Life & Work with Thomas Proux

Today we’d like to introduce you to Thomas Proux.

Thomas, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
My story goes back to 2007 in the city of Lyon, France. I was just starting middle school when my older brother introduced me to a free software called PhotoFiltre. I was not much of an artist growing up and actually never considered myself one until recently. However, there was one thing I liked, technology. I quickly started experimenting with the basic tools that PhotoFiltre offered to create small photo edits and share them online with small gaming communities. The limitations of the software rapidly became apparent and this is when I picked up Photoshop. Once again, tutorial after tutorial I learned the tools and started producing more images to share online.

After a few years of creating still images, I started wanting to do more. I wanted to tell different stories and absolved myself from the limitations of a single frame. I wanted to create animated pictures.

I got my hands on After Effects and this was an instant hit for me. I was spending whole nights over the weekends creating small animations. Even though these were only a couple of seconds long, I was getting such a thrill of spending countless hours learning the software and problem-solving issues that I knew, right there and then, that I wanted to make a career out of it.

Fast-forward through high school, after lengthy discussions with my brother, I quickly understood that if one day I wanted to achieve my dream of working on big animation productions by studios like Disney, DreamWorks, or Pixar, I would have to learn English and study abroad.

It is on September 20th, 2015, that I stepped on that plane and little did I know, it would change my life forever. I remember these days vividly. I felt a whole range of emotions. I felt alone, scared, and doubtful about my decision. But more than anything else, I was excited. Excited to start a new chapter. Excited to meet new people. And excited to learn about a new culture.

My first year in the United States was probably the single best year of my life. There was never a stale day. Surrounded by other international students, I made a lot of new friends, with whom I traveled all over the country and from whom I learned a lot. The years 2015-2016 truly open my mind about other cultures and in turn, allowed me to grow up and become independent rather quickly.

But this only lasted for a couple of years as I was getting serious about my education and career goals. All the way from 2016 to 2018 I was attending Santa Monica College where I wanted to graduate with a 3D Character Animation degree. Unfortunately, as too few students were interested in the 3D classes, I was forced to complete the 2D Animation degree instead. And there is one thing I have not mentioned, the reason I never considered myself an artist is that I absolutely hate drawing, hence my interest in 3D. I thought that a 3D artist was more of a technician than an artist because we operate with software. Only at Gnomon did I truly understand that regardless of the medium, we are artists. Holding a pen or clicking a mouse does not define your artistic abilities but rather supports them.

But before Gnomon, and after graduating from Santa Monica College, I had a transition year which was my second most transformative year after moving abroad. As international students, upon graduation, we are allowed a 12 months work permit. At the time I was thinking that I could probably get a job in the animation industry and work my way up from there. That did not happen. I had to face the reality of it, my portfolio was just not good enough. I spent 6 months finding an unpaid internship in a start-up that was poorly managed to do graphic design. Far from anything animation related. But this taught me a valuable lesson, the importance of hard work. My portfolio was comprised of assignments that I had made at Santa Monica College, but they were just that, college assignments. Assignments that I had completed to pass the classes and not build a portfolio. Which meant doing the minimum required by the teacher. This realization shaped my future at Gnomon.

After a couple of months in this start-up, I decided that I needed to pursue my education with a real focus on 3D. This is when I came across Gnomon. After taking a tour, I knew this was where I belonged, and I knew that this time, each assignment will be made with my portfolio first in mind and not just completion. For a few months, I worked with the admission office to build a strong application, and low and behold I got accepted and even earned their scholarship for artistic excellence. And in Spring 2019, I started attending Gnomon.

My first year was pretty uneventful but I’ve made progress like I’ve never had before. Term after term I could see my skills growing and it only fueled my motivation to keep learning. When covid hit in 2020, I was just starting my second year. The transition to online classes was rough as making social connections became harder but it offered a few advantages in terms of artistic growth. The ability to record classes, even though we were not supposed to, allowed us to rewatch lectures and learn more from them than a bunch of quickly written down notes. The access to the software at home also meant that we were not dependent on lab availabilities and school hours to work and learn. And while the lack of social interaction was tough, it allowed me to fully focus on my schoolwork and progress by leaps and bounds.

However, after a year I was hitting a wall. A year until graduation, with my demo reel in mind, I started losing passion for the work I was doing. It kind of all became meaningless. And in addition, I was also struggling in choosing what to specialize in. When I joined Gnomon, I wanted to be a character animator full-stop. But as I was taking character animation classes, I really hated the process and was finding myself enjoying more the texturing, shading, lighting, and compositing classes. I was so confused because I was so dead-lock on being a character animator that I was not considering these options. It was only after meeting with one of my teachers, Beau Janzen, that I realized there was another, more rewarding path for me. It lifted some weight off my shoulders but I was still struggling with finding meaning in my work.

So, with only a year left, I decided to meet with the career placement department to start pathing my way to a successful demo reel. I was surprised when they told me that usually, they wait for the last 6 months to meet with students. But regardless, we met. I talked with Shannon Wiggins and she helped me understand more clearly what career path I wanted to take, and more importantly how to achieve it. It is thanks to her that I understood why my work had become meaningless. It was lacking storytelling. Through the classes and the growth of my technical skills, I had lost the focus that launched me into this path in the first place, telling stories. For the past year, my assignments were assets, FX, or environments but nothing assembled together. Nothing with an intentional camera composition, layout, or animation. Just plain 3D models on a turntable.

After this epiphany, I made what is still my favorite artwork, Forest Legacy. I used a robot I had made for a texturing class based on a concept by Bryan Van Der Linden and decided to set it up to tell a story. With advice from my friend Emma and inspiration from the Ghibli movie Laputa, I created this forest scene with the character looking at a bird as if it had just woken up and was re-discovering its world. While there is a lot that I could do to improve this piece, its simplicity, and meaning in my artistic growth is the reason why I still cherish it to this day.

Starting my last year at Gnomon, after having talked with the career advisors multiple times, I had all the pieces that were going to go in my demo reel figured out and was ready to take full advantage of combining classes works to push the bar as high as I could. This gave me six months to lay the foundation of these artworks and six months to finish them. That taught me how valuable proper planning is. The last few months were pretty low-stress as I was wrapping up everything, and allowed me plenty of time to prepare my resume, website, and applications to get a job at one of the studios I mentioned earlier.

During my last term, I got my first interview for my dream position, Character Texturing/Grooming with none other than Pixar. I was super excited about it. But as for any first interview, I bombed it really hard… I was not prepared enough to talk about my work and I knew I was not going to get the job. To this day, I still think about it… But I learned from it. For the next few interviews, I was more prepared, less stressed, and better at communicating my ideas. Eventually, that led me to interview with DreamWorks where I landed my first job as a lighter/compositor in their TV department.

I worked at DreamWorks for just about one year, contributed to 6 TV shows, and created invaluable relationships with the people over there. The growth I have experienced as a professional has been incredible. I learned to work in a team and collaborate with other departments. That was the biggest hurdle for me. Coming out of Gnomon, we never worked on group projects, I was solely responsible for every aspect of my demo reel. At DreamWorks however, I was only responsible for one aspect of the work. That meant relying on others and knowing when troubleshooting is not my duty. This was hard after working solo for all these years. But in turn, it allowed me to really honed my lighting and compositing skills.

Now, as my time at DreamWorks has come to an end, I am opening my arms to new experiences that would further my artistic journey. While my skills are still those of a 3D Generalist, my focus lies in Look Development and Lighting/Compositing. And I am excited about the work that lies ahead and the people I’ll get to work with in the future.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Oh no, it can never be a smooth road. And I believe a lot of the struggles are important to learn and grow from them. There is always a lesson to be drawn from a bad situation.

Immigrating to a new country, alone, as exciting and fun as it can be come with a lot of problems. All of a sudden you find yourself immersed in a language you can’t speak and with no one to guide you through the most mundane processes. This is a hard challenge for anyone to take on. Being open-minded, desiring to learn, and surrounding yourself with the right people is the key to anyone’s success.

When I decided to immigrate, as a student, I chose to live with a host family. I was lucky enough to land in a lovely family that accepted me as one of their own. They allowed me to learn their language and culture at my own pace and also were here for me when I had questions. I lived for three years with them. And even though it’s been 5 years since I left, I still see them from time to time.

During my gap year between my two degrees, I really struggled with finding work. I spent months applying to every single position that I could remotely fill, I was desperate. From Video editor, animator to graphic designer, I applied to every single job in the Los Angeles Area that would use even one of my skills. I found my archives recently, and it was more than 230 applications sent over the course of a couple of months. Out of all of these, I only remember interviewing for less than five companies and almost getting scammed by one.

This was a hard time and a lot of self-reflection took place. Then, eventually, I found the worst place possible to work at. But as bad as it was, it showed me what to avoid in the future. Two lessons were learned at that time, work harder to have the best portfolio, and this is what bad management looks like. I believe this experience to be the key to my success at Gnomon.

But even my education at Gnomon was filled with struggles. During the first year, it was a lot of foundational art classes, meaning a lot of drawing. And this is something I really disliked. But I had to push through and in some instances, I started enjoying a little bit.

Then covid hit, and that held me from going back to my family in France for a whole two years. We were scared that I wouldn’t be let back into the country for various reasons which meant not finishing my education. These were some of my loneliest moments… But thankfully, I had my partner there for me. This is when surrounding yourself with the right people is important. During these moments of loneliness.

And during my last year, I had to find my passion again. Remember why I was making art and making sure I don’t lose sight again. All these moments taught me a lot about myself and allowed me to grow as a human and as an artist. It forged my work ethic and made me the professional I am today.

And yet, even as a professional, we struggle. Ever heard of the impostor’s syndrome? I think this is something we all feel at some point. At least I did. As soon as I started working, I was doubting myself and my abilities. I almost wanted to quit even though it was a dream job because I was scared to let people down. But people over there trusted me, and along with their trust, I gained confidence. The fear of letting people down became the motivation to not let them down. It pushed me. It drove me. I was thriving for a while, but then work started slowing down. Fewer and fewer projects were coming in and boredom settled.

It’s so easy to get comfortable in a position that pays well and is not demanding. And yet, I did not like it. For weeks, every day, I would be asking for tasks to do. But eventually, I was let go among other artists because of this very lack of project. This was tough as all of a sudden, I was launched into a world of uncertainty. Where I once had my dream job, I was now trying to find a job knowing that it’ll hardly be as good. But I welcomed the situation with open arms. What made the work at DreamWorks so special was not the projects, it was the people. The friendships I’ve made carried outside of work and that’s priceless. Now, artistically, I am excited to find a new job. Work on different kinds of projects, and expand my range of skills and styles.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
At the core, I am a 3D Generalist. Meaning that I can handle, to a certain extent, most parts of a CG production pipeline, from modeling all the way to compositing. However, as the saying goes “Jack of all trades, master of none”. I particularly lack in the areas of rigging and animation.

However, while this is my broad skillset, I decided to specialize in look development, lighting, and compositing. These are later departments in the production process.

As an example, a good friend of mine likes to use a chair analogy. Where a modeler would build the chair, the look development artist is picking the material, such as wood or metal, and paints it. The lighter would be doing the photoshoot placing lights around to set the mood, and the compositor would be editing the photo. This is very broadly speaking as each job has more layers to it but this is the essence of it.

While my career is still in its early stages and I have yet to have an official credit released, I was recognized in 2022 as one of the Rookie Of The Year in the 3D animation category. I was also featured on Unity’s SpeedTree blog for one of my artworks, Bonsai Garden, based on a concept by Veikka Somerma, to talk about my workflow in creating stylized trees.

I am very proud of these public recognitions, but the best has yet to come. Some of the shows I worked on at DreamWorks I am particularly proud of and I can’t wait for them to be shared with the public!

We all have a different way of looking at and defining success. How do you define success?
To me, success can be defined in many ways. Different individuals have different ideas of success.

I thrive to be proud of the work I am doing but not at the cost of my personal life. I will consider myself successful when I’ll be able to find this balance. It’s particularly tough as for the past eight years living in the US has been a career-centric lifestyle. I am proud of my accomplishment here but eventually, I want to be able to achieve the same in France, closer to my family and friends.

For now, I see my stay in the US as a means to the end but I cannot consider myself successful if I keep missing my loved ones. Hopefully, sooner rather than later, the opportunity will come for me to go home.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.thomasprx.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thomas_prx_art/