Arnigel

Right after Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood, in November 2010, I set off for new shores: my first experience as a freelancer, under France’s “intermittent du spectacle” status for entertainment workers, on the Arnigel TV commercial for the Boiron laboratories.

The project was produced at Vanilla Seed, a small animation studio in the centre of Lyon, run by a former animation teacher from Bellecour, my own school. A lovely place to work, with a crew of three or four animators.

From 3D to 2D

When I arrived on the project, everything was already in place, and I dove straight into the animation. The style was cute and cartoony, in 2D, so I was a little surprised to be asked to animate the little boy in 3ds Max.

In fact, the whole process was built on rapid iteration thanks to 3D: there was no need to redraw everything whenever a movement wasn’t working. Only once the client had approved the animation did we rotoscope it in Flash, to give it its 2D look.

A clever way of working

I learned a lot on this project. The process was clever, especially when you know how often clients can change their minds, and I discovered rotoscoping in Flash, which I didn’t know at all.

The assignment was far too short for my taste: I really loved working at this studio. It was also my first step into freelancing, and a first look at a very different side of the trade.