When Matthew Hale started his Level 3 Games Design course at Chesterfield College, he never expected to be working on projects for Netflix and Amazon just a matter of years later. With hard work, a passion for his field and the support of great staff at Chesterfield College, Matthew soon secured his dream job.
Matthew quickly progressed through Chesterfield College’s Games Design courses, honing his skills ready for university and the working world.
“I started on the Level 3 Games Design course at Chesterfield College and then progressed onto the HND course. From there, I went to Solent University to do Digital Animation and because I did a HND course I only had to do two years of university instead of three to graduate. Straight from university, I went into my current job as a VFX artist for film and TV shows. It’s exciting! We’ve been working with some really good companies like Netflix and Amazon.”
College helped Matthew prepare for the pressures and workload of his university course.
“The HND course definitely prepared me for university, it was a nice bridge from the Level 3 course. I felt like I could comfortably produce the quality of work the university lecturers were expecting of me. College also prepared me for all the written aspects that you don’t really expect from a media production degree. Some people think all your university modules will be creative, but a lot of mine involved things like animation theory.”
“At university, there was a module all about marketing yourself to employers and, at college, we had a really similar unit. I felt like I had an advantage over other people on my course because I already felt confident marketing myself due to the work I’d put in already at college.”
Matthew believes, even more than his university course, college gave a realistic sense of the working world.
“College also taught me how to manage the quantity of work you encounter in the working world. At university, I found it was more about perfecting a few good pieces of work, whereas at college you also focused on doing a lot of important prep work for your pieces and that’s exactly what I do now in my job.”
After a difficult experience at a previous college, Matthew instantly knew Chesterfield College was the right place for him.
“I actually started doing an apprenticeship in Mechanical Engineering through a different college before coming to Chesterfield. I soon realised it wasn’t for me. A big concern at my previous college was that, although the teaching was good, I was often sat around not really getting involved in much. When I came here and spoke to some of my teachers, I realised it wasn’t going to be like that here. I’m very glad I made the decision to move because I instantly knew it was much better.”
In and out of lessons, college life was always busy for Matthew and he still keeps in contact with his old college friends and lecturers today.
“I made such good friends with the people on my course here, we were always going out and doing things together outside of lessons. I’m still good friends with a lot of people I came to college with. I actually just helped one of my friends from college get a job with the company I’m working for now. We met on the Level 3 course and now we work together. I also still keep in touch with some of the people who taught me here at Chesterfield College. I know that if I need anything they’re here and the support is still there.”
Matthew believes that, now more than ever, it’s key for students to study creative subjects.
“I think a lot of industries now are becoming more creative and need more creative people. If you look back years ago at games, they were just one standard thing and that was 2D. Now you’ve got these ultra-realistic games that take a mass of people to create and it’s becoming more demanding. A lot of the time in my industry you have people crying out for Roto and Paint artist.”
Firebrand VFX, the company Matthew is now working for, has gone from strength to strength in such a short period of time and is looking to recruit fresh faces.
“The company is quite new and I was part of the first batch of employees for them. We’re based in Doncaster and have a lot of support from Doncaster Council. As we’re a start-up, we thought it might take a little bit of time to become established, but we’re already working with Amazon, Netflix and more on some amazing projects. The first project we started working on was ‘Shrouded Destiny’ which is a Star Wars fan film and that’s on my IMDB page. At the moment, I’ve just got that one on there, but I’ve got about six just waiting to go up.”
“At Firebrand, we had our second lot of trainees in January and they’re already getting up to the point where they’re considered mid-level Roto and Paint artists. It’s a really fast placed environment to work in. We’re looking at starting apprenticeship schemes, so hopefully people can start straight from college.”
Matthew has a key piece of advice for current students.
“One piece of advice I’d give to people in college now is to keep your work and start putting it into a show reel. Even if it’s not the best, if you can show your willingness to learn and show that you’re keeping at it then they’ll probably look at taking you on.”