Roger Rabbit Reunion at Disney

Doy, Alex, Nik Ranieri, Ross Anderson, Burny Mattinson, Max Howard, Charles Fleischer, Andreas Deja

Who Framed Roger Rabbit was released in the summer of 1988, making the movie 31 years old this year.  On Friday at Disney in Los Angeles we had an informal reunion with some the people who worked at the film, hosted in the Rotunda Building by Disney marketing head Howard Green.  Lead animator Andreas Deja was there, as well as Burny Mattinson, officially the longest serving employee of The Walt Disney Company,  Producer Max Howard, Charles Fleischer, the voice of Roger Rabbit, Ross Anderson, who has written the history of the film, animator Nik Ranieri, and me.

Medusa Thumbnails by Milt Kahl

Thumbnails by Milt Kahl

Andreas Deja's animation blog, Deja View, is a treasure trove of information about the Golden Age of Disney animation, and in particular the work of Disney's "Nine Old Men".

In a recent blog post, Andreas has uncovered the thumbnail sketches that legendary animator Milt Kahl used to animate his classic scene of Madame Medusa, the villainess of The Rescuers, removing her false eyelashes in the mirror.

The scene is one of Milt's best; a shot I often show in class to illustrate the importance of great acting choices in character animation.

Pixar Animation Workflow by Michal Makarewicz

Michal Makarewicz

Pixar animator Michal Makarewicz was at the CTN Expo in Los Angeles yesterday, running a masterclass in Pixar animation and explaining his own personal animation workflow.

Michal is an experienced character animator whose animation credits include Incredibles, Ratatouille, Wall-E and Incredibles 2.

Michal won an Annie Award (the animation Oscars) for Best Character Animation on Ratatouille back in 2008.

How to Get Ahead in Animation - Tonight

Tonight in London the Royal Television Society (RTS) are hosting a free event titled "How To Get Ahead in Animation".

A panel of animators will discuss the wide variety of options open to those with a passion for animation.

Members of the panel during this event will share stories of their careers, the highs points (and the low points) and how to land that crucial first job in the industry.  To book your free place visit https://rts.org.uk/event/how-get-ahead-animation for more details.

Stratostorm Animation Comes to London

Tomorrow night in London the founders of Stratostorm are making a presentation about the creation of their award-winning animation company.

The event takes place at Escape Studios, and is completely free. As always, we recommend our students attend events like this one; it is a great opportunity to find out how the industry works and also an opportunity to develop industry contacts.

Tribute to Richard Williams Sat November 23

CTN Expo in Burbank, Los Angeles, is hosting a tribute to my father, the animator Richard Williams on Saturday November 23rd.

The tribute is titled "Life is on Ones", and the panel is being hosted by my old friend and colleague Tom Sito, who is an animator, director and professor - as well as the author of many books on animation. 

Blue Zoo: Real Time Rendering

Blue Zoo's Tom Box at BlueGFX Expo

Blue Zoo's Tom Box explained the Blue "real-time animation pipeline" at today's BlueGFX Expo, exploring new ways to speed up the animation process.

Tom described Blue Zoo as a studio that, since its inception, has "refused to accept industry standards", and has forged its own path in the industry.

Recently Blue Zoo have been pioneering the use of real-time rendering using Unreal Engine - trying to find ways to make the production process faster and more efficient. 

Cartoon Movie 2020: Deadline 20 November

Our student animators at Animation Apprentice are film-makers as well as animators, and many are developing their own ideas for original films and TV Series.

Of course, financing idea projects isn't easy, but the annual Cartoon Movie event in France is a good place to begin.

Why Animators Should Be On Linkedin

Tiffany Feeny, Ted Ty, Alex Williams, Jan-Bart Van Beek

How do animation graduates break into the industry?

At this week's VIEW conference in Turin I was invited onto a recruitment panel hosted by New York's School of Visual Arts, hosted by SVA's Director of Career Development Angie Wojak.

Also on the panel was the recruiter Tiffany Feeney of Talent Outpost, an independent recruitment agency based in Switzerland.

Tiffany's big message to recent graduates looking for work?  "Be on Linkedin".

Secrets of the Spider-Verse at VIEW

Peter Ramsay at VIEW: Into the Spider-Verse

The highlight of last week's VIEW conference in Turin, Italy, was a talk by Peter Ramsey, co-director of Spiderman – Into The Spider-Verse.

Ramsay's talk was sub-titled “What Story are You Telling?”, and he showed the audience how the answer to that question informed every frame and every pixel of the Oscar and BAFTA winning movie.

Spiderman – Into The Spider-Verse re-invented the Spiderman franchise, and achieved a unique comic book-style look for the world of Spiderman.  How did they do it?

Funny Fail Stories of Animation & VFX Tonight

Funny Fail Stories is back in London tonight - book your seats for tonight, Tuesday 29 October for tales of failure from the world of animation and VFX.

Hosted by animator and director Simone Giampaolo, this event takes place at Zigfried Von Underbelly at 11 Hoxton Square, London N1, just a 5 minute walk from Old St Tube station.

Speakers bringing tales of disaster and near-disaster in the animation and VFX industry include Alina Bopele from Studio AKA,  Sabina Janetzka from Cinesite, and Stefano Marrone from Nucco Brain.

The event is also supported by the London chapter of SIGGRAPH.  Tickets are free and you can book them here.

Belgis Al-Mahdiova 3D Animator at Studio 68

Many congratulations to Belgis Al-Mahdiova who has landed a job as a 3D animator and digital artist at Studio 68 Creative.

Studio 68 Creative specialises in 2D and 3D animated intros, motion posters, kinetic typography, and character, animal & creature animation

Belgis took our 30 week course at Animation Apprentice, developed her demo reel, and then applied for positions as an animator.

Adobe Premiere Pro - Basics for Animators

At some point every animator needs to learn the basics of video editing.  Premiere Pro, made by Adobe,  comes bundled as part of the Adobe Creative Suite.

Animators need Adobe Premiere mainly to cut (and re-cut) their demo reels and - of course - to make short film projects.

Premiere is also needed to create movie files from a batch render of images. Let's say you are lighting and rendering your scene with Arnold, the ray tracer that is currently bundled with Maya. Arnold will not render out a movie file (such as a avi or mov) directly; instead, you must render still images in a sequence.  To turn those still images into a movie file, you need Premiere (or some other editing software). Here is how to do it.

Character Walks - Animating The Zig Zag Walk

Above is a series of shots I animated during my two years working as an animator on "The Thief and The Cobbler", the never-quite-finished feature film that is sometimes described as "the greatest animated film never made". The ZigZag walk was my one of first assignments as a junior animator, and it was a tough one to figure out. The walk contained a lot of different elements all moving together in sequence but on different timings, hard to pull off and hard to get right.

Aardman Model Making Workshop on Saturday

Aardman animation are coming to London, bringing two model making workshops this Saturday 12th October.

The workshops are one hour long and take place at 4pm at the Hackney Picturehouse (see flyer below) and at 3.45pm at The Ritzy in Brixton (see flyer left).

The workshops form a part of the Aardman Animation day, which includes screenings and activities for kids, starting at 10.30am.

The afternoon workshops are for adults only and will be led by two senior model makers from Aardman; Claire Cohen and Ellie Hugill.

Claire and Ellie will give an insight into stop-motion animation and what it is like to work at one of the UK's most enduring and well-loved animation houses.

Blue GFX Expo November 12th

It's that time of year again. Blue GFX Expo 2019 is taking place in London on Tuesday 12th November.

As ever, we strongly recommend that any of our students who are in the London area attend, so that they can catch up with latest in animation, VFX & Games.  You can buy student tickets for just £15 here.

Meet Thep - New Free Mummy Maya Rig

Meet Thep!

We're liking this cartoon mummy rig named Thep; he's fun and cartoony and you can get a great performance out of him. You can find him here for free download at the Squiggly Rigs official site.

Thep is the first character made with the Squiggly rig system.  Built to allow plenty of flexibility and exaggeration, Thep comes "equipped with some cool features to allow him to act as cartoony as possible without losing appeal".

Thep is a good choice for students starting on acting and lipsync; he works well with a cartoony voice, such as one from the Sesame Street wav archive.

Consider Thep for acting and pantomime shots, or for short dialogue scenes; he has good facial expressions and a wide variety of mouth shapes.

How to Get Started in Animation

Animation Studio by Helen Piercy

One question I get asked often is this "My kid loves animation - what subject should they study at school?".

And also - "how can I teach my child animation?".

Parents tell me that their 13-year old is really into animation, but doesn't know what they should do to realise that goal.

Today, animation is a mix of art and technology.  So, art subjects, such as Art GCSE or Art A level, will help, as will tech subjects, such as IT or computer studies.

Autodesk Launches "Maya Indie License"

Autodesk has launched the "Maya Indie License", allowing students who have learned to animate using the free student version of the software to enter the marketplace at a much-reduced price.

This new low-cost commercial license costs just £275 for a single seat, and is good news for graduates of Animation Apprentice; Autodesk now offers junior animators the chance to "become a pro at a price you can afford".

How to Install the ParentMaster Plugin

Installing plugins in Maya can be a fiddly process, and often needs troubleshooting. And, worse, every time Maya updates their software, you have to re-install all the plugins you installed a year ago. Above is a handy short video showing how to install the free ParentMaster plugin by Paolo Dominici to the latest version of Maya - Maya 2019. The Parentmaster plugin is very useful for attaching and un-attaching objects. Say you have a character who picks up a phone, and then puts it down again. For this, you need the ParentMaster. To see more about how to install the Parentmaster plugin, see this blog post.

Reel talk Live in London on Sept 25th

Nothing is more important for students breaking into the industry than a great demo reel.

We're recommending that our students in the London area attend "Reel Talk Live" on Wednesday September 25 at 6:30pm in Central London.

"Reel Talk Live" is a free event in which professional animators review alumni demo reels and discuss the Do's and Don'ts of demo reels.

Industry guests include representatives of The Third Floor, Jellyfish Pictures and Creative Assembly.

A student's demo reel is the key to finding work in our industry. All are welcome, and you can book your free place here.