Jerry was gracious enough to take time out of his busy schedule to answer some questions for Animation School Review.

What are you up to these days?

I’m editing a new book, Animation Art, a giant illustrated history of animation from Little Nemo (1908) to Finding Nemo (2003) that will be out in October. I’m also working on bonus materials for the next Looney Tunes Golden Collection and a Tom & Jerry DVD. I’m developing a new cartoon show for Nickelodeon… [but I] can’t talk about that right now. I’m also updating my website Cartoon Research and my weblog Cartoon Brew.

What would you say are the “right” and “wrong” reasons to pursue a career in animation?

The “right” reason is that you love it. It’s in your blood. It’s all you can think about as far as a job is concerned. You love to draw, you love to create jokes, you love to create worlds and characters. The “wrong” reason is to get rich. The people who have made it have been very lucky. It’s very rare.

What are the biggest misconceptions outsiders have about working in the animation industry?

That it’s a lot of fun — well, actually, it is. But there is a lot of work involved and dedication on the part of the artists.

What skills are most important for an aspiring animation professional to obtain?

“Animation professional”? Make your own film. That’s the greatest piece of advice I can give anyone. Draw comics, storyboards, character models, record voices… Learn the computer, but it’s more important to develop your own ideas and make them happen. Do it. If you make a film, potential employers can see what you can do.

What are the most difficult animation skills to obtain?

Most people find drawing the most difficult skill. But the most difficult skill is the ability to promote yourself. Most artists are shy types. You need to have a bit of an ego, and confidence in your work.

In your experience, what are the most underrated skills in the animation profession today? And overrated?

Painting backgrounds is the most underrated skill — the artists who render the paintings do a great job that is literally in the background. Overrated — I hesitate to say the voice acting. They get a lot of attention — and this aspect of animated film is very important. And most of the voice actors I know are incredibly talented actors. But this aspect gets more attention than some of the more labor intensive parts of making the film.

Where do you see the animation industry moving in the next ten years?

It’s evolving now. 2-D hand drawn is still big on television and will remain so. 3D computer graphics will be in fashion for a while as animated features. I forsee 2-D coming back to theatres in a few years — but not as traditional Disney style. More like Yellow Submarine… it’ll evolve into an new exciting look and feel. Disney style will return further down the road.

What effect has the explosion of video games had on the animation industry?

Certainly more jobs. But video game computer animation takes its cues from TV and movie animation. I’d like to see video games innovate the art form, but I doubt that will happen.

How is the best animation talent being divided among game design, film, TV, and other genres?

Most true animation talent goes towards feature films or TV series.

If you could change one thing about the animation industry or the animation profession itself, what would it be?

I’m an animation historian — so my answer to this would be that more young animators need to be exposed to classic cartoons of the 1940s and 1950s. There is so much good stuff in the vaults at Disney, Warner Bros., MGM and others — almost none of it is on TV or cable these days. And only a smattering is on DVD.

Who is doing the best work in animation today and what about their work makes it “the best”?

Pixar — everyone there and everything they do. They are the “Disney Studio” of the 21st Century. Brad Bird (The Incredibles), Andrew Stanton (Finding Nemo) and, of course, John Lasseter (Toy Story) understand character animation and storytelling. John Kricfalusi (The Ren & Stimpy Show) is one of the greats. All of these guys love cartoons and it flows through their veins.

Who in particular should an aspiring animation student study or emulate?

Chuck Jones is a great role model. Smart, articulate — he was interviewed numerous times and wrote two books about his career in animation.

Fill in the blank: The future of hand drawn animation is _______.

…a long one. On television, in movies (down the road), commercials, video games, internet Flash animation… cartoon animation is animation.

What are the critical turning points in the history of animation?

Disney with sound (Steamboat Willie, 1928), color (Flowers and Trees, 1932), feature length films (Snow White, 1937), Tex Avery at MGM in the 1940s, UPA studio in the 1950s, Fritz the Cat (1972), The Ren & Stimpy Show

(1991).

What needs to happen for animated films to be treated equally with live action films in terms of credibility?

They are — when they gross over $300 million dollars U.S. Unfortunately the industry requires a blockbuster hit every time at the box office, or a Simpsons or Spongebob success for every TV show.

Best cartoon characters of all time and why?

Bugs Bunny because he does and says what we’d all like to do. Donald Duck, Betty Boop, Felix the Cat, Homer Simpson — we can identify with all of them and that’s what makes the best characters.

Who are the cartoon characters that could have become legends but, for whatever reason, didn’t? That is, who is underrated?

Screwball Squirrel — a Tex Avery character who was completely zany. Avery literally killed him off in his fifth cartoon.

The trend today seems to be for Hollywood to take old cartoons and make them into live action films. Turning it around, which live action TV show(s) or movie(s) would you like to see made into cartoons?

That’s a fun question… I’ve always wanted to see an animated version of Mystery Science Theater with animated characters making fun of bad 1930s cartoon shorts.

On Wayne’s World, Wayne and Garth used to have an ongoing debate about who was the sexiest cartoon character of all time (Pebbles Flintstone, Judy Jetson, etc). Who gets your vote? (Editor’s note: Garth once commented that his choice was Bugs Bunny in the episodes where he dressed as a woman!)

Jessica Rabbit, Betty Boop, Betty Rubble — I really liked the animation of Jane in Disney Tarzan feature.

Finally, your advice to an aspiring animation student?

Draw. Draw and watch old cartoons. Then draw some more.

The Fundamentals
First of all, you need a solid foundation in drawing — undoubtedly, the most important element of an animator’s education. All the computer skills in the world can’t mask a bad artist, so make sure that you find a program where you’ll spend the long, necessary hours honing your craft. Ideally, you’ll want a program that offer a combination of drawing opportunities — including life drawing, layout animation, and fundamental drawing studies.

In addition to drawing skills, you’ll need a program that covers the requisite animation skills like storytelling, layout, character design, direction, design, editing, acting and visual communication. Animation skills should include not only a knowledge of fundamentals (weight, movements, timing, reversals, motivational forces and thinking time, etc.), but development in posing, breakdowns, in-betweening, clean-up and special effects (wind, rain, shadows, water, explosions, etc.) as well. A general background in visual communication — including design, composition, texture, color theory — is also key.

And don’t forget science! Creating believable animation requires that you understand the properties and effects of gravity, momentum, inertia, friction, fluid dynamics, and so on. Knowledge of mechanical engineering principles and a thorough understanding of physics and mathematics are absolutely necessary. For example, the more you understand about mechanical linkage, sliding and rotational joints, power transmission, and so forth, the more realistic your machines will be. The same holds true for the anatomy and kinesiology of humans and animals.

The Secret about Software
Everywhere you turn, you hear about how computers are revolutionizing the industry. Computer animation — led by films like “Toy Story”, “Monsters, Inc.” and “Shrek” — have dominated Hollywood’s box office the past few summers. So it makes sense that any prospective animator should concentrate on learning the latest animation software packages, right?

Well… not really. The truth is that, while computers have become an increasingly large part of animation education, they’re no substitute for the fundamentals — learning the nuances of drawing, shading, lighting, and storytelling. While you should know enough about computer graphics to know how they work in general, you should avoid just learning packages of software. Today’s packages will be rendered obsolete as quickly as you learn them, and many studios use proprietary software that you can’t learn in school anyway.

Focusing on Film, Multimedia
If you intend to pursue a job animating for television or film, then you should probably look for a program that matches that interest and provides the background the potential employers are looking for. Check for programs that focus on traditional skills like drawing, painting, and sculpture, as well as “film knowledge” such as cinematography and composition. Find out how the school will help you build an effective portfolio of your work: not just a collection of assignments, but a well-developed presentation of your unique point of view, and your technical skills. You should also check to see how well integrated the school’s theatre and film departments are with their 2D and 3D art departments.

Likewise, if you want to focus on producing multimedia animation, you should find a program that covers the constraints and peculiarities of producing animation for the web, CD-ROM, and various other media.

Other Factors
There are numerous other factors to consider — the quality of faculty and facilities, school reputation, access to hardware and software, and, perhaps most importantly, cost (don’t forget: you need to eat too!). But as long as you keep these various factors in mind and remember to ask questions of school representatives, you’ll undoubtedly find a school from which to launch your animation career. Good luck!

Source: http://www.animationschoolreview.com/

2-D Animator
2-D Animation may sound old-fashioned in a day and age when computers are everywhere and 3-D animation has taken Hollywood by storm, but 2-D animation continues to be an expanding and popular medium — especially since classical 2-D skills are the foundation for most 3-D work. 2-D animators develop their skills through life drawing, composition, and perspective courses — studying proportion, line of action, structure, and basic anatomy — while working in areas as varied as animation, character design, clean-up, doping, modeling, slugging, and storyboarding.

3-D Animator
3-D animators are occupied with many of the same considerations at their 2-D counterparts — computers don’t get rid of the need for skills in life drawing, concept drawing, composition, character design, etc. 3-D animators will also deal more extensively with modeling, texturing, and lighting in a 3-D environment, often with the use of such software tools and packages as PhotoShop, SoftImage, Alias/Wavefront, Maya, and others.

Storyboard Artist
The Storyboard Artist interprets scripts to create storyboards. This usually means planning shots, visualizing the story before drawing it, and being careful to maintain continuity among the shots. Starting out on this career track as an assistant, you’ll typically start out by doing clean-up and revisions, eventually working up to preparing some parts of the story board under supervision. This work involves a lot of cutting and pasting, drawing and quick sketching, perspective and composition, and perhaps most importantly, story development and interpretation.

Layout Artist
The Layout Artist creates the foundation for the animation by rendering background layouts for each scene — usually referring to storyboards and additional research materials. These layouts don’t appear in the final production, but are critical for the positioning and perspective of the animation. Layouts are usually done with graphite pencil on punched animation paper; the aim is to provide a stage in which the animators will animate their characters and effects, as well as a blueprint or underdrawing, to be rendered in color by the Background Painters.

Inbetweener
Most artists enter the world of animation by starting as Inbetweeners — the artists that help the animators and animation assistants complete the action of a scene. It may not sound like much, but it’s an important step where you’ll learn the basics of animation. An inbetween is one of the transition drawings between two extreme drawings — the key drawings that distill the essence of an animated action. The inbetweens fill in the action between these key drawings. You’ll usually work in a team and learn to imitate the animator’s drawings and line quality.

Source: http://www.animationschoolreview.com/

Keep in mind that even the best computer skills won’t make up for sub-par drawing skills — don’t focus entirely on software (that may be obsolete within a few years) instead of studying the fundamentals! You should also note that, if you’re aiming for a job with one of the big feature animation studios, many of them (such as Pixar) use their own proprietary software.

Adobe Flash
In just a few short years, Adobe Flash has become the de facto standard for producing animation for the web. With vector-based content and streaming data, Flash movies are perfect for the web due to their (usually) quick download time. Adobe has turned Flash into a fairly robust, intensively interactive application environment — allowing developers to build entire e-commerce applications entirely in Flash. And with most current browsers shipping with the Flash Player, the majority of web users can access Flash content without having to download a plug-in.

Homepage: http://www.adobe.com/products/flash/
Trial download available? YES

Autodesk (Maya)
Maya is a powerful and complex 3D graphics program that challenges the skills of even veteran computer animation professionals — covering everything from modeling and texturing, to animation, character animation, rendering, and paint effects. Maya has been used for numerous film, video, and videogame projects, including Spider-Man, the Lord of the Rings, Star Wars: Episode I, and Gran Turismo 3. While Maya is a phenomenal tool, it’s almost overwhelming to an individual user — it’s really geared towards production houses.

Homepage: http://www.autodesk.com/maya/
Trial download available? YES

3D Studio Max (3ds max)
Powerful controls for realistic lighting, shading and dynamics, as well as texturing and scene management tools, have made 3D Studio Max a popular choice for next-generation video game development (XBox, PlayStation 2, GameCube, etc.). Though it’s showing up more and more in film production, 3ds max is often used for game development, and was used for such games as Grand Theft Auto 3, Halo, Metal Gear Solid 2, and many more.

Homepage: http://www.discreet.com/products/3dsmax/
Trial download available? NO

SoftImage|XSI
SoftImage|XSI is an industry-renowned 3-D nonlinear production environment that also has a large following in the film, commercial, and videogame markets. It boasts such features as an interactive crowd simulation pipeline to automate the creation of complex and heavy crowd scenes, hair and fur simulation tools, and direct support for Playstation2 and XBox development. No wonder it was used in films like Star Wars: Episode II and Moulin Rouge, as well as numerous video games.

Homepage: http://www.softimage.com/products/xsi/
Trial download available? YES (see ExperienceCD section)

LightWave 3D
LightWave 3D is smaller and more robust than its competitors — and often praised for being more intuitive and easier to use. It’s also used in everything from print, film, and web to industrial design, architecture and medical imaging. (A quick look at LightWave’s gallery shows its wide use in various industries.) It also includes a number of tools — soft-body dynamics, particles, hair and fur, unlimited render nodes — that other packages require you to buy separately.

Homepage: http://www.lightwave3d.com/product/
Trial download available? NO

Source: http://www.animationschoolreview.com/

One of the hottest job markets out there today is the field of computer animation. With technology getting simpler and its possible applications growing, the number of opportunities for you to become a computer animation professional is on the rise. It’s not as easy as just saying you want to be a computer animator, though. Knowing what skills, training, and experience it takes to be a success is the first step in achieving it.

Computer animation is a unique field in that it requires you to be proficient in both the creative and the technical processes. Having just one of the strengths isn’t enough; you need to be fluent in both the basics of art and the basics of computers.

A solid art foundation where you learn the fundamentals of drawing and color principle is the basis from which the rest of your creative education grows. From there, you can move into two- and three-dimensional illustration, and technical design. These are all important skills to have before actually venturing into digital media training.

With software packages becoming increasingly user-friendly, specific knowledge is no longer a prerequisite to gaining employment. It’s more beneficial to master the core skills that translate from program to program, such as motion capture and texture mapping. By concentrating on being comfortable in the digital medium as a whole, you can widen your employability by not limiting yourself to a program that could very well be defunct in a year.

While having a solid background in art and computers is vital to your success, so is being an effective communicator. As with any production of this kind, there is a substantial amount of pre-production that takes place, requiring you to interface with clients and co-workers in order to determine the structure of the project. Sound interpersonal skills make the difference between an automaton and an artist.

More so than many other fields, computer animation is ideally mastered in an academic environment. It’s possible to get the technical training on software packages at home, but not only does that require a lot of time and money, it also shortchanges you on the other skills that will make you a great employee. Having the tools is very different to knowing how best to use them.

Choose a school that will give you a well-rounded education. Because different colleges focus on different areas, deciding prior to selection what your career goal is will help you find the one that fits your needs. It should have trained and competent instructors, varied coursework, and a top-quality computer graphics lab. The latter will assist you in putting together a demo reel of your work, the most valuable asset in finding your first job.

Computer animation is a versatile industry, offering you a productive and exciting career. Whether your dream is to do the effects for the next Hollywood blockbuster or to design the next bestselling computer game, you can succeed as a computer animation professional if you enter it with the right tools and education.

Source: http://www.animationschoolreview.com/

Video games are about characters and the problems they face. That means as a video game animator, you need to know the rudiments of story telling. You need to know how a character reacts in a given plot situation, what drives the character, and how the character responds to any special rules (e.g. no gravity) that operate in the character’s physical world. You must be able to storyboard a character’s actions, or, in some cases, know how to create an animated character from the storyboard others provide you.

You also need technical animation skills. These all involve a degree of artistry, and can range from stop-motion, to hand-drawing, to 2d and 3d computer animation. 3d computer animation skills are especially important for gaming; you use them to depict a character’s interaction with an environment. Essential aspects of 3d animation include creating the character’s body type and physical poses, adding facial expressions to show emotions, creating gaming loops, and lighting the scenes the character takes part in. You may also have to lip-synch the character’s mouth to recorded speech.

Finally, you need to have professional skills as a video game animator. You might have to sell your video game idea to others. You will probably have deadlines you must meet. And it’s likely that you’ll need to be comfortable working with others, such as artists, programmers, script writers, and creative managers.

Source: http://www.animationschoolreview.com/

If you are interested in animation, there are a number of different animation styles you can use, including 2D, 3D, and stop-action. Each requires that you have skills in different kinds of technology. All require that you have artistic skills, either in drawing, or, for 3D styles, sculpting or building models.

2D animation is the traditional animation style, used in classic cartoons. It’s also used on many Web pages. If you are a 2D animator, you create a frame-by-frame representation of a character or scene, manually creating the image in each frame. If you’re creating a cartoon, you will likely draw each image using pen and ink. The images are then converted into film or video by a photographic process.

If you are creating an animation for a Web page, you can draw each image and scan it into your computer, you can draw each image using a graphics tablet stylus, or you can create images onscreen using graphics software. Once you have created the images, you can use software such as Flash for tying the images together into an animation that is deliverable over the Internet.

In 3D computer animation, you create a character using software. You move the character through a computer-generated three-dimensional world, tracking the character with an imaginary camera that can create a still image of the character from any angle that you determine. These still images are tied together to create the frames of the animation.

In stop-motion animation, you also create a 3D character. But this character inhabits the real world, not a computer. Stop-motion characters can be puppets, dolls, or clay figures (clay animation). For each animation frame, you must move the character, then shoot a picture of it with a movie camera or a digital camera. With a digital camera, you use software to tie the images together into an animation.

Source: http://www.animationschoolreview.com