What do you do?

[geneterror]

Bro that school used to have a terrible rep. My friend got stuck there for 6 months in a class with no tutor! He took them to court to get his fees back becasue it was the only way he could get his money back.
I used to work in an animation studio that wouldn't take people from Freelance becasue they had to retrain them. My friends uncle is a producer and told my other friend that if he really wanted to do animation to get a bum job in a studio over paying to go to Freelance and it worked out really well for him.
I'm sure it's changed now but that place used to be a complete joke in the NZ animation industry.
edit: I'm talking 1998-2004/5 mainly. Don't know anyone but you who's had anything to do with them in the last 2-3 years.

[DVS]

Bro that school used to have a terrible rep. My friend got stuck there for 6 months in a class with no tutor! He took them to court to get his fees back becasue it was the only way he could get his money back.
I used to work in an animation studio that wouldn't take people from Freelance becasue they had to retrain them. My friends uncle is a producer and told my other friend that if he really wanted to do animation to get a bum job in a studio over paying to go to Freelance and it worked out really well for him.
I'm sure it's changed now but that place used to be a complete joke in the NZ animation industry.

Dude I find that story hard to swallow - the School has been running for 20 years now and is the countries longest running animation school. Freelance has trained some the countries most talented animators - we have an employment rate 75% after the first 6 months of finishing the course. We have animators working in almost every studio in the country and overseas in Korea, England, Germany, China, Australia and America.
The fact is that every studio in Auckland runs differently and it doesn't suprize me that there is "retraining" involved as every studio runs on different softwares and has different systems. Freelance teaches the fundamental animation techques -it would be impossible to teach an animator "everything" as as an animator you are a constant learner -software changes yearly. 
Freelance has an excellent reputation in the industry both local and world wide - which studio did you work for? I personally studyed here and have been employed at many local studios and overseas as well. I use the skills I learnt here daily.

Saying that it is a "complete joke" is far out of context. Your friends uncle maybe right -save yourself the fees if you can get a job at a studio, but with no fromal training why would they hire you? you'd be competing against people with three or four years experience. You'd have to work your way up the ladder which would take time and you won't be earning top dollar. If he's talented enuff all the power to him.

But I'd put an animator from here up against someone with no formal training any day. 

[geneterror]

Yeah but you're focusing on skills and I'm talking about how people were treated, students with no tutor etc that school had a bad rep for a long time there. They may have eventually got those skills but my friend got so sick of waiting for a tutor on a course he had half completed that he quit and went and did a design course at MDS.
My friend Dean used to tutor there and you don't want to try and talk to him about that place.
I'm not trying to dis your work bro and like I said I think (hope) they've changed a bit but I know to may people that had bad experiences with that place in the late '90s early 2000's.

ps. I used to work at Slightly Off Beat with a lot of the guys that went on to Firehorse. My friend Jim ended up being one of the producers on Bro Town but he hated it.

[DVS]

Yeah but you're focusing on skills and I'm talking about how people were treated, students with no tutor etc that school had a bad rep for a long time there. They may have eventually got those skills but my friend got so sick of waiting for a tutor on a course he had half completed that he quit and went and did a design course at MDS.
My friend Dean used to tutor there and you don't want to try and talk to him about that place.
I'm not trying to dis your work bro and like I said I think (hope) they've changed a bit but I know to may people that had bad experiences with that place in the late '90s early 2000's.

ps. I used to work at Slightly Off Beat with a lot of the guys that went on to Firehorse. My friend Jim ended up being one of the producers on Bro Town but he hated it.

I personally can't comment on "students without a tutor" as I was not here at the time. Freelance to my knowledge would not leave students without a reliever until a replacement was found. Again I don't know the circumstances here. 

As I said I studied here from 1999 till 2001 and had no issues with the way I was treated. Freelance is in contact with a lot of it's graduates even from years gone by -we have people visiting us daily who used to study here.

Firehorse is a different kettle of fish -I personally worked on two seasons of Bro' Town. The whole "Slighty off beat, Anim8" issue is too massive to discuss in this post.

Due to the fact that Freelance is the longest running animation school in the country there are bound to be people who had "bad experiences" - the school is run with the students best interests at hand I can vouch for that.

[geneterror]

Firehorse is a different kettle of fish -I personally worked on two seasons of Bro' Town. The whole "Slighty off beat, Anim8" issue is too massive to discuss in this post.

Fuck yeah, don't even get me started on those fucks. "SOB" still owes me about $1,500 I'm never going to see.

[CrazyMobius]

I remember hearing some dodgy stories about FAS when I was there and even more after I left. I think it even got a story on 60 minutes. Yeah it's been around a while but it you can't pretend there wasn't some controversy there.

[samurai black]

Gotta invest in ya future aye. Did you walk away with some good skills?

well, my drawing definitely improved and i met some way cool peeps. and i can almost use 3dsmax without something going balls up.

also, last year in the diploma class, we usually started our mornings pirating ish between everyone

[DVS]

I remember hearing some dodgy stories about FAS when I was there and even more after I left. I think it even got a story on 60 minutes. Yeah it's been around a while but it you can't pretend there wasn't some controversy there.

Dude, like I said in a previous post. I personally never had a bad experience, if anyone else did, I've personally have never heard of it. I know there is always two sides to a story and I think everyone should hear both before the villagers grab the torches. That's all I gotta say about the issue  .

If anyone has further questions about the matter you're more than welcome to approach the school with the matter.

Peace