Jake Hines

For Jake Hines, work doesn’t feel like work when it’s his passion. In the rapidly evolving world of VFX and 'Vubbing' (visually adjusting lip movements), he’s woven himself into cinema history. From continuously working on creative side-projects to assisting others, he’s constantly improving as an artist, taking on more challenging work day by day. Here, he shares his tips on networking as an introvert, self-taught learning and ultimately, just saying yes and figuring it out later.

What I do

How would you describe your job title?
I’m a compositor and I work at a company that does Vubbing – visually adjusting lip movements in films, TV or ads so they match the dubbed voice. My job often involves translating on-screen text into the target language we’re vubbing for, and sometimes I’ll also clean up little artefacts that show up on faces after the vubbing process.

What are the main influences and inspirations behind your work?
I’d say it’s my overall love for film and TV, from the classics to the modern, and the creative process behind how they’re made. The one person that always comes to mind is George Lucas – his story of creating Star Wars and Industrial Light & Magic always fascinates me. There are things I’ve taken from him on my own path into the industry, such as just saying yes and figuring out how to do it later.

Would you say you need any specific training for what you do?
To do what I do, there are definitely specific areas that you need to train in. The most obvious is learning the software that I use – Nuke by Foundry. I first got my hands on it at the beginning of university at Escape Studios, but there are definitely tutorials online as well. The software is expensive, but there are some free trials and student prices as well, or if you go to a university, they’ll have it.

It’s also about learning to understand the real world and how it looks, training your eye to see small details and imperfections. What I produce is to a photoreal standard, so seeing the specifics of the world helps tremendously. There are many different ways to learn these skills, including videos, books or self-taught learning. To this day, I'm still improving all these skills.

What’s been your favourite project to work on from the past year, and why?
There's definitely been a few favourites. In particular, there was this film called Watch the Skies; this was the first film I worked on when entering the industry, and the first fully Vubbed feature film ever made. The film was originally in Swedish, but we made it fully English. It’s a great film, and somewhat part of cinema history – definitely a source of great motivation.

What does a normal day-to-day usually look like for you?
My normal day-to-day is quite simple. I'll arrive at the office around 9 am and boot up my workstation. Usually, I'll already be working on a few shots, and so I'll get straight into it as soon as I arrive. If we’ve just completed a project, I’ll soon be assigned a new shot or shots – a single shot can go from half a day's work to a week. There might also be meetings that I’ll be a part of throughout the day, providing insights on current and future projects. When there's a lot of work on, we’ll also have daily sessions to gain feedback on the shots we’ve worked on.

Jake's workstation

If there was a starter pack for your job, what would be on it?
Firstly, my trusty keyboard and mouse – I'm too accustomed to them now that working on anything else would leave me stumbling all over the place. Another key item: my Tesco lunch – a vegan sausage roll, my personal crème de la crème of Tesco lunches. The final, but most important item which I can't live without is my handheld fan I use on the tube and at my desk. This is the best investment of my life and a lifesaver on those hot days.

How I got here

What was your journey like when you were first starting out?
Although the work we do is far from what I thought I’d be doing when I got into the industry, I definitely found my feet quickly; I was prepared from what I’d learnt at uni, and also from the various short films I’d made. Slowly, I was working on more and more difficult shots and was able to find my groove and adapt to the work.

Roto work Jake did on the short film Ocean's Playbook

How did you go about landing your first few jobs?
At the end of uni, I started applying to various companies that had openings, but I was unlucky with the applications I sent – some replying with the ominous ‘unfortunately’ email and others not getting back to me at all. 

I always say I was quite lucky landing this job at Flawless. I was approached on LinkedIn about doing some freelance work after my uni showcase at the end of our final year, where we showed our work to industry professionals. Some of my other uni friends and I got the same offer, and a couple of us managed to stay on as permanent employees.

What has been your biggest challenge along the way?
At the beginning, networking was definitely the biggest challenge for me, and maybe even still is today. I’m quite a shy and introverted person, so networking has never been my strong suit – especially when it comes to selling myself. When I was first looking for work, this was quite challenging. 

Also, the challenge of training your eye to detail can be a struggle for me from time to time. Now and then, there's still something that stumps me, although I’m definitely getting better every day.

How important are social media and self-promotion to your work?
I think in this industry, it's important to promote your work – it will only help you to put yourself out there and to gain feedback from people, which in the end will make you a better artist. This was something I did quite a bit during uni, although I could’ve done it a bit more with the stuff I worked on after – it's always good to get your name around LinkedIn and have your work seen by people. 

Saying that, a lot of the time when seeking a job, the employer may only look at your showreel. You’ll only gain anything extra if you’ve already reached out to the recruiter or person hiring, so it’s definitely important to do so.

What are three things that you’ve found useful to your work or career, and why?
The main thing I’ve found useful is working on side projects to build up my skills – I think this is the main reason I’ve gotten to the stage I’m at now. I'm good at keeping myself busy outside of work with these personal projects and being part of short films that friends of friends are making.

I would also say a lot of the self-taught learning I’ve done has been really useful – there are tons of tutorials out there by credible people in the industry, such as Victor Perez’s Node by Node series, which is everything I was asking for during uni, and Hugo Guerra’s tutorial videos.

Lastly, I've found helping other people out useful. This may be due to the way I like to learn, but helping others out not only helps someone else, it also solidifies your knowledge in the problem area. For a short film I worked on during uni, I was head of 2D, and there to help other artists that had issues, which only furthered my knowledge and skills. That whole project was a case of me just saying yes, I can do it and figuring it out later. I was anxious throughout the entire thing, but in the end, I managed to pull through and make a fun film.

Have there been any courses, programmes, initiatives, access schemes or job boards you’ve found helpful or would recommend to get into your sector?
There's the obvious uni course which I took to learning the software and everything about it. During uni, I worked on short films on the side, which ended up giving me some great connections. University was valuable to me and can be particularly useful if you work outside of it and try to gain those connections that your tutors will have from the industry.

I’d also recommend ACCESS: VFX – an initiative where you can get a mentor who will help you out in any way necessary. I basically just asked my mentor a million questions on the industry and what it's like. I had a couple of mentors through there, and I would also ask questions about shots I was working on at the time and what I could do.

What have been your greatest learnings with making money and supporting yourself as a creative?
When I was first at Flawless, I never really negotiated my freelance contract. It wasn’t bad for me, so I never took a second look at it, although maybe I should have, as that seems to be standard. In the future, I would probably negotiate more, but in this area, I'm still learning. I would always say that if what you’re offered will allow you to be financially comfortable, then it’s fine to take what you can to get into the industry – that can be the hardest step.

My advice

What’s the best career-related advice you’ve ever received?
I haven’t directly been given advice, but something people have noticed about me is my passion for the ‘work’ – it’s strong enough that I genuinely find what I do fun, and it never feels like work. It’s always best to move towards something that you enjoy – you’ll get the most out of it.

You do have to be careful though, as sometimes you can be taken advantage of, working for free or for longer hours, all for the love of the art. All the short films I work on aren’t paid, which is my choice; just don't be afraid to say no to these things. There have been some short films I’ve said no to because I know I couldn't devote the time to them.

What advice would you give to someone looking to get into a similar role?
The main advice I give to people is to never stop working on your own stuff. I’m always working on practice stuff or short films via connections I have, like the one I'm currently working on; doing this will build your skills and your showreel. Make sure to work on side stuff at uni as well. I managed to work on four short films outside of my final year, not including the two made for the course. This helped build my showreel with unique shots that others didn't have, as well as growing my skills and adaptability.

If you’re not comfortable with in-person networking, I advise just messaging people on LinkedIn and asking them to take a look at shots – all the people that I reached out to came back with feedback. It's a good way to start speaking to people in the industry and building connections. Now, I get messages from people from the year below me at uni, who I'm excited to help.