Matthew Evans is applying to university to study visual effects (VFX) and pursue his passion. He discovered his interest in VFX through creating basic effects as a hobby in video game edits. This led him to leave sixth form and enroll in a creative media course to develop his creative skills. He believes university is the ideal place to gain crucial industry skills from tutors with experience. His goal is to become a VFX artist at a top company like ILM or Weta Digital.

1. Matthew Evans’ Personal Statement
Whilst in 6th form, I started to do small scale visual effects using After Effects as a hobby. This was
basic VFX within video game edits and helped me realise that I made an error whilst choosing my
post-16 education, as I discovered a love for this new-found hobby. I became inspired to leave 6th
form, to pursue this hobby and join York College's Creative Media course, which suited my creative
side and provided me with projects to develop skills in creative areas. I strongly believe University
will be the ideal place for me to develop crucial skills I need for this competitive industry as I’m
driven and motivated enough to learn and develop skills taught by tutors with industry experience. I
am aiming to make connections with people who share the same interests in this industry as well as
people who are already working in the industry.
Whilst at college, I have been apart of a wide range of projects causing me to develop upon and
gather many skills in a variety of different creative aspects. For example, I worked on a couple of
group film-making projects, which helped me to develop my teamwork skills which will be
imperative moving forward as I will be required to work in a team to optimise workflow and results.
Throughout these projects, I also got familiar with camera rigs and basic cinematography principles,
as well as learning the basics of some software I was not familiar with, such as Premiere Pro, Blender
and Photoshop.
My final major project in college provided me total creative freedom, to complete any project I
wanted, providing me the chance to start work on a 3D project using Blender. I decided upon making
a horror inspired environment. I then formatted this environment in a video with a camera freely
moving throughout the environment. I had very limited knowledge of 3D as I had briefly used Maya,
and this was my first real project inside of any 3D software. During the project I learnt the basics of
many skills such as texturing, modelling, rendering, sculpting and volumetrics. These are all skills I
want to study more in university.
In the future, I hope to be a VFX artist for a VFX house such as ILM or Weta Digital. Currently I enjoy
working on environments but compositing really interests me, it's something that I'm eager to learn
at university. VFX at University is perfect for me as it will provide me with projects closer to a
professional level and challenge me to improve upon skills that I already have as well as develop new
skills, allowing me to work successfully within the VFX pipeline. Currently, I'm looking at become a
generalist and I will then later decide which area interests me the most.
Outside of college, I have been doing VFX for around 2 years now as a hobby. I started with basic VFX
on video game edits which sparked my interest in VFX. This allowed me to take on client work for
people inside of the community and got me familiar with working towards client's requests. I then
started to look at films and TV shows in more depth through breakdowns on YouTube. This got me
extremely hooked on the industry and led me to start learning 3D modelling. I started to learn 3D
using Blender through a college project, allowing me to get basic 3D modelling practice and produce
my first 3D environment. In the summer, I then joint a 3D Blender course to stay active in my time
off from college and further develop these new skills I learnt.
I want to go to university to develop my skills within VFX in areas that I have already explored as well
as to uncover skills in areas I am yet to explore. I hope by exploring a variety of areas within VFX, I
will develop employable skills to help me get to where I want to be within the industry. I think that
through the help of university I will be able to make connections with people that have similar

2. interests to me, and with people who are already in the industry and due to my eagerness to learn, I
believe I will be an excellent candidate for university.