Double Event on CGI/Titling and How the BBC works with Indies
BBC meets Lion TV
Krishan Arora - BBC Independents Executive Background: He gives website briefings. He explains the outside world to the BBC. He is an ex-programme maker in factuals for BBC and Indies.
Jeremy Mills – of Lion TV Background: Started making animation films at 12. BBC Plymouth – docs. BBC, Ch4, Ch5, Lion has London, Glasgow, NY, and LA bases. Contemporary factual programmes. Breaking into Singapore with Dennis the Menace animation.
Jeremy talked about the role of the BBC Broadcasters as gatekeepers – perceived to be very hard to get through, to get them to make a decision. Big Brother – generates £10m income from telephone calls for Endemol.
Q How do individuals get their ideas to the BBC? A: Krishnan – Partner up with someone who has a relationship with the BBC. BBC and new producers - all about minimising risk.
Q: What are common causes of failure? A: Krishnan - BBC buys 5 year licence. The contractee has to deliver the product and therefore takes on the risk if they can’t deliver. If it costs more to deliver than agreed, it’s down to the Company to pay the rest itself. A: Jeremy – BBC can’t micro-manage, so editorial control down to Indie. BBC cash flow at 3 or 4 stages v. ITV pays on delivery! Storyville Strand – Made by Producer/Directors Film Network is BBC equivalent of 4Docs Krishnan: Entertainment, Drama, Comedy departments all short of ideas.
Q: Gender Diversity? A: Krishnan – We’ve sort of forgotten about that.
The BBC's future: £100 million going into drama. John York, Lucy Richer ,Jane Tranter heads up Heads of Drama for Wales, Scotland, N Ireland. BBC is moving to on-line application process for proposals. Sign up for his newsletter and E-briefings. http://www.bbc.co.uk/commissioning/newsletter
Motion Graphics – CGI and FLUID PICTURES
Rosa Mulraney
Mill TV divided into two new companies: Mill TV that makes Dr Who CGI and Fluid Pictures. Visual FX and Motion Graphics
Rosa’s Background: Ravensbourne College – graduated in animation. After Effects work initially then went to New Zealand to teach animation. Worked at Jellyfish Pictures. Now works at Fluid as Producer managing teams of creatives.
Projects worked on: Buildings in the name of God for a satellite company Developed the brief, then animatics, used softImage to produce 22 shots over 4 cathedrals. Using a studio enables job to be done quicker. A freelancers could do the same job but slower. It’s about risk avoidance. They get the script and dummy narration.
Q: What’s been the impact of HD on CGI? HD – same work, but for HD pushing the hard/soft ware. Same money as SD. Compositing work means big file sizes, slows down work when digitising in and out. A 20 second scene takes 20 minutes to transfer. Quality checks taking extra time too. They try and cheat to gain time, thus render layers in 720, then perform final render at 1080. Rosa’s job to negotiate cost of each shot. Market so competitive. Clients don’t really appreciate the work involved. Titling and related graphics – 2 weeks deadline.
Mr & Mrs Smith – 2D graphics studio work, using After Effecs, Lightwave and Shake. Uploaded uncompressed quicktime files to website and client then downloaded it. Daily rate £550/day (came down from £750/day) per animator. HD adds 10-20% extra render time.
