Matthew Roberts

Where I want to go / Post M.A.

In summary (bullets):

• Aim for work as a commercials director
• Would like to work for a production company
• work my way up
• will freelance to earn money if full time role not immediately available

The skills I have gained over the past 5 years whilst I have been in education (in addition to the 15 years I previously spent producing music), will be combined with my focused study of narratives in my the second part of my M.A.

I would like to use these skills to direct commercials, information films, guides and visual essays. 

I believe that the skill-set for creating these type of works are analogous. Storytelling techniques and clarity of communication in both short films and commercials can deliver information rapidly and succinctly, and is well suited to the technological era.

Recent figures show that despite the huge uptake in Internet use (especially via mobile devices), television has not suffered. The bigger TV shows fully embrace social media (for example, in news media, social events, reality television). The combination of both these markets is massive.

In a world where there are vast choices of TV channels and Internet outlets (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube etc), there is a great need for quality content. The customer has never had so many choices, and they want great quality, which includes commercials.

This same theory also applies to the Internet. Life is finite. No one wants to see poor quality content, they want to be informed, entertained and excited. This requires strong creative ideas, good scriptwriting, strong design, inventiveness and good execution.

This is what I plan to do. Create great content, for the masses. This will happen via television and the Internet. I don’t think that this will happen immediately.

Malcolm Gladwell famously says that it takes 10,000 hours to become a master of anything. That’s 5 years, with 4 weeks off per year. The second part of my M.A. was 400 hours, and the greater part of things I undertook were new to me.

The creation of good motion graphics requires strong graphic design, illustration, animation and creative/writing skills, plus it helps to be good with audio.

n.b. I made music prior to returning to education. This is useful. I then did a graphic design undergraduate degree, which its obviously useful in motion graphics. I DID NOT study animation. This means that I have and continue to be self-taught. Animation takes up a lot of my time; there is simply a huge amount to learn. This is where the bulk of my time went in part 2 of my MA. Trail and error, testing, searching, failing.

I see myself spending some time, three or 4 years learning in the field. Learning by doing. This would ideally involve gaining full-time employment at a production company. If this is not immediately available, I will undertake any freelance work I can get (as a graphic designer, writer, motion designer etc) and work on personal projects to get further to this objective and build a stronger portfolio.