My grandfather was a mechanic and owned an auto parts store in Bakersfield, Ca. My great-grandfather was also a mechanic and started working on cars around the turn of the century when cars were replacing horses. These men understood tools and how to use them to fix anything mechanical. They made a living with their skills and knew how to twist wrenches. In the mid 1970’s, cars started getting more complicated. Emission standards were changing and a whole new set of tools started coming on the scene to monitor the electronics. Today, all cars are equipped with sophisticated electronics and mechanics have to know how to analyze computer data in addition to traditional mechanical skills. Certainly, today’s mechanic also twists wrenches. But twisting wrenches isn’t always enough to get the job done. The modern mechanic is required to know a range of tools that mechanics of the past could never imagine. Armed with a solid foundation and technical know-how, the modern mechanic is in a profession that requires a combination of schooling and practice to pick the right tool for the job.
Over the past decade, there’s been an explosion of tools available for animation, motion graphics and visual effects. While the fundamental principles of creating movie magic and animation have not changed since the early days of film making, today’s tools allow artists to blur the line of reality on the screen like never before. In addition, advances in software have created some very powerful tools that were once only available to big motion picture studios. These advances have allowed individuals and small creative shops to accomplish truly amazing things.
Five years ago, I started working with Flash to make web animations and interactive websites. I was immediately hooked. I could let my imagination run free and post dreams online so anyone could interact with them. To make it all come together I had to learn how to write the underlying code and logic. This was an alien concept. I was a writer of words, not a person trained to think in logic using analytical reasoning and if-else statements and other computer science jargon. Then I remembered something my linguistics professor, Dr. Batenburg once said, “All languages follow rules. Once you understand the rules, you can speak the language.” Once I learned how to code, it unlocked the door to working in 3D animation, physics simulations and a world of new possibilities making things move opened up to me.
My current animation and visual effects toolbox consists of After Effects, Nuke, Maya, Cinema 4D, Mudbox and Mari. I’m now adding Motion Builder, Softimage, Houdini and Unity to the mix. My goal is to make things people can watch and enjoy, or interact with in real time – like games and augmented reality. Each tool has a specialty area that it does better than the others. Knowing a wider range of the tools, and being able to pick the right tool from an ever expanding toolbox, is exciting and nothing to avoid or fear. After all, the tool is only as good as the person using it.