Hey guys, because we were discussing product animation with Pierre in his latest post, I wanted to share this one. I love everything about this. How simple it is, the art direction, the animation, the sound design, the editing. https://vimeo.com/1090006524

Hey everyone, I hope you are all well and good This past week for me have been full of ideas, excitement, but also questions, reconsiderations and reflections on my current situation and what time will it take for me to get my first "accomplishment" ( like a first client, first paid invoice, something that says " this is the first success, let's take it further"). Small recap of where I am in my professional situation: - I have 2 months (including the current one) left of unempmoyement money. From July I'm on my own and with my savings. - Because my financial situation is in a bad spot, have been applying to jobs, both in animation studios and in my area, looking for part time jobs so I can have time to devellop my business. So far, I did not get a single interview, whether in a studio or in a local shop, bar, etc... where I applied. So quite unlucky so far, and I have been applying to studios months, and local businesses for weeks. Of course it does not mean I'm giving up freelancing. Quite the opposite. But I do need an income. On what I'm doing/working on at the moment. This is where things get a bit more chaotic - I'm nearing the end of the year long animation mentorship I enrolled in, it coincidently will end at the same time my unemployement money runs out. I'm working on a shot that I need to finish before July 4th, because at this date my Maya Indie license will end and I can't afford to renew it unless maybe if find a job by that time. So this shot is quite a big focus currently, and I want it in my demoreel. - Passive Income: I've been building my own character rigging system for quite a while now, using a Blender node based rigging addon called Mantis. When it will be finished, I'll be able to quickly rig whole characters with my own rig quite fast. Until last Thursday, this was a side project that I was working on and off, I didn't have any commercial plans with it. But then I tried to use Claude to find potential passive incomes using my skills. And I found one, on which my rig system play a key role. I'll collaborate with a 3d artist friend on that. This is what got me really excited. I've been thinking non stop about it, and how can we take it further if it works and gathers a community. But this is the passive income plan. Not the main income/clients plan ( tho maybe it could turn into this in the future if we establish ourselves steadily in that market) - Motion Design: The original main income/client plan in Blender. Now this is the part where I'm still trying to find my footing. I've been looking at artists who already use Blender for motion design, mainly to see how they used the software for this purpose, as K neved did before. There is not a huge amount, but the one who exists are doing really cool things. So I now have an idea on how to do basic things. I've been going back to Geometry Nodes as well (back because a few years ago I used it a bit). It's Blender's procedural modeling/creation tool. It's REALLY powerful, and I suspected it could be verrrry useful for motion design, so I'm relearning it properly because I'm convinced it will be very useful. It's also used for 3D motion graphics and that's how I learning it ( Ducky3D on Youtube. He is one of the best to teach this kind of things). I have a small ghost/personnal project in the works, with help from my best friend for a few non animation aspects. Waiting for him to get back to me on the script first draft ( I never wrote scripts before but he did) - Also, I recently been wondering about product animation. I know this is a potentially quite profitable alley as well. - And there is the gym explainer videos project. I looked for free gym machines/equipment 3D models to use in the MVP, had a specific one in mind. Finding goos free models in that category turned out to be harder than expected, but I found one that could fit. Need to tweak it if needed and rig it. My coach suggested what would be good to showcase for a demo, and I'll go with that.

Hey guys, Quick one for you all. I'm using Claude to redo the Animator NOW's website this week. Looked at the page yesterday and realized something obvious. There's a whole section called "Testimonials" with three placeholder cards and zero real quotes. I know it's early. Some of you have only been in here a few weeks. But if there's been anything in the community, the course, the office hours, or even a thread that helped you, made you think, or moved you forward, I'd love to hear it. Two or three sentences is plenty. Doesn't have to be polished. Just what you actually thought. If you're cool with it, I'd quote you on the new homepage (first name + role + country, like "Maya, 2D Animator, France"). If you'd rather stay private, just say so and the quote stays in here. Reply below, DM me, whatever's easier. This is the kind of thing that helps the next animator decide to join. Thanks.😊

Hey guys, So the past weeks have not seen much developement, mostly research about various topics. I've been looking at how freelancing works in Belgium (where I live). It's basically two choices: - "Personne physique" (translates litteraly to "physical person") which is basically one person alone - "Société/SRL" (translates to "company") which is a company, you become CEO in a way. Both have their own requirements, and various advantages and drawbacks, mostly on the financial side. For my case, at this moment, I think going as "personne physique" would make more sense to begin with. It costs less overall to start and maintain (with no stable income), and there are structures and systems made to help new freelancers to get started. I signed up for an information meeting organised by one of these structures, which will take place on the 27th of May. It will be about what can I get access to, to get help and support when creating my business in Brussels. What are the financial helps I can have access to, etc... So this will be interesting The good thing is, it is possible, if at one point the business flourishes and becomes very profitable, to "evolve" into an SRL, and so eventually create a whole studio for example, with the possibility to hire people. Because you can't hire people if you are a "personne physique" freelancer. You could ask another freelance and pay them, but not hire directly. There are also ways to quickly take care of all the admin part of creating a business, through dedicated websites and structures, helping with the creation, registration, etc... I've been gathering useful links to articles about various things, like pro bank accounts as well, to separate professional and personal accounts, and how to choose the best stuited, or all the legal and fiscal aspect of starting a business in Brussels and what should be expected. So that's for the administrative part. On top of that I started a Pinterest board, on which I gather some visual styles, color palettes, logos and overall ideas about how I'd like to present my futur website and brand. I already have something that I created with my animation mentor (I'm still part of a mentorship program focused on animation skills until end of June, and that was the first thing we worked on. Updates to CVs, cover letter, brand coherence across all of it. But I do not consider it final design. It's nice that I have something coherent now, but it will change again I'm pretty sure).

Hey everyone! 👋 Quick round of updates from me. 🟡 First off, sorry for the delay on Modules 3 and 4. Vacation's over, the coworking space is packed again, and finding a quiet moment to record has been harder than I expected. Can't wait for my studio to be done!!! 😜 ➡️ Module 3 Lesson 1 is up. I just uploaded the welcome video and the first lesson, which is all about time management. Hope you're going to love it. Go check it out. ➡️ Module 4 is coming next. Heads up: I might end up filming parts of it from the phone box in the coworking space. The quality will dip a tiny bit, but the content stays the same. I'd rather ship it than make you wait another week. 🟡 The new course structure Once everything is recorded, here's the order the course will live in. Two big changes worth flagging: Pricing moves up to Module 3, and Productivity slides way down to Module 9 (it's a solution to a problem you don't have yet, so it hits harder once you've been working for a while). 1. The Freelance Mindset 2. Building Your Professional Brand & Presence 3. Pricing & Quoting 4. Finding & Approaching Clients 5. Client Education & Communication 6. Project Management & Delivery 7. Money & Financial Management 8. Growth & Sustainability 9. Productivity 10. Wrap-Up & Next Steps 🟡 Office hour tomorrow, slight time change I need to push it a bit earlier because I'm picking up my daughter at the airport. New time: 4:00 to 5:00 PM (Paris time). Let me know if that works for you. As planned, I'll do a live tour of After Effects. If we have time, I'll open one of my actual film projects so you can see how I structure my work when I'm doing motion design for film. 🟡 Where are you at? Last thing: I genuinely miss hearing from you. Drop a comment and tell me where you're at right now in building your business. Stuck somewhere? Got questions? Hit me with it. That's the whole point of this community, and I want to help you steer this thing in the right direction. See you tomorrow. P.S. Small process win I'm pumped about: starting with Module 3, I switched my setup. Descript for the screen recording, Canon M50 for the face cam. Different from how I shot Modules 1 and 2, and I think the quality bump is noticeable. Let me know what you think.🙏