Matthew Allen - Contact Report

For my design investigation i looked at the motion graphic industry, i contacted companies that i have always been inspired in and others that i found through my research. The two big compa-nies i really wanted to get in contact with were Loose Moose Productions and LaPac. I wanted to contact Lapac because of designer Xavier Chassaing’s Work which in the last couple weeks has inspired me alot and opened a new area of motion graphics to me.I wanted to contact him rather than the head art director. Before i sent my email i created a list of things i wanted to find out so when writing my email i could refer to this.

- What skills are needed- What inspires them- How briefs are put together- The team approach taken- What is collborating with other designers like- Future predictions for motion graphics

I then formatted my points into these 10 questions.

- What influenced you to work in the motion graphic industry ?- What is the usual timespan for a brief ?- What is the first thing you do when given a brief ?- When trying to get into the industry what skills do you need ?- Who do you work with directly on projects ?- What are you inspired by and who inspires you ?- What are your future predictions for this industry ?- What do you think will be he advancements in motion graphics within th next few years ?- What do you think about collaboration and what is it like working in groups for projects ?- Have you always been interested in motion graphics or was it something you moved into when starting to work in the design industry ?

My email to Xavier Chassaing was not succesful as i did not get a reply. I did not any information about the questions i asked but i did learn more about the techniques he uses through my re-search into real time special effects.

The second company i was very interested in was Loose Moose Productions that are based in Soho London. I have been interested in them for many reasons. The main reason being i like the fact they use live action and comedy into their productions and the fact they still use stop frame and one of their main processes. I was also very interested in one of their animators and illustra-tor’s David Whittle, i sent an email to him with the same ten questions and not did get a reply althought i did draw alot of inspiration from him in my final artifact.

My design investigation was a not a failure as i found alot of my answer’s in an interview* with Chris Lefakis who is the owner of Nomint Studio. From the interview i was able to answer my question (What are your future predictions for this industry) and the understanding of how a motion graphic companys works and what tools they are using.

Towards the end of the brief a friend of mine Laura Jackson who works for CreativePod in Sussex passed my questions on to a illustrator and animator, this helped me finished off my investigation by giving me answer’s that were similar to the interview with Chris Lefakis. The answer i was inter-ested in was what were her inspirations and this helped me develop my artifact.

* http://youtu.be/a6edR9nJV1M Chris Lefakis Interview.