We recently connected with James and have shared our conversation below.

Hi James , thanks for joining us today. Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.

Back when I was younger, I always found moving graphics and animation super fascinating. I would love to watch movies like In middle school, I finally got my hands on Adobe After Effects. I spent many days learning about different effects, watching tutorials (especially Video Copilot) and getting myself knowledgeable with the program. Flash forward to college, I started to find my love in 3D. At the time that I was in college, Blender started to become a viable option for people to create high quality animation. During Covid, it was my absolute obsession. I created different renders every week and kept at it for quite some time.

The biggest thing I wish I would’ve known would be that its okay to make mistakes. Often times my own perfectionism would get in the way of learning. I would focus on why something wasn’t good rather than working on a solution or trying something different. Over time, I dedicated time to learning other art mediums such as charcoal/graphite. That has been very helpful in understanding that art is a process and a journey, not a destination.

James , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

While I do spend a lot of time working in 3D and motion graphics, I’ve also had lots of experience with photography/videography/creative direction. Often times, I have clients reach out to me about work from a variety of things from photography to color correcting short films to creating VFX for feature length movies. I really enjoy having new experiences to learn about different creative practices, so the variety of work is something I like. Its also very valuable to the people who hire me. Once I develop a working relationship with them, having the ability to work in numerous creative fields has opened me up to various opportunities that otherwise I wouldn’t have had.

However, the thing that is my bread and butter as a creative is lighting and color. Not only is it the thing I have the most fascination with, it also is the thing that I understand the deepest. Its an aspect that transcends all of the creative things that I do and its the part of the creative process I always enjoy.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

My main goal is to work on creative things with creative people. Some of my closest friends are very creative individuals and being able to collaborate with them to create something together is very fulfilling to me. I would love to find myself in a lifestyle where I get to create with these individuals and support them.

Any resources you can share with us that might be helpful to other creatives?

Talking with other creatives and taking some mentorship opportunities has been so beneficial for me as a creative. I’ve found that no matter how successful one creative person is, lot of them started somewhere and have varied stories. I find its easy to fall into a cycle of feeling isolated especially when projects are in full swing. Being able to connect with people helps me to realize our creative journeys are really intertwined and that there are many different ways that we can all support each others journeys. It been the biggest factor in my growth as an artist.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.jameshannamotion.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/foresought/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jhanna-motion
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@JamesHannaMotion