Make Better Effects With Thomas Harle

Today's episode is an interview Thomas Harle, a freelance VFX artist in England.  Thomas shares his experience working as a freelancing , being an educator and tutoring other students, and his YouTube tutorial series for technical advice in Unreal Engine’s material editor.

Tom's Artstation - https://www.artstation.com/thomasharle

Tom's YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzyMNIlh7lBQnIagTrEh1ZA

Tom's Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/thomas-harle-32a5b32a/?originalSubdomain=uk

RTVFX Forum - https://realtimevfx.com/

Transcript

Michel:   0:00
Hello. I'm Michelle Gang. Me and you are listening to the real time visual effects podcast where wizards reside.  

Travis:   0:12
You have a gift. You have a passion for creation. There's something inside you that wants to express itself and that something has led you to explore the world of visual effects. A place where magic happens on the only limitation is your imagination. All the greatest artists in the world started somewhere learning and growing into the people they are today. You being here is the first step to building your legacy. As an artist, I learned from the best and brightest in the real time visual effects community. Sharpen your skills and be your best self. Today's episode is an interview with Thomas Harley, a freelance, the effects artists in England. Thomas shares his experience working as a freelancer, being an educator and tutoring other students and his YouTube, Siri's for technical advice and unreal engines material With that said, Let's get started. Here is your host, Travis. Mick, Calum. Hello, everybody. I've got Thomas Harl, a vfx artist with us. He is also a tutor for escape studios. Tom, how you doing today?

Tom:   1:21
I'm good text. Yeah, How you did.

Travis:   1:22
I'm doing well, man. It's, uh, 60 degrees here in Dallas, Texas, who said it was raining over there in London,

Tom:   1:28
gray and raining here in London. Yeah, this for a change. So today

Travis:   1:32
we're going to get into what it means to be a visual effects artists and kind of like your experience are especially working at places like escaped studios. Splash damage, ubi soft can, even at rebellion. But before we get into that, how'd you get into visual effects, Tom?

Tom:   1:47
Yes. So I can't quite a strange route into the industry. So my original background was in architecture and engineering, So I did. Ah, before you musters studying these two subjects. But by the end of the degree, I kind of decided I liked making three D images of buildings more than I like designing buildings. So I kind of graduated, then knew I wanted to move into some kind of three D graphics type thing, worked for a couple of years as an engineer to saving some money and try and like, do it on my own back, and it's obviously really hard. It's a really tricky industry to get into, and then I sort of took the plunge and I went studied at skate videos where I now I'm working as a teacher and you and I did a 12 week introduction to Environment Arts. And of course, on that got me my first job rebellion, where technically I was hired as an environment artist. But after the first project I worked on was never dead, and I didn't really do any environment are it was Maur kind of setting up technical destruction and that kind of things, and then by the end of that, it's one of the other vfx artist was leaving. So there was an opportunity, and I've been working a lot with the effects team because I was setting up the destruction in engine. I was doing a lot with the sort of the particle effects and everything, and it seemed like a really cool thing to be doing in with ins off the game out space. So I asked to move across and they were happy to give me some internal training. And then that was it was a very effects artist.

Travis:   3:01
That's cool, man. So thinking about real time visual effects, what does that mean to you may be in comparison toe other areas that you've seen in visual effects.

Travis:   3:11
Yeah. So you have another sign it in, like, one word. I'm not one word. Maybe that's a little hard. One sentence?  

Tom:   3:19
Yeah. I mean, so it is so difficult because it means so much Thio. Every different projects different every different exceeded the work out. It's gonna be different, but to me it's it's dealing with constraints. It's problem solving with constraints and sometimes the problems that you're solving. How do I make this fire look, the best possibly can out. I'll make you look super realistic. But so often with the effects, the problems, things like, How do I communicate this effects to a player? How do I communicate the size of my character? Or how do I deal with my frame rate being low, like, outweigh optimized this effect? Obviously, we could go into things like Houdini, and we can rent about crazy fluid Simms and like that all looks amazing. But that doesn't necessarily work for a video game, right? It doesn't work for real time, so we have the duel of that cool, make it look amazing stuff, but also make it one make it work to make it kind of like to suit the game that we're making. So, yeah, it's it's a more We took around with the film artists at work. It's like we do everything they do, but also its 60 frames a second.

Travis:   4:13
What did you Ah, wish you had known when you got started out in visual effects?

Tom:   4:18
Yeah, I was thinking about this earlier. It's a really difficult question. Yes. I mean, my career is gone pretty well, like I'm really happy where ended up. I'm really happy with the things that I've done. I think, realistically the biggest, sort of like if I could go back and tell myself kind of like question would be the just that hard work pays off. There's a couple of years when I was working, the engineer and I was given my nights and weekends overtime to doing three D, and I wasn't sure it was gonna happen, if you know what I mean. I was like I just wasn't good enough. I wasn't have didn't have the time to do both full time job and the study, but the sacrifice is worth it. You put the time in. And yeah, like if you put the hours in, you can get

Travis:   4:50
I'm just curious when you say, put in the hours and kind of sacrifice. What is that? Life? Look Flight for you in that time period, you go off four hours of sleep a night or something or

Tom:   5:00
no, I mean, I wasn't over that, but like my craft on my weekends, we had finished work on a Friday. I'd maybe go out and have a quick drink with some friends, but then gets the computer work or leaning, said they mostly work. And then, like, Sunday, maybe at you go out, do some grocery reason and, like, they're kind of real life stuff. But when I was giving a lot of evenings a lot of weekends up to be working on three D things

Travis:   5:21
I personally struggle with staying disciplined and focused in on my task, especially when I get out of my day job. Do you have any kind of life hacks or things to stay on task, not be distracted,

Tom:   5:33
So I get a lot of stick this for my students at the moment, so I still listen to the radio. I'll have a radio show that I like this like two hours long and I'll just get home and I'll stick it on and that's it. And that's my kind of work time. And it doesn't matter how productive you are in those two hours. If you have a really bad day and you just kind of like you're dancing around and go on the Internet or whatever, that's fine, because you're gonna do it the next day if you know what I mean. So but there's a two hour time slot every running when you get home, when it's work time, and then that over time after weeks and months like that kind of two hours a day adds up. But But having it kind of like regimented and kind of like set aside with this radiation was my kind of like time tracker. I found that really helpful, that friend that worked and you went over working because it's very easy if you get into something you could like. Oh, I could do five or six hours of an evening on this, but other things suffer like you say you could, like, run out of sleep like you kind of are having a social interaction with your with Your friends are so two hours a day to that side. Nice radio show off an album that you really like something like that, just so that it's sort of a marked period of

Travis:   6:25
time. That's good habit building techniques. Yeah, so right now, what do you most curious about? What's got your interest in your attention right now?

Tom:   6:35
The things that really liked it push more into, obviously with Niagara Niagara's. That's the big kind of tent pole like this is the thing that's coming, Or is it here yet? Is it coming? Still is it? Don't quite know. I haven't had much time to dig into it. I did look a little when it first came out, but it was still in that kind of experimental and have not quite ready for you stage. But just like, how much is that gonna change? Not just the work that I do, but like the course of the tea, like the power that that's gonna kind of a gifted artist in the industry. And that's

Travis:   7:01
what we'll tell our our listeners. Maybe what Niagara is just to give some

Tom:   7:06
contracts. So in the end real engine. There are now two different particle systems or particle editors. One of them is called Cascade. It's been around for a very long time. Back on riel. I think it's the original particle editors like Unreal one. I've been using it for a very long time as well, and it's incredibly powerful, like it's very feature full. You can do all sorts of things, whether it's been extended in over the years. But it's also like it's finicky, right? There's things that a buggy of bird at this, things that don't work that well, some of the you wise, really difficult. Having been teaching Cascade now for a few years, it's a real nightmare, like a the improvements you could make that part of the software, just with a little bit of few I improvement would be. It would be huge, but obviously on real or ethnic been focusing on their new editors. So that's Niagara. It's using the same kind of kind of dichotomies, and it's still marginal. Based is still stacked based, but it also has a huge amount of extra functionality, so you can bring data and from other sources you can build instances so you can have reusability and it just have extends that that of the power that the capacity of what the effects editor can do so much. But at the same time, you have to ask Is it worth a pound? Yes. So I mean it sze a whole new kind of like engine A whole new system within real time effects within unreal that I just haven't quite had time to get my hands on him play with yet. So

Travis:   8:16
So if we have anybody from Epic definitely put some editorials and teach us newbies about it and get it is in production so we can start using that. That sounds really

Tom:   8:25
Yeah, Well, that's that's kind of what I'm going for, I think. Is that like I'm sure when Nigris finally gonna be released to production ready, there's gonna be a huge about push from it because they do do that right. They do a lot of life streams, and there's a bit of data right now, but I think when I try it, it's good it before it was just kind of missing a few features and like I've seen that the U. S. Changed a lot and you don't get to involves in working with a new piece of software until it's ready, just cause everything can change. And so, yes, there soon.

Travis:   8:49
Yeah, absolutely. So can you tell us? Ah, we hear a lot about success stories, but we know there's opportunities to learn from failures. So I'm just curious if there's any been any failures or struggles or challenges that you've had through your own career that you've learned from and you can kind of impart some that wisdom toe.

Tom:   9:06
Yeah, I mean, I was thinking about this Western allies. Well, it's a bit tricky with into the flight, the professional space. There's such a support network around you that it's quite rare. I mean, we all make mistakes. Seven makes mistakes. Everything goes wrong occasionally, But like you've got your colleagues and you've got your lead and you've got your team lead. And you, quite the director, is it just got so many kind of extra people around you supporting you that big mistakes tend not to happen. I will say so. I'm actually ah, colorblind. And so a couple of times I've had some problems with color in my work, so I very famously made a greeting fire because, like it was, it was kind of like on that, you know, we kind of side of you. And I just sort of like Okay, yeah, that's that's what looks good to me. And it turned green in the whole game. Just had green fire in it for about a week. And everyone is a bit like, Why is this happened? Work on my art director. He didn't know you came up to me. Was like, Why is that the fire Agree? Nice like, Oh, is it okay? And he looked at me Was like, You color blind. And I'm like, Yes, yes, I am. And like, just from then on, like, we just double checked all the color work that I did, I ask my colleagues like I already knew, but, like, I'm pretty good about making sure that color pick and double check my color works. But this from that point onwards, everything that ideally became a bit of a running Derek. It was fine, but everything had to be double checked in. But the people surrounding me and people supporting me to do that and help me through that there was a pink son once is well, so I mean, like, yeah, my color work Maybe could be a little bit better, but But it's it's fine. That's people who can help me with that.

Travis:   10:20
Totally. When you're actually looking at the work of others. What are some things that you are looking at to help them help improve their work?

Tom:   10:28
Yeah. I mean, this is the really open ended difficult question as well. Like it so depends on everything, if you know what I mean. Like they did. My seon said, Escape like they'll have questions. And so it's kind of like how many polyglot understood this Model B? And the answer is it depends, right? Because it's the same model used in different ways that give it say, Well, game probably won't speak with a low number. If it's Triple A game, obviously can be a high number if it's gonna be a cinematic, and maybe that's front of. Cameron wants to be even higher. If it's the main character like you take something like a chair. There is no way amount of polygons for a chair, and it's the same every effects, like people say. Okay, well, What's the kind of like what's Texas sized? This beast? I don't know. And then you break it down into what's the important part of it? So if you're talking about something like a fire effect, obviously if you're going for realistic or stylized, all the timing, the motion that color, all these things is a really important, just that kind of effect. But then, if you look at someone's work and they're doing more environmental effect, they're doing some dust in the air. We're kind of like then it's more about making a mood, and it's one of the things that's really great about the effects is that we get to do everything we get to do a little bit of like high impact, fast destruction staff. We get to do a little background, things we get to make kind of water and fire. You know what I mean? There's so much in everything. So what you're looking for in each piece of work really depends, like if it's an impact fact, it's about that kind of like timing. If it's a yeah, water effective, it's about realism. So, yeah, it's a difficult question to answer.

Travis:   11:45
Has there been maybe in effect, that you've worked on recently

Tom:   11:49
What? That I've been picked, clean, kind of proud of. Ah, like I

Travis:   11:53
was thinking in terms of, like, what? Your thought process When was when you were putting it together and getting it out? Amount of that process?

Tom:   12:01
Yes. I mean, I've been working on a few fire things for the meal marketplace in the moment, and it's just kind of trying to get that balance between kind of the speed of the effect that the motion trying to get something that has obviously we used reddit of flip books and looping, but also trying to break that up in some way, either with some settings and cascade or just trying to push the the realism to it, really focusing on some reference kind of getting those little kind of flicks and and deep diving. I think sometimes people have a tendency to look at effect or like a reference or something, and then they were kind of like, Okay, that works like that. They'll get them the main parts correct. I mean, they'll get the main motion of the main color, but then there's always like a little second beat details and the richness that makes it feel like alive or makes it feel kind of so difficult with effects because there's some kind of concepts that don't go into words. But you know what I mean? There's that feeling of kind of like Oh, yeah, that really has that kind of like niceness to it.

Travis:   12:51
Yeah, absolutely. And I see oftentimes different visual effects artists of different approaches and going into it and kind of like how you pointed out. If it's real life versus stylized, you may start with concept, are kind of like draw it all out, or you may just grab reference photos and kind of base it off of whatever that stock footage is. Yeah, it is very ambiguous. And it's it's yeah, personal taste.

Tom:   13:15
Yeah, No, I think so, definitely. And, like I mean and style as well, Like I mean, I think the more you make, the more you kind of like put your own spin on it. Obviously, when you talk about kind of cartoonists, cartoonists like they have their own style, do things. And so I think you could look at some of the effects, especially when you've been working with your colleagues for quite a while. You're looking at me like Oh, yeah, that's definitely a so and so is effect. Because, like, you can see their little fingerprint in something about it. So

Travis:   13:35
cool, man. Cool. So excuse what? Some trends that you're seeing out in the industry right now. What's catching your eye in the news?

Tom:   13:42
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, one of the new techniques that came out not so long ago, but, like, I think it may be getting a little bit overused. It's the sort of the GPU particle style effect. You know what I mean by that? Like where you just have lots of tiny little dots. So for a long time, cats Kate All right? Yeah.

Travis:   13:58
Mark Hughes, GPU Nowadays, that's graphical processing unit. So it's like your graphics card.

Tom:   14:04
Yes, basically. So in in computer graphics. So you've got your your CPU. That's the brain that's doing all the thinking. And then you've got your GP utes, the kind of the drawing partners that rendering things to the screen gp user really fast, doing the same thing, really simple calculations, but really faster than a lot off them. And so what we can do now as a few years ago is we can move the particle simulation off onto the GPU, and for a long time we were really limited in how many sprites we could have on screen just cause they were all taking a lot brainpower of CPU time to calculate. So by moving them off under the GPU, suddenly you can have thousands or millions of particles. But there's not that many realistic effects that have millions of particles in them. And it's kind of I think they've been, at least you know what I mean. Like suddenly there's this toy that they can use this really powerful and sometimes it's really cool. But also, sometimes I think maybe getting over used a little bit or kind of like isn't necessarily the right tool for the job. Just kind of like these big clouds of dots. It looks cool, but it doesn't necessarily work for the effect all the time, in my opinion. Islamic sense.

Travis:   15:01
Okay, got you kind of moving into more specifically toward what you're doing right now. You're working as a freelancer and you've worked to some other studios. A swell when you think about your visual effects process. What is it like being a freelancer?

Tom:   15:16
Yeah, well, I mean, so it might set up a bit of a strange one, and I kind of like a teeth part time on that takes up about 50% of my capacity, and then I have some assets available in the marketplace, which is kind of like, kind of a background freelance job. So if I don't have any other work, then I'll work on something new for that And this kind of an ongoing I'm never completely out of work and then freelance walls as they come and go L d kind of like short bursts of intense work on a project. Yeah. I mean, if the freedom of being kind of mine in Boston work between this very difference of subject matters is really nice. Yeah, I mean it with the freelance work versus studio. I think I work on my own, so I mean, it's it's a work from home gig, and so it tends to be much Maur kind of like you, obviously talking to the client. But you're more bringing solutions to the client, So there's less of that creative process within the development of the work, if that makes sense. So like, if we had a problem on a game and we've got five question team of effects artists, we're gonna sit down. We're gonna discuss it we're going to gether on. There's a bit of that with this of client relationship with freelance, but it's more you kind of bring solutions as options, as opposed to when you're working in a studio in a team, you've got Mork kind of capacity toe to communicate and come up with solutions together.

Travis:   16:26
So I'm curious, like in the studio environment, at least oftentimes studios may have as little as one visual effects artist and sometimes teams. So when it comes to maybe in the team environment, how do you all kind of like divvy up the work and decide who's working on what?

Tom:   16:41
Yeah, I mean again, it depends a lot on the on the individual projects, but mostly it comes down to what your Spencer will be worked on. Gears Ultimate. We had a team of 45 effects artists that the whole thing and it was just one guy had a really good background with weapons and blood, and instead of gameplay. Will it effect? So he took all the gameplay effects, and I've got quite a lot of stimulation. Backgrounds up, big, rigid body. Seems in my asshole winds up taking on most of that work. And so there was obviously time when things move, but it was that kind of communication, so we kept things pretty fluid. But the people who had more skill in a certain area or possibly wanted to work in that area. So if you wanted to improve your skills, you said try and negotiate that that was the work that you wanted to do. Yeah, And then you'd have to say your lead And you are director, and then, obviously the requirements of the projects of the deadlines. So sometimes it's just gonna like, Okay, we've got a flask need to do this. This needs to be done by the weekends, right? He's got capacity. Jump on in there. Says to be a real mix of purchase.

Travis:   17:34
Cool man. Cool. So I'm just curious the transition that you had from being an environmental artist to visual effects. What was that like?

Tom:   17:44
So it kind of didn't really ever happen, to be honest. So Although technically I was hired as an environment artist, my first role was on again. Couldn't never did. It was game with a fully destructive environment was all part of the game play, so I never actually made any assets for that game. I just took things that people would be made and straight them. So I was breaking up things with various bro and I shattering tools like making not rigid body Simms because we're using an engine physics but taking pieces and kind of fracturing them and then setting them up so that everything in the game has certain health value and then you could have staged destruction. And so, by the way, was technically part of the environment team. I wasn't actually doing in moment art on Venice. I was fine with that. Like I enjoy the technical challenges. I've got quite technical backgrounds and it's good to be working with the effect. It was also it was a position that no one else wanted, and so I got to be kind of everyone likes well, one would come to me with help with the specific to system that we had and it was so integrated. The game that it was kind of everywhere. So I got to meet everyone and worked really closely with the Dean. And then, at the end of the role, I moved on to the Sniper elite series, and I was asked to make a kind of on one of the planes as a reward for having all my hard work doing technical stuff and no artwork. But that was the same time I could have asked to move into the effects anyway. So So I think everybody ever made one proper over here came as a Roman artist and then every kind of straight into into technical and re effect will. So it wasn't so much as a transition that I've always been doing affects. I know we

Travis:   19:02
were talking earlier about what it's like being a visual effects artists and freelance, But for those that want to take the lead into freelancing, they're already working in the studio. What's, um, maybe advice or thoughts that you have for making that jump and what? Yeah,

Tom:   19:16
yeah, I mean, I kind of sort of fell into it, Really. It's a tricky one, because that when I started out, like the support Network I had came from the marketplace effects that I had. So I made a few things and then, like, I had a little sort of trickle income coming from that which you gave me as a support. But unfortunately, I think that the marketplace hasn't quite got the same kind of capacity that he used to like. I kind of got into the right time, so well, I definitely coming with people to make things for marketplace. If that's something they were interested in, there isn't quite the same, yeah, capacity within the marketplace to support people in the way it used to be. So I'm not just saying Don't that compete with me because it's my place. Get out? No, but it's more kind of like having some

Travis:   19:56
Yeah, I've read the report on the marketplace. Sometimes people are like, This is terrible. Don't buy this stuff. Don't Don't ever go to this person and then sometime Yeah, well, give me my money back. I

Tom:   20:08
mean, I've had a few people asking for refunds, but there's definitely a problem with piracy. And like, I don't know, I just kind of air my debt. You don't do too much, but like there's Stephanie, You can go toe websites and you can see how many kind of like downloads have been done that obviously you're not getting any money from, and I like it fine. It's a part of the industry. It's just how any kind of digital media. So he's gonna work. But I think maybe there could be a bit more done to maybe prevent that a little bit. I don't know. It's tricky, but did a good thing with freelancing like from what I hear is always this kind of not knowing where the next paycheck comes from. But because I had enough work set up through the marketplace, I kind of always in with the next paycheck. What was that meant? That I had a bit more freedom, sort of like be a bit more picky about what jobs I picked in that kind of thing. So, yeah, it's a difficult one because, like, I think my process or my my kind of transition into freelance has been very untypical and so I wouldn't want to give some advice to people that maybe doesn't work for first of the standard approach, but but maybe any other thing is find a part time job as well. If you've got some experience in the industry and we're always looking for more people in education, I mean here in London. But, like, I know from a lot of the other schools around the world being able to work part time one or two days a week with the school, it gives you a really nice, steady income are really rewarding kind of work environment to be in. And so keeping your income streams broad and separate means that if you're just freelancing and you lose a gig, suddenly, you know, real difficult position. Whereas if you've got two or three different things going on, maybe it's okay.

Travis:   21:32
Yeah. And a lot of the schools, at least here in Dallas, they have games, programs, but they may be spend Maybe a week tops on visual effects, and they just move on to other areas. So I only see a demand for a visual effects artists in teaching. Yeah. No, definitely. You also do education for vfx artist on your YouTube channel, and I was wondering if you tell us a little bit about that.

Tom:   21:56
Yeah, so that kind of started completely by accident. I've been working for escape, So I've been I've been making some videos for work, and so I kind of got used to the idea of sitting in front of a computer and talking through what I was doing and a while back for them. I, uh, have a live webinars based around U V S and techniques from that. Basically, someone had messaged me or the message escape and come back to me asking some questions about this. And I was like, Okay, well, I'll answer your questions, but you kind of need images and then made some images to send to them, and I was like, Well, actually, it still doesn't really explain it very well. I'd rather just kind of talked to them. So I just recorded a quick video and I put it on YouTube, and I kind of just meant for it to be direct to that one person who asked that question. But luckily, 80 level, the industry website picked up the fact that I had done this and kind of publicized it for me. And so to this day, it's still one of the most viewed videos I've got, partly because it was the 1st 1 but partly because it got so much of the traffic from a sea level. And I was like, Yeah, this is quite fun. I quite like giving something back. Kind of. People come with me with questions, and it's like I can explain it in 10 15 minutes and you really need a video to sort of make these kind of like explanations. Obviously, this thing's on the discord. People ask questions and like you communicate quickly three texts, but it doesn't really communicate properly if you know what I mean. So So, yes. So I started putting every year every couple of weeks, and it works really well with teaching the idea. So we had a couple of students for struggling with specific topics, and it just meant that I could really spend time with them in class. But I could also just, like, spend the time on the weekend to make a quick video, and then it was there for them to kind of like you're over multiple times and I could share that information between the different classes that teach, and so they kind of like the teaching work that I do escape feeds back into the YouTube general, and that feeds back into escape. It's quite a nice kind of little step, and hopefully, I mean, I've been a little bit busy with work at the moment, so I haven't done any new videos yet this year. But I'm gonna get going back to part time Teaching soon and tryinto have expand that a bit more than 20. A few more videos?

Travis:   23:41
Yeah, as a nun, really user. I find the material editor is a beast toe learn. So I often reference your technical videos, especially on UV distortion, because I keeps it ingrained in my head. So, really, to see those effects is a

Tom:   23:58
bit like that. It's kind of like you need tohave. There's so many, like a little techniques that will completely independent from other techniques and use it once. And then you kind of like six months later you're like, Oh, yeah, there was a thing that I could do and how did I do that? And like, it's It's funny, So I've actually referenced own videos before. We have kind of like, I know I did this before. I can't remember how I did it and I went back and I We watch something that I done to remind myself of what I should have already known. But you don't use a technique for a year, and then you go back like I know where it was. So I mean, I'm learning from my own video Aces. Wells. That's helped.

Travis:   24:28
So you started tutoring at escape videos? What is tutoring look like?

Tom:   24:32
So the original. So I I did my course there myself. We're back in 2010 and at the time it was just environment on, and that was that was great. I really enjoyed my course. And then a few years ago, the head of games got in touch and they just wanted to ask me, kind of like my sort of curious story. Could they use me on their Web site? Is this a testimonial? And I was like, Yeah, cool when we started talking back and forth and they were just kind of looking to expand the games course at the time, And so they asked me really to get involved, right? The course content Justin feedback on kind of like the curriculum instead of one thing led to another, and so ended up teaching a couple of weeks of the first class that we're using the curriculum that I'd helped shape and I really enjoyed it. And so I could have picked up a few more hours. And so the main thing I've been doing, we actually do degree level education now. So we do the master's degree. It's a stating week of tuition. So 12 weeks are done by when my colleagues first and they do everything from mobile basic modelling text a ring we go to substance. We get into baking lady, you sort of like a small mobile project and then ah, amore kind of like Triple A stale dia Rama on Dhe. Then they come to me and we do so. The part of the course is called Advance Team Andi Effects, and about half of it is Morgana. Four. I would call the more advanced game art stuff's still environment art, but it's Maur animated materials or, well, position offsets leaders stuff like that stuff that's not necessarily definitely re effects, but it's also a little bit more in that advanced end of environment art. And then we do simulations and cascade particles. Andi yeah, it's pretty good. Pretty small class sizes. So most we've had was nine different classes, collects ex students, but you get to know them really well. And we do. It's a full time office environment, so it's dental four every day, me standing in front of the computer, telling them how to do some of the things that I know how to do. So it's pretty, Yeah.

Travis:   26:11
So this is all on site inside the classroom, right?

Tom:   26:15
Yes, Yeah, yes. Oh, it's so we've got a couple of floors of a big office building in central London and we're expanding. I mean, this came two days that we

Travis:   26:22
have any, like people living in London who wanted to sign up for one of your classes. How would they do that? Are you Do you have any vacancies? Just curious.

Tom:   26:30
Yes, way was to always taking new TBD too short courses a year on. That's the master style that I am involved with. We want to do three programs, so we have underground. Yet we do three year undergraduate in games, and then I mean escape studios does games, film compositing, animation re effects will kind of like TV and games. Media and yeah, we have officers based in central London. You just kind of coming along and apply. There's an application process. We have to, like, check that you have work scared and you go up to a set standard for you coming to our course. And yeah,

Travis:   26:58
that's cool, man school. All right, Tom, let's get into the lightning ground. These questions are fast and easy. Just like that affects what is a perfect one day Get away in Tor Kay and the surrounding area. Announce it

Tom:   27:13
right. You did not start, Tookie. So talk. He's a coastal town, so there's a beach there. But the beach is an amazing s O. I would go up to dumb or so that more National park is nearby. Sort of a more lands is wonderful, abused, And they have these little rocky outcrops that you going climb on and so just get out in the nature and and yes, when I stay hopefully innocents, we get some sun until key. But yeah,

Travis:   27:36
What video game or mobile app are using on your phone? That is the most fun. I

Tom:   27:43
have a terrible answer for this Google sheets. So I do all my planning and organizing with spreadsheets on Google sheets. And that's the thing that I use on my phone. More than any. I'm pretty organized person, I guess. Like I have a spreadsheet for kind of present ideas for my friends and family. So when it comes to Christmas, I'm like, Oh, I'll just check the spreadsheet and see what I need to buy people. So, yeah, I could go see. I mean, I played games and things on my phone, but I put a pretty high turnover. So it tends to be download something playing for a few days, you know, move on. So next of long term, consistent games there, but it'll sheets is always there

Travis:   28:13
from the secret to being good at math. Right? Okay. Yeah. What is your favorite thing? To cook or eat?

Tom:   28:22
So I mean, yeah, if everything do we Definitely. I think pizza cargo. Along with a good pizza talking. I detected what toppings. Ah, ah, little meat. But not too much like always great for, like, meat feasts. And it's just like, uh, no, the top so little clique in some vegetables, onions, peppers, that kind of thing and then a stuffed quest steamboat stuff Quest.

Travis:   28:43
What is your favorite book or podcasts you've listened to recently?

Tom:   28:47
Yeah, I listen to quite little podcasts, kind of like their. They walked to work in back and try and keep a kind of a near total what the industry is doing. So just unless of consumer sized listen, Thio, the Creighton crowbar, which is a bunch of British ex game deaf or ex getting journalists, some of whom have moved into game, does just talking about the games they played in reviewing things. And that's that pretty good. And then also another podcast called cortex, which is by a few tubers. Andre, listen to this a lot longer than I've been doing YouTube. But there's talking about their experiences, either with YouTube or with, like, productivity, so kind of like how they used time tracking and that kind of systems. And I started listening to that about the same time I went freelance. That's quite nice question. Quite useful things in there, just like howto approach running your own business.

Travis:   29:27
Yeah, favorite videogame visual effects you're jealous of that isn't your own Yeah, so I think this is

Tom:   29:33
like a specific effect, but there's a there's a technique that I have not used that would really love Thio tryout. And that's the There's emotion directors. So frame blending most directors. I don't if you've seen this, but Clement Lazar popularized it on has some great breakdowns on these websites. But basically, the idea is to use an individual flow map between the frames of your flip book. And so you get a really smooth kind of like explosion from a very small number or a relatively small number of frames on the floor Map kind of gives you this nice kind of process as the flame blends from one to the next on. Yeah, I don't I think it would be it Great. Powerful technique is very cool, but I've never had Thio Expo in my own works. I collect it if that one day

Travis:   30:11
right. I think I'm really Simon has a tutorial on YouTube, kind of breaking down the creation of ah flip book in Slate. And then he takes it in tow. Unreal and kind of maps. A floor map to it. Yeah. Sorry. A motion vector

Tom:   30:25
in motion back. Yeah, I think it's to name a powerful technique, but since I've seen it. I've never really had a chance to do any big explosions.

Travis:   30:32
Best advice for a first time visual effects artists or people looking to get into the industry?

Tom:   30:37
Yeah, I think. Focus on like I mean, hard work pays off like, you know, you say, That's all my students. The more you put in, the more hours you do, the better you're gonna get. The better your chances of getting employed on you can't bypass it. There's no short cuts to just like hard work, unfortunately, but don't be afraid. Thio. Focus on something. The thing that you find the thing that you're really interested in, whether that's traitors with its simulations, if its environment, whether it's sculpting or kind of like textures or like lighting is it like, well, building like the the industry? Although it's small and difficulty it into, it also has this capacity. Within it for special ISMs are specialists. And if you're if you're really interested in like Richie body simulation and just doing destruction, you can do that. And as a first sort of like way in having that thing that you're really well practiced in the or really focus done, I think helps.

Travis:   31:23
Cool, man. What are you most excited about with the future of visual effects?

Tom:   31:27
Yeah, So we're definitely getting to a point now where? I mean, two years ago, Ray tracing was as a pipe dream. And then when you go rape, you tracing was a tech demo. And then a year ago, like now, kind of like Ray. Tracing is a thing you could do. You could just send it on. You can go out and buy a commercial grade hardware like the first tech demos, the GDC one like $40,000 worth of hardware. No one can afford that. Where's then the ones? A year later, we won $1000 graphics card, Which is it Expensive. But it's still consumer create. And I think that kind of like that dedication in that approach is going to start being focused on effects stuff as well. So we've seen things like M Bridge in the real time fluids, solving things specifically the middle where specifically targeted at getting real time be effects. And just if that's working with real time fluid. Simms, then how long is it gonna be before we have real time fluid? Simms kind of an engine and you see things like flex lm let the in video, Perkins. And so there is a LL This kind of like periphery of, like, cool tech Demo is happening, but never quite made it into, like a real video game here on. And I think that's the next step when we start getting all of these real time solutions that we've been using offline for a long time. But we'll start being able to use them actually at one time, and that'll be super impressive.

Travis:   32:35
Awesome. What question do you never get asked that you wish you were asked more often

Tom:   32:40
like actually, how do we do this or like, What do you think of this so often? Especially with my students. But like with everyone in the industry, the only way you improve is by getting feedback on your work. And that's what we're here for, the people who have been in the industry for a long time, the people who are doing educational stuff, we want to help. We want to make your work better. So people, I think, quite scared so that people get really sort of like protective or embarrassed or you know what I mean? Like that they don't want to share their work because I don't think it's good enough and, like, maybe it's not. But how else is it gonna get better unless you share your work? So So just kind of like being reached out Maur to kind of like, yeah, for feedback and for help what we're here for, it's what we want to do.

Travis:   33:16
Totally any final thoughts or things you wanna plug, maybe share your freelance Web site or some resource U

Tom:   33:23
s. I mean, so everything that's about me online ysl that tlv effects dot com. So I've got links there to my YouTube. My personal work licks my marketplace things. I've got some reference videos that I still on gum road for like, five bucks. That's like 500 hours or 500 videos. I can't member of this little 12th reference videos that I do my YouTube channel like hopefully, I'm gonna be spending some more time on that on people. Do you have kind of like topics that they're struggling with or they'd like to know more about then please. Yeah. You sent me an email. I'll try and spend a little video focusing on it because the first right and you're probably not the only person struggling. And so why not ask someone? Get that self just for your own sake, but also helps everyone have a whole industry. You help so security. So

Travis:   34:01
cool, Man. Thanks so much, Tom, for taking the time to talk with us today. Really appreciate it? No. My pleasure. Hey, guys, I hope you enjoyed listening to Thomas Harley's interview as much as I enjoyed talking with him has so much to offer to the community. And I really encourage you to jump on his YouTube channel like some of his videos, and subscribes to keep up with some cool technical techniques and tricks that he's throwing out at us. Speaking of subscribing, I really want to encourage you to subscribe to this podcast and go in and provide some feedback and ideas or topics that maybe you want to explore here with the real time to your next piece. There's so much that I want impart on you to learn and grow its community. Reach me at Travis McCall of 86 at gmail dot com, or feel free to hit me up on discord or in our TV FX forums, have you Here? Our next episode is gonna be with Nicholas Sebert, also known as Jenga Ex. He's creating a new movement for real time simulations for different types of effects. And it's gonna be super cool. Kind of hear all this cool stuff that there. Anyways, you guys rock on, I'll see you next upset.