Start: Martin Hebert

Studio: Exient Entertainment
College: Palacky University Olomouc, Faculty of Education

My name is Martin Hebert.  Currently, I’m working as lead animator for Exient Entertainment in Brno, Czech Republic.  I have also served as Lead Animator for Vatra Games (Silent Hill Downpour, Rush’n Attack), 2K Czech/Illusion Softworks (Moscow Rhapsody) and Pterodon (Vietcong 2).

I came into the game industry ten years ago in a rather unconventional way.  My education isn’t art-related at all.  My schooling, which focused mostly on math and engineering with Faculty of Education, didn’t give me much useful art knowledge, except self-management skills.

I have always played video games, but I never knew how they were actually created.  I accidentally stumbled across some information on a 3D artist forum, read a few tutorials (despite suffering from poor English skills), and once I had created something in CG, I became very interested in the whole process.  Since that moment, 3D modeling became my hobby.

The 3D artist community in my area used to hold regular meetings and conferences, and I decided to start attending some of them.  The very first one I attended was the reason I became an animator.  Most of the attendees were amateurs like myself, but one in particular was just an old dreamer who didn’t know anything about 3D; he simply had a dream to create a short 3D movie.  As there were only a few good artists available at that time, he offered to pay for courses for a few of us who were just 3D fans, so that we could create that short for him.  Good opportunity, so why not take it?

Now, I can tell you that creating a short film using only beginner artists was a very naïve idea.  However, while that guy lost a good sum of money and we didn’t actually create anything worth watching, he did give rise to a generation of great artists, many of whom are successful in the film and game industries.

I don’t know why but this visionary told me: “you are going to be an animator,” without knowing anything about me.  I agreed, and it was the most important decision of my professional life.

At that time, I had been working as a lead lift engineer for a small company, and I probably would have continued on with them if our boss had been better and the company had not gone bankrupt.  I was desperate to find a new job, so I was looking for any available opportunity.  It so happened that Pterodon (Vietcong) was looking for animators.

There was only one school for animators in the Czech Republic.  Because our education system is very conservative, the school only taught traditional 2D animation at the time, therefore 3D animators were very rare, which increased my chances to succeed.

Thanks to that old guy who decided I’d be an animator, I have successfully entered the game industry.  At that time, Pterodon was working on Vietcong 2.  I was involved in every facet of the game’s animation, working under Petr Mores, a great animator most recently working for Crytek.  It was he who taught me most of what I know about animating, and of managing people.  It was also he who decided I would be a lead animator for the next project, even though I didn’t have the experience for such a job.  “Throw the man into the water and let him learn how to swim,” we often say, and even though it’s a difficult way to learn, I think it was the best.

I’m grateful that I met the right people; people who pointed me in the right direction so that I can be a part of this fantastic industry.

One word of advice for future animators:

Try everything; you don’t know what your destiny is.

Start: Justin Rosenthal-Kambic

Studio: Telltale Games

College: Ex’Pression College for Digital Arts

So when I saw that Travis had started up this blog with the intention of giving voice to his animator friends to relay their stories of how they, well, started the whole animating thing… I thought, “Hey, I’m sure I have something worthwhile to share. Right?” Now after reading through some of the previous posts of super talented artists, I’m not quite sure how my story will fit in? But hey, let’s find out together!

Oh, and I’m not so much of a “writer,” more of a “write-like-I-talk-er,” so you know, just imagine me talking about all this… Thanks for bearing with me.

Anyways, I didn’t grow up dreaming of being an animator. I mean, sure I grew up on cartoons like the rest of us, and I loved all that stuff - everything from classic Disney to uh, classic Snorks? I don’t know, but cartoons and animation (of questionable quality, perhaps,) have been in my life ever since I was a kid, as were video games, but more on this in a bit.

As I said, I didn’t grow up dreaming of being an animator. I dreamt of being a rock star. I had a little 3-piece band back in high school that was as grungy and punky as the mid 90’s could offer. Just imagine Nirvana and Green Day mashed together like there was no tomorrow. Oh, and also imagine ’96 is your senior year. Oh yeah. Good times. But as with all good times, they come to an end, but not before an indie record label helped us record and put out an album! We played shows throughout SF and even drove down to LA for a weekend of shows. It was great. Such fond memories...

Sorry – I’ll get back on track now. So while that didn’t really come to fruition, we had a fun time of it. Once we all graduated it was determined that college was what came next, (much to my disappointment,) but hey, education, it’s a good thing. So anyways, I decided to put off jumping back into school because I really didn’t know where or what I wanted to do. At the time I was working at Noah’s Bagels, and I know what you’re thinking, “Bagels are pretty awesome,” and while you would be correct, bagels weren’t really the career-path I was hoping for. But again, as it turns out, that was where I first heard of this place called Ex’Pression Center.

A guy who used to work with us at Noah’s quit and took off for school, (smart move on his part,) and at some point after that, he stopped by to visit and told me that Ex’Pression had a “bitchin’ audio program” and that I would probably “really dig it.” That’s how I remember him saying it at least; he was that kind of guy. So I eventually warmed up to the idea and went in to one of Ex’Pression’s open-house events. It was then that I knew what I wanted to do from here on out.

While I started on the tour of the audio-program, my epiphany came when I walked past one of the windows and peered into the lab packed with students and rows upon rows of glowing CRT monitors. I saw 3D models of half-built creatures and environments tumbling about on screens as their creators sat, in some bizarre meditative state, transfixed on their work. Everything looked like pieces of the video games I had grown to love (in an almost-obsessive manner) over the years. “That is what I want to do.” I thought. “I want to make video games.” And soon after that, I became enrolled in Ex’Pression Center for New Media’s “Digital Visual Media Program” (Editor’s Note: The school has been rechristened “Ex’pression College for Digital Arts,” and the DVM program has been retitled “Animation and Visual Effects).

The next 14-16 months were a blur. I hear now the schools courses are far expanded past what I was familiar with – with an actual Game Development program and whatnot. But whatever, I was getting a crash course in Media that was Visually Digital. Honestly, it was was a pretty intense and amazing experience, and by the time I graduated, I had found my calling as an animator. Making stuff move was my thing. As a kid, I spent countless hours playing with action figures; manipulating He-Man and G.I. Joe figures in my tiny hands to create epic slow-motion fights where each impact of their plastic feet sent me bending and twisting the figures about as I imagined each part of their body would react to such a devastating kick… I was still doing the same thing only this time, on a computer. So, you know, now it’s respectable.

After graduation, it was a month or so until I found my first home at a game studio. And now after all my rambling, (and for those of you still reading,) let me impart my first bit of wisdom. “Don’t turn down opportunities, even if you think you already know you’re not interested.” I got the chance to interview with a couple of artists from a company called Digital Eclipse. I hadn’t heard of them and before the interview I looked them up online, as anyone should always do. Digital Eclipse was a little independent studio that at the time, focused on Game Boy games and arcade ports. Now pixel art and Game Boy games are great, but that wasn’t at all what I had just gone to school for, and there was part of me that was thinking on just skipping the interview all together. Again, “Don’t turn down opportunities. Especially if you don’t know where those opportunities will lead to.” I realized it would be ridiculously dumb of me to not go, and so I went in for the interview. As it turned out, their studio was in the process of merging with another to become Backbone Entertainment, and they were looking to assemble a team of 3D artists for a brand new IP. That sounded pretty cool. (FYI - Now that I’ve been in the industry for 9 years, I’m very aware that getting that kind of opportunity, especially right out of the gate, is super rare and probably the dream of every developer. That’s pretty much what we all want; to get the chance to work on something new. To create something unique.) So as luck had it, they were impressed enough with my work to bring me aboard. And the rest, as they say, is history.

Anyways, I’m an animator. That’s how I started.

One word of advice for future animators:

“Don’t turn down opportunities.”

http://www.jxrk.me

@JxRK

Start: Ryan Chan

Studio: Ubisoft Entertainment
College: Ex'pression College for Digital Arts

My name is Ryan Chan and I'm currently a Mocap Technician at Ubisoft Entertainment.

Okay, I know what you're thinking. Mocap?? I'm here to learn about animators and animation and how animators got started in animation and how they animate, animation animation animation! Well, before you beat me with your pencil (or mouse, for the 3d animators) and shove me out of the internet, let me tell my story a bit.

For as long as I could remember, I wanted to be an animator. I grew up watching everything Disney, from the classics like Pinocchio and Jungle Book, to the golden age films like Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin (one of my personal favorites), to Disney Afternoon when I got home from school. It was my lifelong dream to animate for the Disney company and I thought I would start my skills early. My favorite toy as a kid was my zoetrope, and instead of reading my school textbooks, I would draw flipbook animations in the corners of the pages. I even tried making an animated movie of Mickey Mouse blinking by setting up my parent's camcorder on a chair and quickly pressing record and stop to capture "frames" of my drawings tacked up on the wall. Needless to say, that didn't work too well.

But even the most saturated of childhood dreams can become washed as you get older and other priorities and interests invade your life0. So, for a while, I sort of moved on from that dream. After high school, I decided to forgo college, and I picked up some jobs here and there until I settled on what I thought would be my career in commercial insurance, funny enough working for my dad's office. I even got my broker's license before I was legally able to drink in the country. But one day, it sort of struck me. Maybe it was the endless administrative work, or the commuting to a financial district every day that made me realize that I was not doing what I was meant to be doing. Soon after that epiphany, I enrolled to Ex'pression College for Digital Arts to learn Animation and Visual Effects.

I absolutely loved going to that school. I met some of my greatest friends there, and it was so refreshing to be around other creative minds, immersing myself in that cultivating environment. And a quick 2.5 years later, I graduated as Valedictorian, ready to charge into the industry.

However, it's not always as easy. Even with a half decent animation reel (at least I thought it was), it was hard to find animation work. So for a while I was working as an aid to my school, until 2 opportunities came up for me at the same time: An internship for Disney Interactive's Think Tank division, or doing motion capture clean up on a feature film for a "start-up" company (I only say that cause of technicalities. Really, the director building the studio already had Oscars in his cabinets, so I wouldn't say he was new at it). Honestly it was a hard choice. As you've read earlier, me working for Disney? Come on. I was beaming at the thought. But on the other hand, feature film, although at the time I was on my animation high horse and thought mocap was underneath me. But I wanted to work in features, so that's the job I took. And let me tell you, it was the best decision of my then non-existing career. Not to mention that the studio I worked for actually got picked up by Disney early on.

So to briefly bridge the gaps between then and now, I got to work on set of A Christmas Carol with Jim Carrey and some other amazing actors (highlight for me: brief encounters with Gary Oldman, Colin Firth, Molly Quinn of Castle and Cary Elwes..l just to name some of them). What started as a 4 month contract, turned to 6, which turned to indefinitely, which quickly got me to another position in the company as a Performance Layout Artist, building and laying out the scenes for the animators. Next thing I knew, I'm sitting in dailies with some of the top artists in the industry, with Oscar winners and a director who created cult classics, "Back to the Future" and "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?".  As Christmas Carol wrapped, we moved on to the next feature "Mars Needs Moms", and in the middle of production, we got the horrible news that our studio was being closed down once we wrapped the movie. That day, was a really rough day for everyone. Our studio had quickly become a family, and it felt like Mom and Dad had just split up. It doesn't go without a lesson though, that even the most secure situations (even some of the managers had closed escrow on nearby houses the week we heard the bad news) can be taken from you at any moment.

So that leads me to some advice for the people breaking into the industry. The one thing I always tell aspiring animators or vfx artists:  “be as flexible as you can be”. Take the job even if it's not exactly what you had planned for yourself. Be willing to move to places you'd never thought of moving to, as was the case for me; I moved down to LA to do mocap clean up (being a Nor Cal guy, I was instinctively opposed to that idea, but I opened myself to it). That taken opportunity led me to meeting and making friends with some of the best animators in the business, who I can confidently say will look at and critique my work whenever I ask (free mentoring anyone?). As a bonus, my job allowed me to be in the Animation Guild, which actually offered a grant for Animation Mentor for up to 2/3rds tuition. Not only that, but I also met some of my best friends there as well, and my network expands to all the best vfx companies in the world. And as an oh-so-sweet cherry on top, I fulfilled my dream of animating on a Disney movie. Okay so it was only 3 small shots, but I technically did animate on a Disney movie. Oh and let's not forget about the other cherry: the Disney employee Silver Pass. 

Any journey can take several different roads to get you to that same goal. Never expect the direct flight, as it rarely happens. Plus, you'll never know what else you'll discover on that journey. My ambitions and lifelong dreams of becoming an animator have led me past that goal. In fact, I now have no desire to be an animator (although I still love it, still do it from time to time and am actively involved in the animation community). During my journey I discovered a new love for story and all the visualization and building that happens before any performance is added by the animators, and it's nothing I would have expected when I was drawing flip animations in my textbooks all those years ago... but at the same time, it feels completely natural for me... that my path would ultimately lead me there. So, keep an open mind. I often hear of people wanting to do nothing but animation. That it's all they dream about and think about and they know they want to do that for the rest of their lives, so they want to fast track that goal by going straight into Animation Mentor or something similar.

Which leads me to my next piece of advice: School is only what you put into it. There is no silver bullet to getting that job you've always wanted, and yes, talent does matter. But it doesn't make it impossible. To be honest, it does irk me when I hear of a newly high school graduate excited to apply to Animation Mentor. My first thought is "you really want to spend the prime years of your life making friends through webcam and animating on a computer all the time?" Yes, perhaps you're doing your passion and there's nothing wrong with working hard for it. But I think the one thing most aspiring animators lose sight of is that animation has nothing to do with animation, and has everything to do with LIFE. That's probably why Frank and Ollie decided to call their infamous book "The Illusion of Life" and not "The Animation Bible" or something like that. Animation is only a tool to manifest life through the medium. And if your life is all about animation, how good can you REALLY be at emulating it? I know it might sound strange and harsh, but I beg you, learn everything you can about everything else other than animation, and your animation will become infinitely better, because only you can bring the experiences that you have and THAT will ultimately make your animations unique and alive. I mean, if you just hear any great animator talk about a scene that they animated, they almost never talk about their 2ndary action or the anticipation pose or what have you, but they talk about something they remember in their life that inspired that action.  One of my favorites?  Glen Keane talking about the first time Tarzan is "inspecting" Jane. When animating that scene, he thought of the first time he held his daughter in his arms; it's almost like seeing yourself for the first time. He exclaims that when he shows his daughter watching that scene, he tells her "that's not Tarzan looking at Jane, that's me looking at you". THAT is what it’s is all about, and no amount of school or mastery of the principles can teach you that. That's life experience. And that's ALL of what animation is.

So nowadays, I’m still in Mocap and I’ve actually grown to love it. Another one of those unexpected discoveries on my journey I guess. I get to consistently work on set and make friends with and interact with a lot of the actors. How can I complain? Plus, there’s always room to be creative on my free time, as I work towards making short films with some of my talented friends.

So all in all, best of luck on your journey. I hope that you might have found some inspiration on my story. And remember, there are many roads to get you to your destination. As long as you have a compass to move you in the right direction, you'll get there. Happy Animating!

One word of advice for future animators:

I’ve been lucky enough to gain experience in this industry and am able to share advice to people trying to break in, but the one piece of advice I wish someone told me from the beginning, is that outside of your dreams, is reality. I think it’s easy to mold these ambitions of one day working for Pixar or Disney, because that’s the underlying message of the movies that make us want to get into the field in the first place give: wishing upon stars and being saved by the handsome Prince; It’s always a happy ending. But the reality is that the industry is unforgiving and really competitive. More and more students are learning animation, jobs are scarce and/or moving overseas and companies are shutting their doors forever. It’s a great time to be an animator (online schools, mentoring and communities and blogs such as this), but it’s also a really bad time (for all the reasons above plus many more). So I would say, don’t ever forget that. Getting paid to do the work we do is eternally rewarding, but it also comes with a price that we all have to come to terms with, and the earlier you’re exposed to that, the better off you’ll be. Had I been privy to that from the beginning, I don’t think it would have shoved me off my goals (and if your passion is strong, it won’t). But I got through school on mostly talent alone and even though I worked hard to do the best I could, I wish I worked even harder. There was no better time to hone my skills, so if you’re in the position to just work on your art and learn exclusively, squeeze every last ounce of liquid from that lemon."

Start: Sam Baker

Studio: Mr. X

College: Ex'pression College for Digital Arts

My name is Sam Baker, an animator from California, and I'm currently working in Toronto on the remake of RoboCop.  Getting here was certainly not easy, and it took a good 5 years (after art school) of trying, failing, hustling, and pumping out as much animation as possible.

As a kid I was raised on Star Wars, Harryhausen movies, Wallace and Gromit, and of course everything Disney.  My mom was/is an art teacher, but I could never draw too well.  Making movies intrigued me though, so I started out with stop motion.  South Park had just come out, so I began with paper cutouts and moved up to claymation, pressing start-stop on a VHS-C camcorder with no frame grabbers or animation lunchboxes to be had.  This continued throughout high school, and at the time I wasn't sure what to focus on in college: film making or animation?  I decided community college was the way to go, and studied all kinds of art.  Film history, art history, video production, actual 16mm filmmaking.  When most of my classmates were sketching storyboards, I was roughing out stop-motion animatics of what I wanted to do, and someone said "maybe that's what you should be doing."

As it turned out, my college had a stop-motion class!  Immediately I knew this was a path I wanted to pursue, but the teacher (a legend! a hero! my idol!) basically said that it was a dying art.  He suggested trying computer animation, which I hated at the time, and I decided to give that a shot.  After opening Maya and playing around for a few months, that was it.  I was ready to focus on that, and the best option at the time was going to a specialized art school with industry connections.  My goal was to get a job doing this stuff, not just do it for fun.  So Ex'pression College in Emeryville, CA was the answer.  A little over 2 years later, I had a demo reel, decent knowledge of animation, and enough skill to get noticed.  It still took 6 months after I graduated to find an industry job (expect that!) but I couldn't have hoped for a better first job.

My career as a professional animator started at a game company called Factor 5.  I received an email from a recruiter at my school who saw the posting and relayed my info to her contact there, and viola!  I got really lucky.  Four contractors were hired, and I was chosen to stay on full-time.  Although this was an amazing experience and I learned a lot, it still wasn't film.  After Factor 5 shut its doors, I was unemployed more often than employed.  What they don't tell you in school is how unstable it is out there.  Most jobs are 3-6 month contracts (even shorter for commercials) and if you're lucky enough to find a staff position, who knows how long the company will last?  It was about a year before my big break came, and it was all due to connections.  As they say, "luck is when preparation meets opportunity."  I was fortunate enough to work on some creature stuff, and when my girlfriend at the time was hired by an Australian company, my reel was just barely good enough that I was able to go too.  Rising Sun Pictures, about 2 years of awesome film experience to follow!

It's easy to uproot your entire life when you're chasing a girl and have nothing tying you down, but being ready to move to the other side of the world for work is not a simple task.  It's quite expensive and stressful, but very exciting.  Being ok with becoming a traveling artist nomad will open so many more doors and create contacts who can help you get to even higher places in your career.  Would I suggest it if given the chance?  Absolutely.  It's not an easy life, but it's the one I chose because I really don't want to do anything other than animate. 

My advice to current animation students is to pump out as much as you can as often as you can.  The faster you work, the sooner you'll get good, and the more valuable you'll be in the workplace.  After a few months you'll have an epic reel and you'll be ready when luck come your way.  Cheers!
For Sam's reel, click: HERE

You were a wizard, Harry(hausen)!

Ray Harryhausen

1920-2013
"Ray, your inspiration goes with us forever."
Steven Spielberg

For more info, click HERE

Start: Alper Akşit

Studio: Double Negative Visual Effects

College: Animation Mentor

My name is Alper Aksit.  I'm currently working at Double Negative Visual Effects as an animator.  I've studied animation at Animation Mentor in 2008, although I didn't complete the course.Working in films was a long time dream for me so I went to college to study filmmaking. During my time there I started to grow an interest in visual effects and animation. Not having any lessons on the subject, I tried to teach myself about it and started playing around with the softwares used for visual effects and animation. This didn't really get me far but at least it tought me there are different areas of expertise and gave me a better idea on which one of these to focus. This was around the time when there was a popular Animation Mentor Showcase video circulating the internet, and seeing this made me think, this might just be the thing for me. 

So I enrolled to Animation Mentor and started learning from very talented animators working in the industry. Getting an education on the subject was invaluable. It saved me massive amounts of time and gave me the chance to meet many talented and inspirational artsts among teachers and fellow students alike. A year later, I've prepared a demoreel of my student work and started applying to some of the places I wanted to work at. I was offered a job at Double Negative shortly after and I've been working here since then.

My advice to animators just getting started would be; get an education if you can. While self teaching is possible, I think it is getting increasingly harder since there are so many schools around and the quality of student work is ever higher. Don't think of school as some place that just teaches you animation, it is where you can find friends on the same path and this will be a great way to motivate yourself and keep your excitement up.

Currently I am working on Thor: The Dark World. Here is a trailer of the film;

Click Here for the Trailer

Start: David Rodriguez

Studio:  ReelFX

College: San Francisco State University/ Animation Mentor

I got a BA in Fine Art (emphasis in printmaking) from SFSU in 2007.  After graduating, I started thinking of what I was going to do.  I was working as a secretary at an advertising company at the time.  I was planning on applying to The Academy of Art for a MFA in Illustration, but then came across Animation Mentor (AM) after reading about it on an animation blog.  That was on a Wednesday, and by Thursday evening, I had applied and was eager to start!  I kept working for the first two classes of AM, but then decided to live off my savings and not work for the last year of AM.  After 18 months, I went from knowing nothing about animation to being not horrible.  Unfortunately, I graduated at a less than ideal time, and not many places were hiring.  After graduating, I went to live with a friend in Switzerland for 2 months to finish my short film and relax.  After I got back, I worked odd jobs and took a class with Jean-Denis Haas at his Spungella workshop in San Francisco to properly finish my short film.  After that, I got a job at the Academy of Art of San Fransico, helping students in their animation computer lab with technical issues, all while continuing to work on my demo reel.  I was lucky enough to get inot a small private class with Michal Makarewicz (an Annie award winning animator from Pixar) and I kept learning and pushing myself.  Then on April 15th, 2011, I got a call from Rhythm & Hues: I had gotten into their apprentice program.  That was a great experience!  It was tough and I learned a lot about posing.  After the 1 month apprenticeship, I rolled onto Alvin and the Chipmunks 3 and learned a lot!  After that film, I moved to Norway for 3 months and spent time with my fiancee, moonlighting as a freelance animator at an ad agency, and took a class at iAnimate.net to continue learning  and getting better.  When I got back to the states, I got a job at Red5 Studios, working on Firefall (a first person shooter Massive Multiplayer game).  Six months into that job, out of the blue I got an email from a friend at ReelFX asking if I would be interested in moving to Dallas to work on their first feature film, "Turkeys".  By the time I had gotten married and my wife, who is also an animator, had moved from Norway to Southern California.  She wasn't too keen on being stuck at home all day without much of a network of people she knew beyond my family, and the idea of moving away from even that small network didn't sit so well.  So after I had my interview and got my offer from ReelFX, she applied as well -- she would soon be getting her work permit and could take a job.  I sent that email on Wednesday, and by the next Monday, she had had her interview and got an offer as well!  So that brings us to today.  My wife and I have both been at ReelFX since September 2012, and are loving it here!  We are both working on our first fully animated American feature film together: Free Birds!  Life is good!

Advice:

Work your ass off, but don't stress over things out of your control, and enjoy the ride, because after all, the ride is the best part!  Oh ya, and KEEP IT SIMPLE!

PS. Work smarter, not harder!