How Framestore use Shotgun to bring blockbusters to life

If you want to learn about production tracking and how it's used on the world's biggest movies, there's no one better to speak to than Alex Jackson, who's worked as a developer in Framestore's Production Tools department for the last eight years.

Originally hired as a Filemaker Pro developer, he's part of a team of three that develops and maintains Framestore's Production Tracking software, as well as managing the company's Shotgun installations.

And tomorrow at 6pm, he'll give a presentation to HP ZED, the pop-up shop for creatives in London's Soho that's open for two weeks of talks, workshops and contest for 3D artists.

In his talk, Jackson will give us an insight about his extensive experience using Shotgun as a production management tool across the full gamut of Framestore's Commercial and Film projects.

It's a subject he has a true passion for, naming his favourite thing about Shotgun as "The Python API. Yes. I'm a geek!"

Register for this great talk here!

In his talk he'll show how Shotgun has helped the teams that worked on Guardians of the Galaxy, Gravity, and Activision’s DJ Hero and how Framestore have built a pipeline around Shotgun.

They've all been dream projects, he says, although when it comes to career highlights, Gravity pips the post for Jackson. "I knew from the first moment I understood how it was to be created that it would be groundbreaking," he enthuses. "I've a soft spot for Where The Wild Things are too."

Jackson is also excited about Client Site right now, he says. "It's got great potential to make things more efficient," he says, "but we would need to make sure it's going to work for us and our clients first before we start using it at Framestore."

If you can't make it to his talk tomorrow, Jackson says he's also planning to attend 'How to start a VFX studio' next week, so you'll have two opportunities to say hello.

HP ZED London 2014

This content has been brought to you in association with HP ZED, a 'pop up shop' for creatives in London's Soho from 29 September – 10 October 2014.

With talks, tutorials and creativity sessions brought to you by top experts from leading studios like Double Negative, MPC, Milk and The Mill, as well as HP, Intel and Nvidia, it's going to be a must-attend event for anyone working in motion graphics, animation or 3D. Find out more here!