Alex Bowden

Video Editor and Motion Graphics Artist

What does an average day at work look like for you?

I'm a video editor and motion graphics artist, so I work with the animation team, our visual effects artists, the audio team and the art director to create our trailers, behind the scenes videos and other video content for promotional purposes. There aren't any typical days and you never know what might happen, but a lot of my time is working on video concepts, editing and post production. There's also a lot of organisation involved to capture video of multiple players working together, particularly with the Wings trailer and now CQC. Elite Dangerous is a tough game to screenshot in action; cockpit shots can only ever be live gameplay.

What aspect of the game have you worked on that you are most proud of?

I've worked on all of the trailers since the Alpha combat phase of Elite Dangerous but the one I'm most proud of would have to be the Powerplay trailer, mainly because there's so much going on in that video. It's by far the most complex trailer I've ever worked on which made it challenging and great to see the final edit. I also really enjoyed the 30th Anniversary videos we created last year, they were a lot of fun and it was interesting to hear everyone's opinions on things. The out-takes were good as well.

What's your favourite thing about Elite Dangerous?

It has to be the scale of the game, it still amazes me now. A couple of weeks ago I went location scouting for any trailers we might make in the future – because that's something we have to do with our game – and there's so much of our game that just looks stunning. Whether it's an amazing twin sunrise, flying through a misty ice asteroid belt or some of the amazing coloured nebulas. I just want to go exploring all the time.

What was the biggest challenge you came up against during game development?

The biggest challenge with creating trailers for Elite Dangerous is that we are always creating something that is new in the game. That's a lot of moving parts whether it's a new ship being built, new UI being designed or the game mechanics themselves evolving. With so many people working on the game it can change around very quickly so we have to be able to make the trailer come together quickly in time for the launch of an update.

What have you learned from working on Elite Dangerous?

A huge amount. Before working on Elite Dangerous I had worked on platformers and adventure games on consoles and touch screen devices. Those were all quite straightforward to create videos for but Elite Dangerous is extremely complex. There's so much to learn about how the game works to create the videos we do. It's a real challenge and far more enjoyable as a result.

Federation, Empire, or Alliance? And why?

Well the Federation have very strict rules so that's no good, and the Empire think slavery is okay, so I'd have to go with the Alliance.

Tell the community a fun fact about yourself

I went to Australia and did some surfing at Byron Bay with a friend I had met out there. After a while he got out for a drink and as he looked back to the water he saw the fin of a shark swimming very close to me. He started waving madly but I didn't see him and just carried on. Seconds later though it jumped high out of the water... it was a dolphin, not a shark. So technically I've been surfing with a dolphin but I didn't see that either. I was too busy just trying to stay on the board.

If you could ask the community one question, what would it be?

I'd love to hear about the community's favourite Elite Dangerous streamers and YouTubers. I'm always interested in seeing how other people are filming our game, so who do you like? Tell us on our forums here.