Mark Ardington, an Oscar Winner.

One of my first unforgettable moments at NUA (Norwich University of The Arts) was the lecture given by Mark Ardington. On my first week as a NUA Student, I got the amazing opportunity to meet Mark Ardington, an Oscar Winner for the VFX in the movie "Ex Machina" (2015). He gave us a presentation of all the challenges he and his team had to go through in the movie. For example he explained to us that there were some parts of the movie that looked easy to create but in fact it wasn't. At the same time, Mark showed us some real shots from the film and how they were not working and described how they manage to fixed them. They use the technique called "Crazy Ik", which basically allows you to move a rig, in this case from the leg of Ava, the AI from the movie. This great experience showed me that I have to always focus on my goals and objectives because even though you're playing against big guys, if you give your 110% you can always win. That's the case with "Ex Machina", they beat up in the best VFX movies such as "Star Wars", "Mad Max", "the Martian", and among other big movies. This kind of achievements shows passion and dedication. There was a particular experience Mark shared with us. When they got nominated for the Oscar they couldn't believe it and when they went to the show, they were talking about who's going to win, Star Wars or Mad Max and when they said EX Machina it was a great moment for them.

Mark Ardington, it was a great pleasure meeting you.

Of Course, I needed to take a picture with him: