October Dormitory Diaries: Kaneko

Hello, Kaneko here.

This is my Dormitory Diary Entry for October.

My work hasn’t changed all that much, so I’d like to take some time to touch on what another fellow dormitory resident wrote about job hunting.

After graduating from high school, I left my hometown and went to a two-year vocational school that offered courses in illustration. When I first got there, I had only a vague idea that I wanted to work as an illustrator, but didn't have a clear definition of exactly what I wanted to do yet. For a bit there, I was thinking about working for a game company or a company that does illustrations for other commercial properties, and I didn't do any animation work in class or for assignments.

I went to roughly half of the company hiring meetings and game company presentations that I could, then tailored my portfolio to the game industry and started job hunting. However, it didn't go too well, and after consulting with my homeroom teacher and another teacher from the animation department, I switched my aim to animation. This happened right around this same time last year. I was scrambling to make a portfolio and apply to some studios for the second round of hiring.

I failed to get past application screening at the first company I applied to, and the second company is the one I'm working for now. I made my portfolio in a hurry, so it was only about 20 pages long, and because I was in such a rush, I almost didn't get to study for my end-of-year skill assignment. I basically just winged the test on the day of with almost no practice. I was very grateful to the teacher from the Animation Department who gave me advice and ideas for my portfolio.

This was right around the time when COVID-19 started, and almost half of my entire school had gone remote, so I felt frustrated that I couldn't attend the program the way I wanted to, but I'm glad it worked out in the end. There were about 40 students in my department, but only about 7 of us, including myself, were able to find a job outside of school, so I think I was lucky.

Last but not least, crowdfunding for the dormitory started the other day. This will help us maintain the dormitory for next year and beyond, so we would appreciate your support! Thank you very much for everything that you do for us.