Welcome to Alumni Live the podcast.

These are conversations with Grand Valley State University film and video

graduates about the industry, the film video major, and alumni profiles.

Welcome to another episode of alumni live the podcast.

I'm Randy Strobl, your host for today.

And I'm here with a really exceptional person.

If I could say we've got Tim Dailey here from Exceptional Minds.

Hi everybody.

Thank you for the pun, Randy.

I'm sure they'll be coming all interview.

So what is Exceptional Minds?

Let's, tell the folks at home.

So Exceptional Minds is a school for students on the autism spectrum

to learn and study the digital arts.

What our company does actually is we provide a complete pipeline for students.

You can be as young as 14 years old , but you can be from that age

and you can go into mid adulthood, 35 years old, learn about the specific

computer arts for the first time.

And then what we do here is we have a three year program that helps you

develop a portfolio specifically in your chosen field of the digital

arts, whether it be visual effects, 2D animation, 3D animation.

We cover a wide variety of these digital arts.

So somebody who's looking to get involved at Exceptional Minds for the first time,

they might start off with us in some part time workshops that are devoted to these

specific areas to get a feel for them.

And then if they really enjoy it, they explore it even further in the full

time program that I just mentioned.

And during our full time program, we offer career services support where

we have dedicated industry partners that help students on the spectrum,

specifically secure jobs and internships.

So while we can never guarantee placement, our job as a company is to

help these students specifically build their portfolios to the best degree

that it can be in order to help them secure those opportunities out there.

So these different types of, opportunities.

. So you might have something like a mentorship and internship.

Some freelance work, and so we help the students develop those skills necessary

to be competitive in that field.

And even after they graduate, we still provide additional services.

And we also have a dedicated animation studio where students can go and work on

a freelance basis after they graduate if their portfolio is showing these skills.

Our company provides this huge opportunity for students on the

autism spectrum to develop those skills and make a career out of it.

So I'm hearing school.

I'm hearing workshops.

I'm hearing animation.

I want to get into all of that, but, I just want to talk a little bit

about, what is the autism spectrum?

So when we talk about students on the autism spectrum, we're talking about.

The terminology that we use today is somebody who's neurotypical versus

somebody who's neurodivergent.

So it's somebody who usually thinks about things in a different way

or manner and they take in sensory input maybe a little bit differently

from somebody who's neurotypical.

So a person on the autism spectrum might be more sensitive to like certain sounds,

taste, touch, things of that nature.

But something to remember about autism specifically is that it's a spectrum.

So, when you've met 1 person with autism, you've met 1 person with autism.

Some people are very lowly affected and need minimal support.

Others need a lot more additional support.

So, the best way to find out what those supports are that they need

is to just ask the individual.

In viewing autism in this day and age, it's really still about learning

what the individual needs are of the individual person and what the

additional support is that they may need to help them so you can make those

accommodations for them, whether it be in the classroom or in the workplace.

So you're doing some, great work out there and you're not

just from Exceptional Minds.

You're also a Dean, right?

I am our academic Dean.

. Wow.

Congratulations to you on that.

. Let's, learn a little bit about the path that got you to be Academic

Dean at, Exceptional Minds.

So, starting at Grand Valley, what did your school experience

look like for you then?

Yeah, I guess I'll just go through the life story basically

from point A to point B.

So, I started off at Grand Valley as a freshman in 2004.

I was in the film and video program.

Initially, I wanted to study animation right away and, interestingly enough,

while I was going through the program, I had a lot of great friends in the program.

We would spend our nights and our weekends watching movies.

And during my time at GVSU.

I actually got more interested in the film production aspects.

So I did a lot of the great things that GVSU is known for,

like, their summer film program.

And what was funny about it is, I'm going through the program and

I'm like, I hate being on a film set at 3 o'clock in the morning!

So, I go through that after a few years, and then I go and I really start

developing my skills in animation again.

So my professors there were really encouraging.

I remember having DM Morris as a professor.

She was pretty encouraging towards me and my development in animation skills.

So I graduated with my emphasis in animation and then I just worked

a few odd jobs for a few years.

Then after doing that for a few years, I was like, Hmm, I really want to go back

and pursue this a little bit further.

So.

I ended up applying for graduate school, which led me to attend

the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York, where I received my MFA.

So I did that program, received a degree in digital arts.

That program took me 3 years to complete.

After that, I ended up working in the industry on a freelance basis.

So I did a few odd jobs in New York, but eventually I decided,

okay, LA is kind of a bigger pool.

So let's go out there.

It doesn't seem like it would be, but LA is where everything is centralized

as far as the industry goes in America.

So I went out there and I started doing visual effects work,

on a, freelance basis in LA.

And with my MFA, I started.

adjunct teaching on a freelance basis.

For those odd jobs that you had in New York was that freelance animation?

Like, were you working?

Yeah, it was, but it has some motion graphics type work.

So still in that same vein.

I was doing this for about a good four to five years when I first moved

out to LA and then I was looking for more teaching jobs and I was like.

It might be interesting to see what these students on the spectrum can do.

So I applied for this place called Exceptional Minds and I essentially was

just kind of impressed looking at their work at the time at the level of quality

that the students could do specifically.

So I applied, I interviewed for a role as a VFX instructor actually to

begin with, and I was a VFX instructor with the company for three years.

But at the same time, I was doing a lot of these managerial type tasks.

And the dean at the time, her name was Kat Cutright, amazing mentor

to me, she had me doing a lot of these type of overview, management

type roles, and so I was eventually promoted into our associate dean role.

And then when she left, I basically took over this role of the Academic Dean.

And what I always tell people about that is.

I really did go through an interview process where I had to prove or like,

Hey, I know this knowledge about this and blah, blah, blah about this.

It's all about talking about what you know when you're essentially getting your foot

in the door, and you're showing people that you can do it, so it's the walk the

walk opposed to the talk in the talk.

I eventually ended up in the academic dean role, because I

showed I could do all these tasks that were required at the company.

And I mean, talking about the, the animation work that so

these students are like actively doing, , animation work, right?

And when you look at the video on your website, I mean, it's a reel

of all the biggest movies that have come out in the last couple of years.

Tell us a little bit about, you know, what partnerships you have.

Yeah, absolutely.

So what you're seeing and you're reacting to is, I'll just say right off the bat,

one of our biggest clients, if not our biggest client, is Marvel specifically.

So they give us a lot of VFX freelance work.

We do some visual effects post production type work for them specifically.

And what ends up happening with that is like any other company that I'll bid for

shots will go to a company and we'll take a certain amount in and we do it on the

basis of what our students are trained in.

So then with the dedicated support of a studio supervisor, they work

on producing these shots, and giving them back to the client.

So we've had this relationship going with them, before I

started at Exceptional Minds.

So that relationship has been like seven years plus specifically.

Some other great clients that we work with are Nickelodeon, Paramount,

Cartoon Network, Disney as a whole.

The bigger companies that we really have those ongoing mentorship opportunities,

internship opportunities going on that are available to the students.

Depending on what it's like year after year, we'll see different

opportunities come up for the students.

So, a few years ago we had two internship opportunities from Mattel.

Okay, Mattel's the toy company, right?

So, it's like thinking about, how are they related to the digital arts?

Well, they had those type of positions related to what we

do here in their wheelhouse.

So they want ours to come in and they hired one of the interns full time.

So we do have those type of relationships as well.

I mean, and you've got some incredible stats for your graduation

numbers are up in the nineties.

You've got students going out to work.

What advice do you have for the students listening to this, so Grand Valley

students trying to work on some of those big movies that you've got relationships.

What is the animation VFX industry look like for students coming out of college?

It's a pretty competitive industry.

So my best advice that I can give is listen to your peers, your instructors,

get that professional feedback, connect with industry professionals, do your

networking on LinkedIn in order to get that feedback, When you're thinking

about, applying for these internships, these job opportunities on these

websites, how do you get yourself noticed?

That is always the catch 22.

I would say more so the first job step is to really think about, hey, what

is a company that I want to work for?

Do they do the type of work that I want to do?

Start connecting with the people who already work at that company, talking to

them over a continuous period of time.

So talk to them, like, form these relationships.

over several years, if need be, so they know who you are specifically

because that's what it's all about.

If somebody recognizes who you are, then that pool ends up becoming

a lot smaller and your chances become a lot more available.

So as we're talking about, the work, right?

What programs are you using?

What, skills, are required?

What does a day in the life of somebody who works on these

shows and movies look like?

So we use the Adobe software in our program now, that's for

beginner level and somebody who's learning the skills for first time.

Premieres coming up on video editing, but as the student goes into more of

the advanced animation programming, we'll learn things like Toon Boom

Harmony and Storyboard Pro because a lot of industry professionals

use that in the animation industry.

Maya is still big one in 3d.

Maya just seems to be in it for the long haul.

So, and visual effects itself, this is hard to wrap your head around,

but this is where a lot of my freelance opportunities came from.

What is used is the program Nuke.

So Nuke is a node based software.

So for those of you who are not familiar with what a node is specifically, opposed

to a layer based system like Photoshop where things are stacked on top of each

other, nodes are basically boxes that connect into one another and tell.

the program to do different types of functions.

So that's the easiest way to describe it.

That's the basis of Nuke.

It takes a person a hot minute to usually learn how to use Nuke because of that.

So when I first learned Nuke, it took me about six months to learn it.

So, but I was self taught in it.

For those of you who are not familiar, because I know GVSU really didn't focus

too heavily on visual effects per se.

It did a little bit of the digital post production, but

let me just give you an example.

In digital post production, in digital effects, you might

be asked to track something.

So when I say track something, that means the computer will lock onto a

pixel or a series of pixels in the screen and create a pathway on that.

So maybe it'll track my hand, right?

And then what that allows for is for something like a

baseball to move in my hand.

So it looks like something is completely integrated into it.

That's the visual effect.

So there is that common value that still exists, but learning

to adapt to different software may take you a little bit of time.

Those are some of the tips and techniques that you can use to make yourself a

little bit more competitive is doing, again, that stuff that not everybody

knows, doing that stuff that you're okay to explore and you're willing to go.

So you don't necessarily have to go down the coding route.

Although, well, people can go that route.

I've heard that too, from plenty of industry partners.

But if you're more of a visual person, there are other ways,

skills and techniques you can learn.

Wow.

I felt like I just got a front row seat to that part of you being an educator there.

I, that was a great explanation of, how nodes and things work.

Let's talk a little bit about you being an educator.

There are some students right now who will become educators or

who will get interested in that.

There are some students right now who are in the film program looking

to, kind of do what you're doing and, spread the knowledge about filmmaking

to a new generation of students.

What does being an educator look like for you?

Being an educator you have the opportunity to come into a wonderful company and

like Exceptional Minds and kind of shadow somebody and learn from the techniques

that they're doing specifically.

A lot of the times you'll be given the opportunity to educate in some

way or form like maybe on a smaller basis and you kind of find your rhythm.

This is the other funny story, the first adjunct teaching job that I ever

had was a 3D character animation class.

I had my MFA at the time they needed an adjunct instructor, so I'm like,

okay, I, that's not really my field of specialty, I, even though my emphasis

was in animation in graduate school, character, I was more of an experimental

animator opposed to a character animator, but I'm like, okay, I have enough skills

to teach this, but, first day of class, I'm like, how do I prepare for this?

Okay, I'm going to write out this entire lecture and like, read it verbatim.

So, the reason I laugh is because I look back at that and because of your nerves

you use some type of methodology like that to make yourself less nervous, but

eventually you just have to go through the process of doing it again and

again to get yourself into the rhythm.

Remember how I said it's about what you know and just being comfortable with that.

That's how you get comfortable in the teaching style.

You just do it again and again.

And eventually you don't need even the lecture notes you

just know everything by heart.

And you talk in your way where you're very comfortable with

it and people respond to you.

So I actually never read my reviews from that first class that I took

because, it's like five years later.

You're like, I'd be curious now to see what they said at the time, because.

I did get some positive feedback in that class.

So some people do like that style, but essentially the point is.

It's just about doing it again and again and getting comfortable with it so you

find your rhythm like if you're naturally comfortable with public speaking, then

just keep on doing what you're doing.

But if you're not comfortable with public speaking, then use these tools

to help make it easier on yourself.

And then once you start knowing what, you know, then at least in my

case, I found I became a lot more comfortable in that way and aspect.

So.

It's practice, practice, practice, essentially.

Well, and I think there's a good lesson in there too, just for, for

anybody, in those first couple of years after you graduate of just,

you're going to be in situations that you weren't necessarily trained for.

Were there skills that you learned at Grand Valley that helped

you, say, I think I can do that.

I think I can figure this out.

So, what I got most out of Grand Valley was creating a great community

of people that I could talk to about situations and problems that I ran into.

So when I think about public speaking, for example, I could think

of like, did I take any classes in public speaking at Grand Valley?

Yeah, I did.

I mean, that definitely helps, but ,the real skills, really come from

putting yourself out there, essentially putting yourself in those uncomfortable

situations, those unfamiliar things that you, might not necessarily be okay

with doing at first, and just seeing how it is a meme, the best advice is,

be okay with being uncomfortable.

Yeah, like those times where you were on set and you decided it wasn't for you.

I mean, you still stuck it out at those 3 a.

m.

shoots for a bit, right?

Exactly.

That's what college is for, like, looking back specifically, because you find,

like, what you are most comfortable with.

And, if you don't like a particular situation, that's okay.

What we like to say also is this idea of "fail faster".

Because you learn from failure, you learn about things that you don't like and

things that you essentially aren't good at or things that you wanna further develop.

And the more and more you do it, essentially, either you become more

comfortable with it and you develop a skill in it, or you move onto something

else that you are more passionate about.

That is a great lesson.

I feel like I just learned something there too.

Going back to Exceptional Minds.

The spectrum is a really important part of what you, do there.

what is it about, animation, autism?

Why is that the, connection that, everybody made there?

You know, everybody has recently been asking me that I want to say that's more

like a human psychology question, because there is something really appealing about

the anime for maybe it's because you're putting yourself into situations that

are so fantastical and impossible, and there's something about being out of

the ordinary in animation, so something becomes this very fantastical event.

There might be reasons behind it in the sense of, okay, society doesn't accept me,

but maybe this other world will accept me.

I think a lot of us in filmmaking relate to that, even if we're not on

the spectrum or don't know that we

More than likely, a lot of people who you interact with in the arts, you've

more than likely met people who are on the spectrum, and they either just don't

disclose or don't identify some people don't get diagnosed until later in life.

In my opinion, it's out there a lot more than we vocalize it

being there, but like anything that there's a social stigma.

I It's up to the individual to say to you specifically.

Whether or not they are on the spectrum or not, because it's about

their own personal life journey and what their goals are for themselves.

Certainly, and I imagine some of the people listening to this could

be on the spectrum, looking for some connection, some community.

There's a lot of hope in Exceptional Minds.

Can you just talk to us about creating that community?

That sense of hope?

So one of the great things about again, our three year program is not only do

we have the education, but we do have extracurriculars that go along with that.

So these extra social engagements, we do a certain amount of parties

where the students come together, they'll have pizza, engage in games.

Things of that nature.

But one of the great things that we do on a weekly basis is

we have a movie or game night.

And the students flip out for a movie and game night.

So last week they just watched the original 1993 Super Mario Brothers movie.

Because, of course, the new Mario movie.

And they were doing ads like, oh, this is going to be a bad movie night.

And like I love the 1993 film, so that's just what I do, but.

Of course, they're like, okay, this really doesn't seem like a Mario movie, but this

is actually a really cool dystopian movie.

So, sometimes you'll get, these fun, interactive reactions that

they weren't necessarily expecting.

They go all in on the game night they'll compete against each other, in Super

Smash Bros or Mario Party, and us as administrators and instructors will

overview and just sometimes we'll get involved in the gameplay, but, it's

just a really great collaborative space for them to come together

and do that type of interaction.

So one, really awesome thing that we just did recently at the end of March

is we have what is called an Anajam.

We have 48 hour Anajam.

Anajam?

So what that is, within 48 hours you get into teams and you produce a

animation within that 48 hour period.

So there's 24 hour competitions that are out there that happen

year round specifically, but we decided we're going to do our own.

So that was just, another great way to interact, produce some

animation work, get to know their peers a little bit better, have that

type of interaction to really build that sense of community right there.

lots of cool things of that nature happen at Exceptional Minds,

so, instructors were there like at three o'clock in the morning.

I was there only during the day, because like I said, in my old age, I'm like,

yeah, I don't do the three anymore.

And for those of you who are one year, I'm actually 37.

So I'm not, so just semi old.

So outside of Exceptional Minds just, general industry tips

for students on the spectrum or, recent graduates on the spectrum.

What do you tell your students when they go out into the world?

General tips that I can give you would come back to, what

do you want your brand to be?

And so what that comes down to is although we want, like, hey, I'm going to

be the best at this, I'm going to be your top level Disney animator or Pixar artist,

take a step back, think about this.

Do you want to destroy your self worth of putting yourself at that level?

Now, for the 1 in 10, 000 people, that may be the way to go.

What do you mean by destroy your self worth?

What I mean by that is, are you going to make yourself

sick, specifically, by like, I'm technically not good enough to do

Work life balance?

Essentially, and then pulling yourself all into it in that way.

So that comes back to the point of develop a style for yourself.

Have an artistic voice that's unique to you.

That is what's going to get you noticed.

So you present yourself at a certain way, in a certain theme.

Maybe you're all about goth and horror.

Maybe you're about sci-fi.

Maybe there's something crazy and wonky out there that's your style.

Maybe things in regards to, like, we look at something like Rick and Morty.

Adult humor animation, right?

But it has this very distinct style.

Do you have a voice that's like that?

Do you borrow themes of that nature, make yourself more

appealing to a wider audience.

And that's why I use that as that specific example.

You develop a website, a cover letter, a portfolio that reflects your brand, what

you're all about, whether it's raunchy or by the book, but something that

really defines you, not everybody's going to respond to you, but a lot of

people will, that's being true to yourself because those are the people who you're

going to have the commonalities and by showing your voice your vision in that

way and form, then you can make those connections, put yourself out there

in a way where people are going to recognize you for the talents that you

have artistic, technically, and they'll get where you want to go, in the end.

Always be true to you and you won't go wrong

This episode is brought to you by the Chuck Peterson Memorial Fellowship.

The fellowship was established by Chuck Peterson's family and friends to assist

upper level students in the film and video program at GVSU who are working

on creative projects that support the non profit sector in their community.

Kyle Macciome the 2020 recipient of that fellowship, describes the

benefits of the support he received.

When going through this fellowship, there are three separate parts

of yourself that I think get to experience a lot of development.

The first is as a student, because this is a learning process.

You get to learn how to work with a client on your own, independently,

out in the world, away from the classroom like you would in

something like producing for clients.

And the second one would be as a video maker, as a video producer, as someone

who has respect for the work that they're doing and wants to improve on

themselves and produce a final product that can be used out in the real world.

And then the third one would be as a citizen, you know, you're not making

video for an entertainment value or for some kind of commercial purpose.

It's for a nonprofit.

It's for a direct benefit in your community and being a citizen of that

community, understanding how you can directly impact and improve it, um,

is a really valuable experience that I think the fellowship teaches you to be

as, as a student, as a filmmaker, and as a citizen, all three of those things

are directly a part of this process that you get to learn and ask yourself.

How do I want to be seen and how do I want to act as these three roles?

For more information and to donate to the scholarship, visit

the link in the description.

Now back to the show.

So you brought up work life balance and I'm curious what that looks like, between,

school or, going out into the industry.

And you all are doing professional work on these big movies I assume

with pretty hefty deadlines.

What does work life balance look like?

What tips do you have for that?

So in school, we teach that actually in our vocational part of our curriculum.

Another unique thing about the social minds curriculum is.

, we spend one day a week towards, this is how I prepare for a job interview.

This is how I resolve workplace complex.

This is how I prepare a cover letter.

This is how I prepare a resume.

This is how I build a portfolio specifically.

What that ties into is having those soft skills, those professional

skills, going back to your original question about that work life balance.

You have to be able to regulate and recognize, okay, I'm burnt out.

I need to take my break.

I'm going to resume this and I'm going to do this in chunks so I

can get a certain amount done.

So a lot of the time in the VFX industry, we do run into the issues and the

animation industry , where, hey, people will be working these massive amounts

of overtime, getting a certain job done.

If you're going to go into the industry, will you run into

times where that's unavoidable?

Yes.

You want to keep your sanity as much as possible.

And only do that when it's absolutely necessary, because there will be

times in your life where you won't have a choice, unfortunately.

But when you do have the choice, allow yourself to take a step back.

Solving that technical problem that, artistic problem If you're getting

stuck on progressing your art.

Give it a few days, come back to it, look at it from a different perspective.

So you can keep moving along.

So ultimately, in the end.

Maintain work life balance when there isn't a company breathing down

at you saying like, hey, we have a deadline at 5 o'clock tomorrow.

At that point, you're going to have to stay overnight.

That's just the reality of this industry.

Now, when that's not happening, though, take time to learn and ramp yourself

up and develop those additional skills because there will be those down times.

Certainly.

What does that look like for people who are a neurodivergent?

Is that the same process?

Yeah, it would be.

So, in the workplace, this would come down to, what potential

accommodations you can provide to them.

So, for example, if a neurodivergent person is working on the details,

somebody on the spectrum.

And they're having a hard time concentrating.

You might just want to check in with them, make sure like, hey,

is this space quiet enough?

If it's not, then will headphones solve that problem.

Or is there another available space in our facility that you could work?

That's a little bit quieter than this space.

Those are small things, but things that can really help a person

concentrate and get the work done that they need to get done.

Hmm.

Very good.

Since 2004, you've been doing animation, you've been doing, special effects work.

How have you seen technology change, techniques change in your career?

So technology, the technicalities, the software's always changing, always.

Techniques stay the same.

Basic traditional techniques, like drawing techniques are still

very much the same, so you'll see a lot of that same similarity.

The software you use, you might be introduced to a new technique

or concept in it based on what we're seeing in the industry.

So one of the very popular things that we're seeing right now is

puppet animation and motion graphics.

So you'll have a pre existing character, that animates across the screen.

So opposed to drawing out the character, you're going to animate it with a

rig and either an After Effects system, such as the Duik system,

or you're going to use Toon Boom Harmony and animate it with their rig.

So those type of functions may change over time.

And we do see a lot of those techniques evolving to make things more user

friendly for people and more accessible, but the overall concepts stay the same.

You've seen this change happen.

For students who are in class right now, how can they prepare themselves

for an industry that's always changing.

So definitely keeping those traditional principles in mind, whether it be

design principles, if you're doing more motion graphics related work, if you're

doing visual effects work, those basic visual effects concepts like tracking,

but, you're going to go online, you're going to Google, you're going to go on

YouTube, you're going to keep up on those channels, you're going to keep up on

your network specifically, and you're going to ask Hey, what are you seeing?

In Exceptional Minds we have an awesome thing called a program advisory committee.

And so what that is.

We have industry professionals who are out there actively working, who

will come to us and communicate with us different things, trends,

based on this exact question.

And they'll tell us specifically, hey, we're seeing software going this way.

Are we seeing more of this happening right now?

So we had this constant communication going on to see, like, Hey, are

we still putting the right things into our curriculum for

what's going on in the industry?

Or are we outdated?

So Exceptional Minds is not accredited what that allows for.

Is it allows us to basically change our curriculum on the fly if we need to, and

our instructors are amazing at developing new curriculum all the time, based on what

we're seeing happening in the industry.

So you've went to school in the Midwest, you've worked in New York, worked in LA.

I'm always interested in, how is the industry different coast to coast or,

what is similar New York, LA, Midwest?

Speed, New York is so, in my opinion, everybody's tried to one up one another,

LA, you still have to get your work done, but people are much more understanding.

Maybe it's the traffic mentality, if you get traffic, so you get a few hours

behind, but you have a lot of work to get through, but you can take a breather

every now and then, go back and understand and realize your life, heading back to

that whole work life balance discussion.

That is still available.

That was just my personal experience.

Maybe people have different experiences, but that was my

overall view of that specifically.

Michigan for me, it's my home state.

It's where I grew up.

The speed of work, if I'm being completely honest, is a

little bit slow for me there.

Would I do it?

Yeah, of course I would, but I don't know how I would feel about

doing it long term because I do like staying pretty consistently busy.

That's just my perspective.

Sure, sure.

Like working from home, so computers have gotten a lot more powerful now.

Are, people able to work from home or are you still commuting in that LA

traffic all the way to, where you have to go if, you're out there in the world?

We were offering virtual private lessons at Exceptional Minds

even before the pandemic hit.

And then when it hit, we went online in a week with no problem.

There we go.

We're good to go.

By being a digital curriculum, that's mostly based online, having those

computers, in that week, that's what we ended up doing mostly.

We rented out a bunch of our computers that we had on site.

So people who didn't have the available equipment at home

would have it specifically.

But it was a very easy transition for us.

Now that's not to say there were some growing pains up at that time for us as a

company, I think everybody went through that a little bit just because of the

status the world was in specifically.

A few people went on to other jobs and things of that nature just because there

was such a dramatic change at that time.

Yeah.

So when you were a freelancer, did you have your own editing equipment

or like, do students need to invest in those computers to be competitive?

Okay, a student should have at least a medium grade computer to be competitive.

It doesn't have to be a fancy $3000 machine ,but it should be something

that has a decent amount of RAM.

So in this day and age, something that's like 16 gigabytes, if you're

doing 3D, things like the Adobe Suite.

Like Nuke, you can get non commercial versions of it and practice on it

if you're building your portfolio.

So software is really a non issue for us.

It really never has been because, the companies basically are like,

yeah, will absolutely help you out.

And we're like, Oh, you're so awesome.

You're so great.

Thank you for doing this for us.

And then when we eventually came back in person specifically, depending on

the year and what's going on with our donations and our budget, if we're talking

about the company as a whole, that's when our equipment gets upgraded, but we do

the best we can to keep pretty current.

So our students can keep up and be competitive in the industry.

So, and we're always actively looking at that.

One of the things that we definitely use, there's a bunch of Wacom equipment.

So we have a bunch of tablets and Cintiq specifically that the

students use in the classroom that are available to them on site.

So that was a little bit of a struggle when we were in COVID, but they

were able to check out the tablets.

I mean, there are certain things like having that and the instructors being

able to look over you directly, give that direct one on one support, do a little bit

of that hand holding when needed in person that is more viable when the students

are on site opposed to being remote.

So there were positives to being online, but also part of our

workshops are always online, too.

In fact, we have some of our workshops coming up where the majority of

them will still be online this year.

And that's a great way to get involved with exceptional minds programming

specifically for the 1st time, if you're interested in it at all.

So we do a combination of both of them and continue to expand into this online realm.

We have a really great in person presence, it's a combination of both these days.

Right.

I think that's, we see that a lot across the industry for sure.

What are you working on right now?

I mean what are the big projects?

Can you even talk about them?

Do you have just like NDAs across , the whole spectrum?

Yeah, that I can't talk about specifically.

I can say, yeah, we're definitely working on some Marvel stuff.

I can't tell you the titles.

Can you tell me what that work looks like?

What are the jobs your students are helping?

What do you see up on the screen?

Yeah.

So if you're talking about visual effects, you're actually not going

to see it because part of the thing with visual effects, they're

what we call visible effects.

Often, you won't notice that something has changed.

So, while they may do a green screen replacement background, like I

have in my background right here.

I know this is a podcast, but for those of you at home, I have my Exceptional

Minds logo on in the background.

Which is a form of green screen, essentially.

But, if there's like a wire in the shot.

or a boom mic.

So our artists will go through a series of those shots, and they'll

remove those and make those better.

Those would be the invisible types of visual effects.

So something that might be more concrete, we've done some work for Sesame Street,

and so, there you might see something that's a little bit more visually

concrete, because you're seeing some of the actual animation come to life.

So, that would be something that's very visually apparent, but, If you're looking

to see, hey, the exceptional advice that you work on this, read the end

credits of a movie specifically to see who all the visual effects artists were.

Right, right.

And so people are doing everything from just removing one little wire

to creating a whole dragon, right?

It's like across the visual effects is everything now.

Exactly.

Oh, man., I'm just, my brain is spinning like this is so, interesting to me.

Is there anything about Exceptional Minds that you want to talk about or

about your career about being, you know, an educator, a filmmaker that you want

to touch on that we didn't ask about?

You covered a lot of great questions I think today.

Just naturally through our discussion specifically but yeah, you talked about

this early on, it's really remembering just because somebody is on the spectrum

doesn't mean that they can't do a job, a function or anything like that.

It's really the antithesis of that.

Sometimes need extra support in these very minor ways and

fashions usually to help them be the most successful that they can be.

Because if we're looking at it from the scientific perspective, from the

reading that I've done, what happens in the brain when a person has autism

specifically is extra neurons or extra pathways will go off specifically.

So it's basically an information overload a little bit.

So that's kind of a way of thinking about it.

What the accommodations do is it helps that refocusing happen and that's why

I come back to that point of when you've met one person with autism, you've

met one person with autism because the human brain is so unique and so complex

everybody reacts to something differently.

Now, people who have high levels of anxiety and sometimes ADHD

will also end up being, we'll see those commonalities for people

who end up being on the spectrum.

So there are those commonalities that still exist, but ultimately you should

just always ask yourself or employers should ask themselves specifically.

Can this person just do the job that's out there?

Can they do what's in front of them?

And that's what it's all about.

Just like everybody else.

You see those accommodations and support happening out in the world?

It's happening more and more these days.

That's something that we have constant discussions with the different employers

about is providing the support.

And we see a lot more companies who have a lot more of these

neurodiverse initiatives popping up.

So this is a, great time, but this is the most available time in the history

since I've been alive, where if you're going to disclose and you're questioning

about disclosing whether or not, and if that would give you an advantage.

It could, actually.

Those possibilities do exist.

Now, it could do the opposite too, but I feel like in this day and age,

people have a little bit of a better understanding of autism, where that

stigma isn't as high right now but it does still exist to a degree, so we're

kind of walking this fine line right now.

We're kind of like at this really borderline stage of acceptance,

slash having the stigma of like, Oh, this is a Ray man who doesn't

understand what I'm saying.

Sure, sure.

And we're recording this in autism awareness month, which, even the

fact that exists hopefully shows that, society as a whole is becoming

more understanding and accepting.

Yeah.

I mean, and some people will need higher support, so it's not always the case.

And that's, again, coming back to that idea of, you just have to take

the time to interact with everybody on an individual basis to get to know

their story and what they're about.

Hey, you're doing a great work out at, Exceptional Minds.

In the video on your website, noticed, one of the parents that are interviewed is

somebody who we mostly know as an actor.

Is that Jamie Lee Curtis?

Does she have a student there?

Yeah, that's really funny because that video was made

before I actually started there.

So she was, our graduation speaker.

I believe the year before I came to Exceptional Minds . Yeah,

she gave the graduation speech.

So we usually get like a celebrity.

Year after year, we have a lot of different, amazing people like

that who potentially come in.

There are two students right now who I could actively think of who

actually have celebrity parents.

I have heard most recently.

Do you want to do some name dropping?

I, no, I can't do , but

, We'll leave that to the, listeners imagination.

But I know, but that's the funny thing about LA because like the celebrity thing

happens every now and then, and it's just kind of like, oh, sometimes you'll be

starstruck and then other times it's like, oh yeah, it's LA so it's expected , so

Sure, You got a lot to be proud of.

I always like to end the podcast with, something that you're, you know, a

problem that you've solved, something that you're really most proud of, or

something that, pops into your head, something that, you overcame or solved.

Do you have any good stories to sign us off on?

This is where being a teacher comes back into play, because even though I am the

academic dean, at my heart and my core, I love, to teach, even though I tell these

stories of how I was terrified at first.

And it is that gratification that the students give you.

That's what it comes down to.

When I was an educator specifically, when I taught Nuke visual effects, it's

when they had that aha moment and I saw, okay, they got it now and they

can create this amazing world projects that always made me feel incredible.

Now, it's like, you're getting your demo reel done.

It's at the pristine stage that needs to be awesome.

You can be competitive in the industry now.

Go out there, make us proud in the world.

So, that's.

The most fulfilling thing for me.

That's that's great.

Well Tim Dailey from Exceptional Minds, the academic dean of Exceptional Minds.

Thank you so much for hanging out here on alumni life.

Absolutely, thanks Randy.

Thank you for joining us for this episode of Alumni Live, the podcast.

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