Contacting Practitioners

Through email and LinkedIn I have made some progress in contacting practitioners who are involved within the animation industry.

First I tried making contact with Powerhouse Animation Studio (based in Austin Texas) and The Line Animation Studio (based in London). The only reply I received was from Sam Taylor at the Line, who can only tell me about their podcasts where some of my questions can be answered. However, he hasn't informed me about possible opportunities within the animation industry.

Despite this I have been able to connect to Sam on LinkedIn plus various other practitioners within animation industries:

- Sam Taylor, Director, Producer, Cofounder, The Line Studio

- Aya Suzuki, Animation Director at Passion Pictures, Walt Disney Animation

- Serah Vieira, Artistic Recruiting Manager at Disney Animation Television

- Thomas Romain, Creator, Designer, Art Director in Japanese Animation and Game Industry, Statelight Inc.

- Eric Calderon, Producer at Warner Bros. Animation

- Koichi Noguchi, Produder at Toei Animation Co.

- Ian Wasseluk, Director at Warner Bros. Entertainment Group of Companies

- Mitsuru Yoshida, Animator at Toei Animation Co.

- Peter Dodd, Animator at The Line Studio
- Clinton J Priest, Story Supervisor at Brown Bag Films
- Nick Clackett, Lead Toon Boom Harmony Animator at Brown Bag Films
- Finbar Coyle, Character Designer at Brown Bag Films
- Adventurous Minds LLC, Animation Studio
- Karl Doran, Founder and Creative Director FLOW Creative
- Yogesh Batra, Senior Animator at Anima Vitae

Hopefully I will be able to make further contact with these practitioners and/or look for more connections other than The Line Studio.
However, communication has proved to be difficult since, despite having messaged all of these practitioners on LinkedIn, I haven't received much feedback.

I also made contact with the Studio Adventurous Minds, a studio who like Powerhouse Animation Studio are also located in America (Arizona).
The following email I received from them:

These contacts makes me more conscious of how my style of work relates to the studio.
Even when my style has a variety and I use a combination of many styles I need to express that a lot more within the work I show case to these studios.
I also need to be more persistent and regularly message people within the animation industry.
The same goes for looking at available jobs shown on LinkedIn and try to apply for as many as I can which involve an animation role (if not story telling and character design).

This is what I plan to do once graduated to hopefully move forward in the animation industry.
As well as building upon my animation skills I will try to communicate more with the connections I have made, if not make more connections.
Building upon my animation skills and creating new and more improved animations and illustrations (e.g. character designs/poses) will help me to present myself as a creative individual.
I can then show work similar to the style of a studio I wish to communicate with, not just show my best animation which might not blend with their style. However, I wish to show that I am capable of using multiple or a combination of styles, especially the use of combining western and eastern styles. I regularly watch Japanese animation as my inspiration for stunning animation and meaningful storytelling.
This is why I am hopeful a Japanese studio like the one I mentioned in my list of practitioners, Toei Animation Co., would be great for me.