Haveing trouble passing on the torch

[BuddyB309]

I'm a seinor in right now and next year I wont be on the team because I'll be in collage. I am the only person who works with videos or 3ds max and I'm having trouble getting oncoming freshmen to stay with the program. There interested in learning computer animation but when I start teaching them it, They see thats its not easy to learn, freak out and run away.

And since I am the only person on the Video and Animation team, Its hard to convince my fellow mechanical inclined team mates that what I do also contributes towards the team even though I have never touched the lathe. Therefore they don't see the need of helping to find a replacement.

How do I find and secure a productive animation team? does it require a specific type of personality? Have I not found the right people yet?

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by BuddyB309

I'm a seinor in right now and next year I wont be on the team because I'll be in collage. I am the only person who works with videos or 3ds max and I'm having trouble getting oncoming freshmen to stay with the program. There interested in learning computer animation but when I start teaching them it, They see thats its not easy to learn, freak out and run away.

And since I am the only person on the Video and Animation team, Its hard to convince my fellow mechanical inclined team mates that what I do also contributes towards the team even though I have never touched the lathe. Therefore they don't see the need of helping to find a replacement.

How do I find and secure a productive animation team? does it require a specific type of personality? Have I not found the right people yet?

There is only one solution to the problem: the mentors have to assign someone to do the job. Preferrably a student whi applies for the job but if they can't find a canidate find a kid with nothing to do.
If they don't see it as essential then it will go by the wayside and not get done. It's really that simple, unfortunately.

[KenWittlief]

FIRST teams are not required to submit an animation. If nobody on the team wants to do one next year then its OK. Why force someone if thats not where their interest lies?

There are many aspects to a FIRST team. Each year it changes. Dont worry over this, things have a way of working out in the long run.

Also, dont feel like you can only pass the torch on at your HS. When you get to college you can mentor a local team. When you graduate you can be a mentor.

The torch will be with you, always <= (couldnt resist :^)

[Jake177]

I know that it may be a little late for animation, but the bulk of the work that gets done with video doesn't happen until after the season's over. Once your team's done competing people will be looking for something to do, and you'll still have plenty of time to show someone new the ropes. My freshman year, my team didn't have anyone to do video. At the regional we went to we just took turns taping the matches. It wasn't until afterwords when we had all this raw footage just sitting around that I thought I might want to try doing something with it. So I taped our matches at Nationals, taught myself to use iMovie, and made a montage movie at the end of the season.

Also, just because you're graduating doesn't mean that you can't still do stuff for your team. If you don't find anybody to pass the torch to this year, ask if you can come into a meeting and talk about video/animation when you're home on break next year.

[Nuttyman54]

One thing I've found is those people who are attracted to the robotics team...want to do robotics. The solution is to recruit from outside the team. Make it known that the robotics team does other things too. Ask around school. I'm sure SOMEONE is willing to learn the program. You might even get lucky and find an animator who never considered joining the team.

[abroerman]

I've had the same problem recruiting new students into animation (sooo many buttons). This actually seems to be the problem with our recruitment situation as a whole - if we make an announcement to the entire school, we get 20 excess people that don't really care. My idea is to make visits to specific classes that might have interested students, such as computer science, AP physics, and industrial tech classes (We might have an animation class too - not sure how similar it is). The goal is to get people that actually have an interest in the different areas to join.

Unfortunately not many people take the whole animation thing very seriously, as I've noticed even after our relative success in the area. Of course, the robotics aspect comes first...

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by Nuttyman54

One thing I've found is those people who are attracted to the robotics team...want to do robotics. The solution is to recruit from outside the team. Make it known that the robotics team does other things too. Ask around school. I'm sure SOMEONE is willing to learn the program. You might even get lucky and find an animator who never considered joining the team.

Actually that is not true.
We have kids who have joined our team soley because they want to do animation. So it is possible.

[Nuttyman54]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

Actually that is not true.
We have kids who have joined our team soley because they want to do animation. So it is possible.

I probably didn't word that well. What i meant is that when/if you put out a call to sign up for the robotics club, generally you will not get animators because that's not exactly what springs to mind when someone says "robotics team". It's been my experience that unless the animation is a well known part of the team, you need to do specific, targeted recruiting of animators

[BuddyB309]

I can talk into getting people to try to learn 3ds max. But they always end up quitting cause they say its to complicated or something else. Am I doing something wrong? do other teams have this problem?

[Roushey]

Well the problem lies in FIRST's target audience. The plain and simple fact is, that 90+ % of all students in FIRST are pre-engineers, or pre-Computer scientists, not artists. Essentially, you're looking for the 1 in 1,000 possibility of the artist engineer.(keep in mind I am not insulting the creativity of engineers and CS students, just their artistic ability.) What you should be doing is recruiting people from an art background, and then after the fact mention that it just so happens to deal with robotics. Since the Animation portion of FIRST is so far removed, you should treat recruiting people for it in the same manner. I think another problem is that 3ds gets confused with inventor and other similar CAD programs, so people think that it is all about technical drawings and whatnot. From my own personal experience, whenever someone asks what I've done a particular animation in, they always ask “is that like inventor or something?”

(On a side tangent, teams should also recruit art students for such things as full time PR members, and whatnot. This would more closely emulate the “real world” where companies have professional designers do their logos and PR work.)

Solution: More art students in FIRST!

Rant: Complete

[Mazin]

I agree, animation is a side-goal to the real purpose of the team, that is, building cool robots. Our animation team (thankfully, we had about 5 people who helped) only met once a week. Even being the primary animator myself, animation is not my sole interest/skill. I try to help out with the mechanical stuff, and am also hobby programmer. Does that count as an artist-engineer? There are ppl on my team that are interested in the animation and help out, but don't dedicate all of their time to learning 3ds max, and they don't need to.

I only wish our school had an animation class.

[Morgan Gillespie]

Mike C. the person who did the entire animation last year by himself, (In curve editor!) left leaving the animation seat blank, I came to the first meeting and saw a sheet for animation and I used to do graphic (pixel) art and make simple games and GIF animations and modded Halo PC things in MilkShape and had always wanted to get really into animation but never really had someone to teach me. So I signed up for animation and started going to their Saturday meetings and fell in love with 3dsm, from the day I got it I continuously run it, testing things, looking up tutorials, testing ideas and the such. Mike C. started with basic lessons each time I would come back each week showing what I did, spending up to 25 hours testing things and learning a week on my own then 2 at the weekly meetings. Basically he found someone to hand the torch off to, but I won't let him let go him and I don't think he wants to. We worked side by side this year bouncing ideas off to create our animation. Our Adult mentor Mr C., Mikes father cooked up (heh) a great idea, Mike B did a model and Mikes sister did the music, and a few other students did the story board. We hope to train them all over the summer. Having 5 or 6 trained animators would be amazing!

Honestly I think you should advertise Animation as itself and say it is part of the robotix team. A lot of things contributed me to join the robotix team. From showings they did at the high school, LEGO camp, my 6th grade math teacher, many things but most people aren't like this, they most likely don't know about it, get the word about it and they will come!

[JaneYoung]

It is my thought that many tools of many trades come together to make that which is called F.I.R.S.T. a success by measure of a machine, by measure of a person, and by measure of a team.

Ask yourself if you have communicated your worries/concerns sufficiently to your teacher/mentor and your team. I know they are capable of lifting their heads up out of the drive train if they understand that you are worried or hurting for the team.

Use the tools in place in your school - approved promotion: flyers, PA system, wear a name tag that you've written: 'need animators for robotics' on - talk with the dept. heads of your school or ask your teacher to. Get creative with your team on how to get this word out.

If you look at the CD forums and how they break down and how their sub-forums break down, you see the value you hold with F.I.R.S.T. It's right there. We have a belief in our team that someone always steps forward to fill the gap. Always. It is a trust factor. That is what a large part of team means: trust. If your team isn't there yet, they will be. And the '07 team is not going to be the '06 team but that's ok. F.I.R.S.T. builds people and has succeeded with you, otherwise you would not worry.