texturing artist will be using are Photoshop, 3D Paint, UV Layout/Editing, RenderMan, Mental Ray, Maya, Shaders and Houdini. There is a variety of tools involved in the job, such as software, platforms and rendering environments for textures to be created. Texturing artists also use digital matte painting techniques to create textures and they work with advanced surface types, subsurface scattering and global illumination.