Podcast Link : Medical Animator Podcast
Scientific Art offers a creative medium to understand science, because visualizations are more effective than words and data.
Mangesh Palkar, our next pathbreaker, Assistant Manager – Graphic and Animation at Biorad Medisys Pvt Ltd, creates Product Animations, Surgical Animations & Product Renders for a wide variety of products in Urology, Ortho, Artho, Gastro & Neurology.
Mangesh talks to Shyam Krishnamurthy from The Interview Portal about beginning his career in gaming, and then deciding to specialize in medical animation after realizing the challenging & fun aspects of communicating technical concepts !
For students, Medical Animation is still a nascent field in India, which means the opportunities are tremendous as long as you enjoy problem solving with creativity !
Mangesh, your background?
I grew up in a middle class family in Mumbai. My father was working in a bank & mother is a housewife. I was better than average in studies. Drawing has been my hobby since school days.
What did you do for graduation/post graduation?
After completing my school, like many kids, I was also clueless about choosing a career. Engineering was too far from our thoughts because of the high fees & lack of guidance. Science & Commerce were popular at that time (2004). Since my siblings were studying commerce, I also followed their path and completed my graduation in commerce.
What made you choose such an offbeat, unconventional and cool career?
In all these academic years, one thing I knew was that I was good at drawing & painting. But I had no idea about animation & fine arts based careers in those days. During my last year in college, I saw an article about the animation industry in the newspaper & loved it.
(Medical animation was nowhere at that time.)
How did you plan the steps to get into the career you wanted? Or how did you make a transition to a new career?
My father was not in favour of animation, so he refused to pay for the course. I decided to do a job post my graduation to save money for the course. I worked for one & half years in an IT Company in their operations department. By then, I was pretty sure that I can’t work like this for a long time. So I decided to leave my job & do a 3D animation course from MAAC.
Before I finished my animation course, I got a job offer from a gaming company. So I immediately took it. After one year of starting my animation job, recession came & I was jobless. It was a tough time.
Gaming studio was my first choice as I wanted to be a Character Modeller. Luckily, I got my first job as a 3D artist in a gaming studio Dimension-Z. It was a small gaming studio. I worked on an Australian simulation game. My job was to model & texture low poly environment objects. I learned good industry techniques there.
But I wanted to work on characters, meanwhile I did small freelance work for Elemental Crafts .As they were planning to start a game project, they offered me a job. I joined elemental crafts, but after a few months I felt that the game project was difficult to start, as they were more focused on Architecture walkthrough. So I left this job. I did some freelance work for Hurix Systems in my free time. They had offered me a job after work. But I said no.
The only thing in my head was working in a gaming studio. I was very clear about it. But luck was not on my side. I decided to take a 2-3 month break & update my showreel. Then I got a chance in Maya Entertainment. But my job was in the rendering department on the night shift. I accepted it, as I was jobless, and because I thought I could enter the modelling department once I start working in the company.
This was the Recession period (2008). Lots of studios were removing staff. Lots of new joiners had to leave. I was struggling to find a job. My dream to join a gaming studio started fading. At one point I felt that I made the wrong decision by getting into animation. It was a very tough time for me.
In difficult times, follow your brain & not heart.
IT companies were doing well at that time, even in the recession period.
I called Mr Harish Jaiswal from Hurix Systems whom I knew during my freelance work. He was the Head of the creative department. I asked him if there was still a vacancy in his company. He said yes, and that they were working on a K-12 (e-learning) project & were hiring 3d artists. I thank him for giving me this opportunity at that time. This is where I first saw medical animations.
I was one of the first five 3D artists they hired, later on the team got bigger to around 40. So I became Team Lead.
It was the best time.
We were making digital content for all subjects. I was working on the Biology subject. I used to get reference animation made by medical animation companies like Hybrid, Nucleus Medical, and Random 42 etc, which were very good. I had not seen such animations before. There was so much creativity in those animations, it was challenging & fun at the same time , doing such animations. I used to watch a lot of medical animations to get ideas. I had found my new interest.
HCL was a partner in this project. In 2012, they took over our department & our entire team. That’s how I got into HCL. After one year of takeover, they closed this project and we all were asked to leave.
How did you get your first break?
When I was in HCL, one US client saw my medical images on Linkedin. He asked me if I could create similar stock images for him. I said yes, it was my first break in medical animation.
I decided to stick to medical animation only & make it my speciality.
But there were no medical animation companies in India at that time. So I started applying out of India for a job. I also did a diploma in Visual Communication during this period to upgrade my design knowledge.
What were some of the challenges you faced? How did you address them?
Challenge 1:
The US, UK & Canada have many medical animation companies because there is a lot of demand for such animations. But they take only those who have work permits or who are medical animation / illustration certified. Few suggested that I become a certified medical animator by doing a course in US / UK University, which was costing around Rs 20 Lakhs in 2012. I could not do it because it was way out of my budget. Also, I was a BCom, & not a BSc graduate. So I dropped this option.
Slowly, I started getting freelance work from medical animation companies in the US & Europe. After 5 years of freelancing, in 2017, I started my own animation company called MEDanimation. MEDanimation is a one stop solution for all medical animation needs, be it MOA (MoA animation videos are videos that visually explain how a drug or device acts within our body to exert its action), Device Animation, Surgery or Patient Education. We can produce complex & high quality animations.
After some time, I started getting medical animation projects from Indian Biotech & Medical device companies. I had a website, but it’s down now.
You can see my work here.
https://www.youtube.com/@med-animationmedical6533
There are hundreds of images of my work, but I can’t put them all here ☺. Adding a few.
Challenge 2:
Medical Animation in India is still a niche market. A very small section of Indian medical companies are doing animations of their products because of budget restrictions & prevalence of traditional marketing methods. But this is changing slowly. Indian Companies have started understanding the benefits of medical animations.
Where do you work now?
Due to personal reasons, I had to close my studio. I currently work as Assistant Manager- Animation in a Medical Device Company in Pune. We have a wide variety of products in Urology, Ortho, Artho, Gastro & Neurology.
What problems do you solve?
I and my team make Product Animations, Surgical Animations & Product Renders.
What skills are needed for your role? How did you acquire the skills?
You need to be a good 3D Artist / Generalist, which means you should be able to do everything, including modelling, texturing, animation, editing. You will find very few tutorials of medical animation, so you have to learn on your own, like problem solving. It’s just that if you know how to use 3D software tools well, you can do it. I work on 3D Max & V-ray , Cinema 4D is also very good for medical animations.
What is it you love about this job?
I love it because I get to know medical & technical aspects of so many different products & diseases. Each product & surgery is different, so every approach is different and so are the difficulties, which keeps my creativity & mind active.
I like working on Microbes the most, because it’s very colourful & gives more scope for creativity, as you see things at a very micro level.
How does your work benefit society?
Medical Animations are required to
- Train medical professionals.
- Educate patient about disease or surgery
- Market product
- Showcase new concepts & ideas
Tell us an example of a specific memorable work you did that is very close to you!
In 2011, after looking at my work, one of my US clients asked me to create stock medical images. I created 3 images for him for which he paid me $21. It was my first international payment. After that, for more than 10 years, I produced medical images & animations for him. He became one of my main sources of income.
Your advice to students based on your experience?
My advice is try to find out your likes & dislikes, your skills during your school days. Based on that, choose a career. Choosing a career is a very important decision in life, so choose it wisely.
Medical animation is a very good career option. If you are very good at drawing and like science, then you can choose this field.
In India, you don’t need a degree in medical animation to accomplish your job. So you will hardly see any courses in India. You can learn 3D animation & create a medical animation portfolio to apply for jobs in India. You will also get good freelance work if you are good.
In the US, UK, Canada, medical illustration and animation has been a very well known career for a long time. You need to do a certified course to work as a medical animator. You can find a lot of renowned universities there which are offering such courses. It is a three year post-graduation course. As per my knowledge, you need to be BSc or HSc (science) to apply for this course. Medical animator Salaries in the US, UK are in the range of Rs 40 Lakhs to 80 lakhs per annum or more, as per experience.
And my last advice is, try to be an expert in one thing you like. And be flexible to adapt to the situations.
Future Plans?
No future plans, Just going with the flow. That’s how I am living.