It was in 2006 or 2007 and I was talking with a friend who was animation supervisor at Rhythm and Hues, a special effects company in Los Angeles, California. He was describing how they were going to streamline and improve their animation department. "We plan," he said, "to lay off the entire department and then hire new talent fresh out of college so that we can train them all to use the same correct procedures and processes. This way we will get a better and more consistent product."
That was the moment when I knew there was no job security in the Visual Effects industry and no honor among the managers. I didn't want to believe it and I thought my talents would give me immunity from the same management philosophy, but I was wrong. When the stock market crashed in 2008, I could not find work for a year and a half. I sent out a thousand resumes to no good result.
My friend's plan must have been successful because several years later, Rhythm and Hues won an Oscar for their work on "Life of Pi." News reports that night showed mass demonstrations outside, because the company had also laid off nearly their entire staff. My friend had managed to keep his management job through the turmoil. Perhaps he was planning on hiring a new crop of animators now that his present compatriots had outlived their usefulness. I have no idea, because we no longer communicate on a regular basis.
Visual Effects and Computer Animation is an exciting and dynamic field to work in.
copyright (c) 2016
William Schaeffer
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