9781422271612

artists. Advertisers, likewise, are hiring more and more VFX artists to make their advertisements more exciting. Put simply, VFX creation is the creation and/or manipulation of moving images through computer software. In the field’s early days, VFX artists were “jack of all trades” types—whatever effects a particular film or show needed, a small team would figure out how to make them happen. Things are very different now. Due to the complex and highly specialized software involved in modern VFX creation, the jobs are also highly specialized. That means there are a surprising number of career paths open to people who can combine computer skills with visual creativity. Who Hires Visual Effects Artists? The majority of VFX artists work for independent companies (sometimes called “studios” or “shops”) that are hired to create specific effects for partic ular projects. That means the same VFX company might work on films, TV shows, commercials, games, and more. Some of these VFX studios are large, multinational companies. To take just one example, Method Studios has done high-profile work on everything from the Marvel and John Wick franchises to TV shows like Game of Thrones and Stranger Things , to TV ads for the NBA. Method Studios has offices in four American cities plus two in Canada, one in Australia, and one in India. But there are also lots of smaller VFX shops that may have only a handful of employees. VFX artists have highly specialized technical skills that can be applied to a number of different fields. Some of those fields, such as filmmaking, are probably obvious to you, but as you’ll see, others may be surprising.

14

Cool Careers in Science: Visual Effects Artists

Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online