Career Plan Report

Career Plan Summary Report

Introduction

This report analyses and defines my career plan looking at my current experience, desired employment sector, desired job roles, entry requirements, application materials, local studios and opportunities and future developments. This summarises the detailed exploration of key elements found on my blog posts linked on my Introduction to the Animation Industry (Lawson-Hall, 2025a) blog page. It highlights the developments already made to my C.V., demo reels and portfolio websites. It also summarises my plan for the next module and how I plan to develop my skills further to improve my employability.

Current Experience

I have 3 years industry experience developing animations for video games at Eutechnyx. I worked on titles such as NASCAR The Game: Inside Line (2012) and Warhammer 40,000: Storm of Vengeance (2014). Since leaving Eutechnyx in 2014 I studied a Post Graduate Certificate in Secondary Education and taught Art and Design in secondary schools for 2 years. I currently work for Sunderland College teaching games, animation and VFX skills and courses from level 3 to level 6. Furthermore, across the period of 2014 to present I’ve engaged in a range of freelance opportunities for a range of companies and projects such as Zerolight, Armor Games, Erasmus+, NextGen Skills Academy, Warner Brothers Discovery and Aim Awards: Qualification and Assessment group. Further to this, I’ve worked as an artist, animator and Bizdev to develop an independent game, ‘Squishy Sports’, in collaboration with a programmer.

Career Next Steps

This section collates my research and exploration of my next steps in my career that I have explored in detail on my blog (Lawson-Hall, 2025a). I currently have a range of experience across the games industry and education sectors; however, I am keen to shift from education back into industry as my next career move. I love the creative and technical fusion that animation provides and whilst teaching is creative, I’d like to progress my career to a role where I am exercising my creatively more frequently through animation production. Furthermore, working in industry would update my industry knowledge to a more current level since I have been working in education for a significant period.

Desired Employment Sector

I’m focussed on achieving work in the games industry. A detailed analysis of this decision to work in the games industry can be found in my blog post Finding Work in the Animation Industry (Lawson-Hall, 2025g) and this section of the report will summarise this exploration.

The primary driving factor in this is that in my local area there are significantly more games studios compared to animation studios, therefore there is more opportunity for work. However, since the COVID-19 pandemic an increasing number of studios advertise remote roles, therefore there is the opportunity to work globally. Despite this, many studios adopt a ‘hybrid-model’ that requires some attendance into the office. This would not stop me applying for these roles; however, I would need to explore what kind of hybrid model might be feasible.

Furthermore, I would also be keen to develop my career in a way that blends both freelance and education. This would serve as a ‘best-of-both-worlds’ career development and would enable me to work in both industries to keep my knowledge and skills current and impart that onto students. There are several challenges to this idea. Firstly, securing work can be time consuming process, particularly in the beginning, however, an animation recruiter can ease this process for you as explored in my blog post Making the Best Use of Animation Recruiters (Lawson-Hall, 2025h). Secondly, education is a demanding profession, and it could be challenging to juggle the stresses of this role with the demands of tight timeframes from a freelance project. Nevertheless, my experience in both sectors would serve me well and both roles could act in symbiosis to better one another.

Desired Job Roles

I’m interested in working as an animator, technical animator or roles that require knowledge of both skillsets. A detailed analysis of this decision to pursue these job roles can be found in my blog post Introduction to the Animation Industry (Lawson-Hall, 2025b) and this section of the report will summarise this exploration.

The role of animator interests me because I love bringing characters to life to convey their actions. Within game animation I love creating animation systems that use an array of loops and sequences to construct complex behaviour that is triggered by the player. Secondly, I have the most professional experience working as an animator for Eutechnyx and all my current practical experience has focussed on pushing the boundaries of the quality of character animation I can produce. My animation work I’ve produced in the past year is visually stronger than the work I produced at Eutechnyx. This can be seen in my current demo reels 3D Character Performance Animation Demo Reel (Lawson-Hall, 2025p) and 3D Animal and Creature Animation Demo Reel (Lawson-Hall, 2025q) compared to my 3D Game Animation Demo Reel (2014) (Lawson-Hall, 2025r) when I left industry.

The role of technical animator interests me due to the problem solving and technical concepts it utilises. This role requires programming skills to produce complex rigs that help bring characters to life, in addition to animation skills to understand how the rig will be used. The skills for this job role are more in demand with most animation graduates wanting to work as an animator. Whilst working for Eutechnyx I did some technical animation work to rig characters, machines and vehicles, however, most of my work used software tools rather than custom tools and solutions created through programming. Therefore, during the next module I plan to create an advanced character rig that uses advanced rigging and technical animation skills such as programming. The plan for the development of these skills is outlined in my blogpost Preproduction Exploration to Prepare for Career Development in the Graduate Portfolio Module (Lawson-Hall, 2025n). This will develop my skillset and support my employability, particularly for technical animation roles that are prevalent in the games industry.

Entry Requirements

There are clear differences and similarities between the entry requirements for an Animator and a Technical Animator, however, also some similarities. There are also variations between the responsibilities for these roles between different industries. This section will summarise my findings and my blog post Finding Work in the Animation Industry (Lawson-Hall, 2025g) analyses entry requirements in more detail.

The required skills for animator job roles are predominantly focussed on high quality character animation skills to bring characters to life through mastery of the animation principles. Experience having worked in the relevant industry is advantageous and more experience is expected for more senior job roles with less experience expected for junior or entry level positions. Experience with Maya is the most desired, however, an increasing number of studios are also adopting Blender and real-time rendering solutions like Unreal Engine (Blue Zoo Animation Studio, 2024). Motion builder is also referenced, particularly with studios that use motion capture animation workflows. Furthermore, common soft skills are cited such as passion for the industry, communication, time management and collaboration skills.

The required skills for a technical animator focus on being able to produce a range of complex character rigs for a range of needs. Understanding of animation skills are always listed so that you can understand the needs of animators and produce versatile rigs for a range of needs. Scripting skills are a key difference too, so that you can build custom rigs for a range of solutions to bring bespoke characters to life. Knowledge of skinning is commonly listed as well as the ability to stay up to date with industry trends and developments. Similar software and soft skills are commonly listed across job adverts. 

The main differences between games industry compared to the animation and VFX industries with both job roles are mainly linked to software and purpose of animation/rigs produced. The games industry focusses on producing animations systems to bring characters to life through a large range of small animations and loops, whereas the animation and VFX industry focus more on production of sequences that convey storytelling elements. Stronger experience with game engines like Unreal Engine and Unity is more common on games industry job adverts, however, as mentioned earlier is becoming more common in animation and VFX job adverts. Technical animators work more extensively in the engine to develop retargeting systems to share animations across different character rigs.

Application Materials Requirements

Following on from the previous section of this report, all job roles will require you to submit a C.V. and a demo reel to demonstrate proficiency in the required skills. This section of the report summarises the work I’ve done to develop these materials to make them application ready!

C.V.

A C.V. is a common application material required for most job roles and acts as a list of academic and professional achievements. During this module I’ve been working intensely to update all my professional application materials and bring them under one clear visual brand – including my C.V.  A distinct difference for C.V.’s for the games, animation and VFX industries is the inclusion of projects you’ve been credited on and software you have experience with. The detail of my C.V. development can be found in my blog post Final Preparations For Your Animation Career (Lawson-Hall, 2025m).

The images below show my C.V., and it can be viewed in full on my website (Lawson-Hall, 2025o):

 

Overall, the development of this C.V. has been successful. I’m using consistent colours, fonts and shape styles across all application materials to build a confident personal brand. The C.V. itself is confident and demonstrates a broad array of experience across education and the games industry that positions me well to apply for job roles. The C.V. links to my portfolio website so employers can easily learn more about me and see more portfolio.

Demo Reel Development

Another essential application material is the demo reel. The purpose of this is to showcase your best work to highlight your proficiency.  In my blog post Crafting a Killer Demo Reel (Lawson-Hall, 2025i) I analyse a range of professional demo reels to inform my approach to developing my own.

To summarise my findings from my research and development there are several key factors that support the production of a quality demo reel. Firstly, reels should be between 30 seconds and 1 minute in length with your best work first. This hooks the recruiter and ensures you put your best work forward. The reel should be tailored to the job role in terms of style and content. I produced separate demo reels for animal and creatures (Lawson-Hall, 2025q), character animation (Lawson-Hall, 2025p) and 2D animation (Lawson-Hall, 2025s). This provides demonstration of the skills that are most relevant to a specific job role. Lastly, showcasing work in the context of a project or storytelling situation is stronger than animation cycles that might be out of context. When you’re working on a project you will need to convey storytelling concepts that fit into a larger project, therefore including elements of this in your reel will prove favourable.

I detail the development of my demo reels, utilising this knowledge, in my blog post Final Preparations for Your Animation Career (Lawson-Hall, 2025m). To summarise the development, I firstly revisited all my recently produced animation pieces and implemented tutor feedback to improve the quality of the pieces themselves. Next, I edited them together with the strongest pieces first. Finally, I created a contact details image that would top and tail my demo reel so that a recruiter could easily contact me directly from my reel. This is shown in the image below:

 

My demo reels can be found on my portfolio website (Lawson-Hall, 2025o) or in the videos (Lawson-Hall, 2025p, q, r, s).

Website Development

The last application material I developed was a portfolio website (Lawson-Hall, 2025o) that professionally presented myself and acted as a hub that included all my application materials. I detail the development of this in my blog post Final Preparations for Your Animation Career (Lawson-Hall, 2025m). The website hosts my demo reels, wider portfolio, about me section, C.V. and links to my blog and social media platforms. Across the development of this portfolio website, I worked hard to keep a consistent personal brand, across all my application materials, that would be memorable and recognisable for recruiters. Furthermore, across the development of this website I shared with a range of industry professionals for feedback to inform improvements so that the quality of this asset was high.

Local Studios and Opportunities

Looking ahead to the future, I’ve identified a range of local studios in the Northeast England that would be suitable for me to target applications towards. There is a vibrant games industry in the Northeast including companies like Ubisoft Reflection, Coatsink, Radical Forge and others. There is a local outsourcing art studio called Atomhawk who are producing an increasing amount of animation work. Slightly further afield in the Northwest there is a games studio Travellers Tales that produce the Lego games. These games almost bridge the animation and games industry with engaging, character performance driven cutscenes fused with traditional game animation processes. This would align with my recent skill development of character performance and past professional games industry experience. All these studios hire for animators and technical animators alike. Furthermore, with remote and hybrid working now more common in the games industry this would make this or other games studios a viable employment option for me.

Future Preparations

Lastly, this section summarises the areas I intend to focus on developing to strongly position myself to apply to the studios I identified in the previous section. The games industry is where my skills and experience are most suited to, in addition to being the most prominent industry in my local area. Recently, I have invested time in developing my animation skills with character performance, which is relevant to all animation job roles, however, I lack recent experience with 3D animation production and integration into game engines. Therefore, in the next module I plan to create a custom bipedal character rig using advanced rigging tools such as scripting, bring this character to life through a gameplay animation system that results in a playable character controller and an animated cutscene in the most recent version of Unreal Engine.

These developments will boost my skills and portfolio for both the roles of animator and technical animator. In my blog post Preproduction Exploration to Prepare for Career Development in the Graduate Portfolio Module (Lawson-Hall, 2025n) I explain a more detailed plan for the development of these skills. This includes initial ideas, research, game context, story development, character profile, mood boards, initial concept art, storyboard development, technical research and a shot list for the animation set. The storyboard developed for the cutscene can be seen below:

This lays a solid foundation for development of key skills linked to my target industry and provides clear direction for the next module.

Conclusion

In conclusion, this report summarises my career plan, highlights the recent developments to prepare for my next steps and clearly identifies the actions I will take to strengthen my skills in the next module. My blog page The Animation Industry: Preparing for a Career (Lawson-Hall, 2025a) collates all my blog posts linked to this module that document my research and development in greater detail. I’m particularly proud of how my personal branding professionally presents all my application materials as well as the quality of the materials themselves. I’m confident with the progress I have already made and am excited to address my areas for improvement in the next module. My goal is to focus on developing skills within technical animation and Unreal Engine to target my portfolio towards the games industry that is more prevalent in my local area. Technical animators are typically in higher demand with specialist technical skills like programming, therefore developing these skills will support my employability. 

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Reference List

1. Blue Zoo Animation Studio (2024) Blue Zoo's new Real-time department. Available at: https://www.blue-zoo.co.uk/blog/blue-zoos-new-real-time-department/ (Accessed: 2 May 2025).
2. Eutechnyx (2012) NASCAR The Game: Inside Line [Video game]. Activision.
3. Eutechnyx (2014) Warhammer 40,000: Storm of Vengeance [Video game]. Eutechnyx.
4. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025a) The Animation Industry: Preparing for a Career. Matt Lawson-Hall Animation Blog. Available at: https://mattlawsonhall.blogspot.com/p/the-animation-industry-preparing-for.html (Accessed: 25/04/25).
5. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025b) Introduction to the Animation Industry. Matt Lawson-Hall Animation Blog. Available at: https://mattlawsonhall.blogspot.com/2025/01/introduction-to-animation-industry.html (Accessed: 25/04/25).
6. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025c) The Animation Production Pipeline: Part 1. Matt Lawson-Hall Animation Blog. Available at: https://mattlawsonhall.blogspot.com/2025/01/the-animation-production-pipeline-part.html (Accessed: 25/04/25).
7. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025d) The Animation Production Pipeline: Part 2. Matt Lawson-Hall Animation Blog. Available at: https://mattlawsonhall.blogspot.com/2025/01/the-animation-production-pipeline-part_31.html (Accessed: 25/04/25).
8. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025e) Copyright Law for Animators. Matt Lawson-Hall Animation Blog. Available at: https://mattlawsonhall.blogspot.com/2025/01/copyright-law-for-animators-animation.html (Accessed: 25/04/25).
9. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025f) Working Under Direction. Matt Lawson-Hall Animation Blog. Available at: https://mattlawsonhall.blogspot.com/2025/02/working-under-direction-animation.html (Accessed: 25/04/25).
10. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025g) Finding Work in the Animation Industry. Matt Lawson-Hall Animation Blog. Available at: https://mattlawsonhall.blogspot.com/2025/02/finding-work-in-animation-industry.html (Accessed: 25/04/25).
11. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025h) Making the Best Use of Animation Recruiters. Matt Lawson-Hall Animation Blog. Available at: https://mattlawsonhall.blogspot.com/2025/02/making-best-use-of-animation-recruiters.html (Accessed: 25/04/25).
12. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025i) Crafting a Killer Demo Reel. Matt Lawson-Hall Animation Blog. Available at: https://mattlawsonhall.blogspot.com/2025/02/crafting-killer-demo-reel-animation.html (Accessed: 25/04/25).
13. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025j) Preparing for Job Interviews. Matt Lawson-Hall Animation Blog. Available at: https://mattlawsonhall.blogspot.com/2025/02/preparing-for-job-interviews-animation.html (Accessed: 25/04/25).
14. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025k) Building Your Online Presence. Matt Lawson-Hall Animation Blog. Available at: https://mattlawsonhall.blogspot.com/2025/02/building-your-online-presence-animation.html (Accessed: 25/04/25).
15. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025l) Overcoming Rejection in the Industry. Matt Lawson-Hall Animation Blog. Available at: https://mattlawsonhall.blogspot.com/2025/02/overcoming-rejection-in-industry.html (Accessed: 25/04/25).
16. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025m) Final Preparations for Your Animation Career. Matt Lawson-Hall Animation Blog. Available at: https://mattlawsonhall.blogspot.com/2025/03/final-preparations-for-your-animation.html (Accessed: 25/04/25).
17. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025n) Preproduction Exploration to Prepare for Career Development in the Graduate Portfolio Module. Matt Lawson-Hall Animation Blog. Available at: https://mattlawsonhall.blogspot.com/2025/04/practical-skill-development-to-prepare.html (Accessed: 25/04/25).
18. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025o) Matt Lawson-Hall | Animator. Available at: https://www.mattlawsonhall.com/ (Accessed: 25 April 2025)
19. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025p) 3D Character Performance Animation Demo Reel. Available at: https://vimeo.com/1060913638 (Accessed: 25/04/25).
20. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025q) 3D Animal and Creature Animation Demo Reel. Available at: https://vimeo.com/985621851 (Accessed: 25/04/25).
21. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025r) 3D Game Animation Demo Reel (2014). Available at: https://vimeo.com/310960582 (Accessed: 25/04/25).
22. Lawson-Hall, M. (2025s) 2D Game Animation Demo Reel (Squishy Sports). Available at: https://vimeo.com/758418688 (Accessed: 25/04/25).