The Allan Mckay Podcast

Episode 22 is epic! Check it out! Everything from discussing careers, hiring artists, scheduling and budgets through to more heavier into the production side of film and design projects. We cover everything from Coldplay music videos to The girl with the dragon tatoo and beyond! 

Rob Nederhorst is a compositor and visual effects supervisor who has a large list of amazing projects to his name, some of the feature films include X-Men, The day after tomorrow, 2012, Thor, Priest, After Earth and many more films. He's a speaker for Gnomon as well as well as an authority on The Foundary's Academy Award winning compositing software 'Nuke'.   This is a really great and insightful interview with Nederhorst's origins in the industry, starting at Newtek and moving early in his career to Digital Domain and moving on up the ladder from there but also a lot of insight into a lot of his methods and advice related to his career with many great takeaways!   For show notes visit http://www.allanmckay.com/21/  

I recently had the chance to talk in-depth with Pierre Grage about his new (and amazing!) book 'Inside VFX'. I have to say the minute this book was released I had it express-delivered because I was so anxious to consume this book. I think there has been so much negative information put out there about the 'instability' of the VFX industry, yet there really hasn't been many resources out there to really help us understand how or why exactly this industry is facing tough times. What I love so much about this book is it provides so much insightful information about the economics of the VFX world, and Hollywood in general, as well as the history of VFX with many, many insightful case studies on all of the most popular films dating back to the dawn of visual effects. It leaves it up to us to make our minds up about whether VFX is 'doomed' but more importantly it gives us the knowledge and understanding to better adapt to this ever-growing and still very 'young' industry. For complete show notes and links to all ma

Chad Wanstreet is an amazing artist with a very vast background, we dive into a lot of really great subjects as we discuss his background coming from architecture to working on many high profile car commercials in Detroit to relocating to Los Angeles to work for Blur Studio. This is a subject for me really interested me, as relocating anywhere, especially with a family of your own is a very big deal and it was really exciting to delve into this as well as a lot of what he's accomplished in the past. Chad's currently running a CG Society workshop as well as various other things and working with Blur on many exciting projects, very cool! This is a long one, but riddled with a lot of really great and valuable insight from someone with a heck of a lot of experience. Really valuable and I urge you to see it through! show notes at http://www.allanmckay.com/19/  

Chad Wanstreet is an amazing artist with a very vast background, we dive into a lot of really great subjects as we discuss his background coming from architecture to working on many high profile car commercials in Detroit to relocating to Los Angeles to work for Blur Studio. This is a subject for me really interested me, as relocating anywhere, especially with a family of your own is a very big deal and it was really exciting to delve into this as well as a lot of what he's accomplished in the past. Chad's currently running a CG Society workshop as well as various other things and working with Blur on many exciting projects, very cool! This is a long one, but riddled with a lot of really great and valuable insight from someone with a heck of a lot of experience. Really valuable and I urge you to see it through! show notes at http://www.allanmckay.com/18/  

This is one of the most critical episodes so far in our journey to grow our career and multiply our successes. Something so critical yet overlooked, is defining our name and our niche and building our brand. Associating ourselves in a way that will resonate with others and key ways to introduce ourselves that will stay with your audience and grow your job prospects. This episode we learn to make ourselves more than just an artist or an employee but to strategically build our name and reputation up, and consolidate our efforts and focus onto one outcome, building a our brand.

This episode is a look back at my year and what I accomplished, as well as a lot of very valuable lessons I've learned along the way, including areas I failed and what I have taken from that. A lot of valuable information I've taken from this experience and how I can apply this to 2015. The most valuable piece is a overview of the 3-6-3 mindset which is how I personally have owed a lot of my success as well as how I have defined a lot of my goals and lifestyle around. Really great and valuable information that will ensure you hit your goals in 2015 but also your BIGGER goals further down the road to position yourself in the career and lifestyle that you've always dreamed of! HAPPY 2015!!!

So this episode definitely is 'off the cuff' but there's a lot of really vital information for those of you who do want to travel the world and want to understand where to start! I will say this is definitely just scratching the surface, and unfortunately being the week of x-mas and with a product launch underway I've only really had time to hit record and go for gold! But I do want to hear your thoughts on this and if it is something you do want to know more about, I have plenty in store for you let me know before I put weeks into bringing the right people on to give you a step by step guide to working overseas and all over the world as also how to approach studios and find sponsorship!  

Midway through the month! Lots of episodes flooding out on a lot of very important subjects! This episode is all about learning the power of negotiation and becoming comfortable discussing money with employers, how to get a raise and how to position yourself so they pitch to you. This episode I'm sure to some is taboo as people typically don't talk about money or negotiating skills very often. However that also means a lot of us are left in the dark how it all works and how to get what we ask for. This episode will go over many of those subjects shedding a lot of light as well as showing what to say in any situation and how no is just the start of the conversation. This episode I think, is vital for everyone working in any industry to learn the art of negotiation. Leave any comments or questions I'd love to hear from you about this subject!

This episode is very focused on more our core habits, how to build a 'ritual' to start out your day so you wake up productive and know exactly what you need to get done and go about doing it by batching your tasks intelligently and adding time constraints to all of your tasks so that you're able to track your succes, eliminate bad habits and be more aware where your time is actually going. We all want more time in our day to get more done, typically a task takes 30 days of doing daily to form a habit. The more habits we have the more auto-pilot we are to waking up, doing those things and getting them done with minimal effort, and using our goals from Episode 10 (http://www.allanmckay.com/10/) you'll be able to create 2-3 additional days a week to focus on those bigger long-form tasks! Leave a comment I'd love to know your thoughts, and I triple dare you to try an ice bath, 20 minutes submerged, can you do it?! Show notes at http://www.allanmckay.com/13/  

This episode I have been excited to discuss for some time - and have shared a lot with my discussion with Todd Sheridan Perry in Episode 9 about his experiences on working from home in Seattle. I have had so much personal experience both launching my own visual effects studio of 30+ people and working on many feature films, as well as working remotely for myself from my home both in Australia and in Los Angeles. With technology and many tools and the internet booming more each day, there is no excuse for many of us to break free and set up our own visual effects services, or renegotiate our lives to work from our own environments we choose. Whether it be leaving to set up our own studios, or working remotely from home - or going the more adventurous and taking our services on the road - working from beaches or other remote locations! Anything is possible! Show notes here: http://www.allanmckay.com/12 I urge you to sign up to the VIP list this week as I am starting to send out a lot of goldmines of information

This episode dives into some of the core concepts of writing a strong cover letter or email to reach out to studios for work. This can make the difference between whether your email actually gets read and if your reel gets seen, and how to have invisible threads that help you promote yourself without sounding like you're bragging.Check out the show notes at http://www.allanmckay.com/11/ and leave a comment on any experience you've had or thoughts you have on this subject! I'd love to hear it and I promise to read every response!

This month is all about change - we're going to band together and commit to our goals for 2015 and begin to build a roadmap to how to achieve even our most unattainable goals. This month is your chance to make change and to go after your hopes and dreams and measure your success as all of us will will be provided the tools throughout December. Every few days a new episode will be up giving you the keys to change and opening up new doors, with episodes tackling our biggest sticking points and showing how to break through and move forward, gain new skills and look at our careers under a microscope and find out exactly what we need to 10x our career and make the biggest impact imaginable! Go to http://www.allanmckay.com/10 and write your goals and join us as we commit to transforming our careers and making a big impact in 2015!  

I jumped at the chance to talk with Todd about this subject, as it's one I plan to cover later this month! Todd has major success working on projects ranging from The Lord of the Rings all the way through to X-files, Final Destination 5, 2012, The Mist, and dozens of others. He's a major source of talent nad also having worked in this industry for over two decades! The best thing by far, is that a majority of the work he does now is all from home - I love this story because it's a perfect example of both success and creating freedom in your workplace. Quitting the typical 9-5 and freeing yourself up to work for yourself gives you many options.   DEFINITELY check this episode out - it's a long one but full of priceless advice! I will be following up too later this month with a lot of additional information from my perspective as a more how-to guide.   What is your plans for 2015? Throughout December I am going to be posting THREE episodes per week regularly to help jump start your career in visual effects and

This is a great interview with extraordinary artist John Brennick for his contributions at studios like Weta and Digital domain and other studios around the globe on many high profile films including Dawn of the planet of the apes and The Hobbit 2. This is a really fun interview that covers a lot of really great insight into both burn out and finding passion in your work.Check out show notes (they're coming, I promise!) at http://www.allanmckay.com/8 Also feel free to email me any questions or comments, or leave some on the website!

This episode comes with a lot of key advice for those wanting to get their foot in the door of the Visual Effects Industry (or any industry for that matter). Where going with the flow and doing what everyone else does will simply limit your opportunities and most likely you'll be lost in the crowd. Thinking outside of the box and taking the initiative to do things differently will maximize your opportunities. Entering the side door - is a way to create your own passage into a job or company, where there is likely none or very little competition because you are creating opportunities that stand out from traditional paths others use. Take lots of notes, as this episode is aimed at creating your own successes and it's a very vital key to making the most of your time and making the most of your career! Don't waste time, get in and get started! That applies for your career and it applies to this podcast! more information and show notes you can visit http://www.allanmckay.com/7  

This episode is with Sean Ritchie who is a vfx artist working for Stargate Studios in Georgia primarily tied to the hit tv series The Walking Dead. We gain a lot of insight into Sean's background leading up to entering the industry as well as how's growth and experience over the past few years primarily working on Walking Dead and various other projects - Sean is an extremely talented artist yet so humble and down to earth while also having a wealth of knowledge and insight into his work and production. This is a really great episode and a must see! Check it out! Check out Episode 6 course notes (coming soon) as well as a chance to win 1 month FREE membership with Digital Tutors! Gain access to thousands of high-end tutorials and other training, check it out! At the end of the month (November 30 at 11:59pm Pacific Time) I will be announcing the winners who each will receive 1 month membership to Digital Tutors and access to ALL of their training material! How do you win this? Simply do these two steps 1) Like

This is a bonus episode that made it in where Carlos Anguiano and I discuss his studio platform and it's major successes. This is a great episode, another very technical one and I wanted to squeeze it in as Carlos and I discussed so much content over the past few episodes I couldn't let this valuable information go. Anyone who runs a studio or is interested in running a more efficient studio pipeline, check this out as Carlos has a lot of great information in here. WIN 1 YEAR FREE DIGITAL TUTORS FULL MEMERSHIP!! Check out Episode 4 course notes (coming soon) as well as a chance to win 1 year FREE membership with Digital Tutors! At the end of the month (November 30 at 11:59pm Pacific Time) I will be announcing the winners who each will receive 1 year membership to Digital Tutors and access to ALL of their training material worth a lot of moolah! How do you win this? Simply do these two steps 1) Like my Facebook Page 2) Subscribe and leave a review/rating on iTunes Simply do these two things and keep an eye out

This episode is part one of a multiple series on job interviews and crafting your communicaiton skills and obtaining what you want from your job prospects. This episode is important especially for those who have difficulty easing into interviews and 'freeze up' as we go a little out there and look at many of the mindsets and how to overcome them - keep an open mind as episode 4 takes us on a bit of a ride down some strong and proven techniques for overcoming anxiety and strengthening your confidence so you can nail your interviews, meetings and obtain what you want! Check out Episode 4 course notes (coming soon) as well as a chance to win 1 month FREE membership with Digital Tutors! At the end of the month (November 30 at 11:59pm Pacific Time) I will be announcing the winners who each will receive 1 month membership to Digital Tutors and access to ALL of their training material! How do you win this? Simply do these two steps 1) Like my Facebook Page 2) Subscribe and leave a review/rating on iTunes Simply do t

This episode covers more the technical side as Carlos and Allan dive into being a technical director and the benefits and impact it can have on your career, even if you're more on the creative side of the industry!reference links: http://www.tdtransformation.com http://www.losart3d.com http://www.allanmckay.com Allan interviews Carlos Anguiano, a Character and Pipeline Technical Director working for many studios including Industrial Light + Magic, Disney, Rhythm & Hues, Pixomondo, Scanline, Blur studio. Carlos is the creator of Mango pipeline platform which has been a huge success among many leading visual effects studios worldwide, and we discuss in this episode about his career working with many of the top studios on various major film productions. Lots of fun and very insightful! Allan McKay is a visual effects supervisor and technical director and high profilementor in Hollywood working in 3D, both in video-games, feature films and tv commercials. Allan works with many of the leading visual effects an