Chris Oatley: When Jobs In The Animation Industry Disappear

This post from Chris Oatley was posted a while back, showing his views on the state of the animation industry and how to cope with the lack of jobs being on offer at the minute. There have been a lot of layoffs within the animation industry lately, and as someone who is going to be graduating in a year it's quite worrying. The people who have been laid off have been in the industry a long time so going up against someone who is far more experienced than I am is quite scary. I need to remember to keep my morale up and don't give up.

Chris Oatley brings up a point: If your dream dies, what will you do?
I can't let dips in the industry discourage myself, I have to keep striving for what I love and my passion. I've come to realise that I don't get the same enjoyment or satisfaction out of anything but animation. Animation is my drive and I'm not going to stop pursing my dream, I may be scared or nervous about not finding that job but hopefully if I keep going for it, I'll get there one day.

No, I don’t think you can guarantee success with a great attitude, hard work and persistence, but you can guarantee failure without them.

I feel like I should be able to achieve my dream, I have the motivation, persistence and I always try and work as hard as I can. It will just be a matter of time and building up experience. All I can do is just keep working and improving. Practice, practice, practice.

You have absolutely NO control over fluctuations in the economy or the waves of change in the industry.

What you DO have control over is the quality of your work, your focus, determination, passion and imagination.

If the animation industry is in a downturn, don’t go down with it.

Stay strong.

No matter what, there will always be layoffs, in any industry you go in to, you just have to remember to keep going. If there are no jobs going, make some. Create my own projects to do in my spare time, by doing something it keeps myself proactive and shows that I'm not just sitting around letting my skills go to waste. This is something I will have to consider once I graduate next year, I'll most likely be moving back home until I can find a job so in the mean time I will have to keep doing small projects to keep my skills fresh. This would also be a good time to collaborate some more with other people and produce something we really like and enjoy.