Chuck Grieb

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What is your name and your current occupation?
My name is Chuck Grieb; currently I am a tenured Associate Professor and head of the Entertainment Art/Animation concentration at California State University, Fullerton.

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
As a young college student I worked a slew of unusual and sometimes interesting jobs. One summer I spent as an Asbestos Remover. Another summer I spent working two jobs at once(75 hours a week), one as a Peer Tutor helping Learning Disabled students in a College Prep program, the other as an “Egg Cook” in a Perkins Diner. I spent a day working in a trash sorting facility and 4 weeks on an assembly line waterproofing nuts and bolts for the Navy. I also painted houses, delivered pizzas, waited tables, worked as an Assistant Theater Manager, as a Sound Mixer for live shows, photo tech, and various others.

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of? 
Hmmm, tough question. I am particularly proud of the work on Genie’s Great Minds, a project I worked on when I was a part of the Special Projects Department at Walt Disney TV Animation under the direction of Gary Katona. The Larry Boy show I worked on at Cornerstone Animation had a very challenging schedule, but was a very fun, if intense, work experience. My wife and I storyboarded an episode of Continue reading

Chris Burns

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What is your name and your current occupation? 
Chris Burns, Owner and Lead Animator of EXIT 73 STUDIOS (exit73studios.com).

 

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
The craziest job I ever had was as a carpenter/roofer. I worked with a bunch of super manly dudes whose life mission was to win concert tickets on the radio or Pick 4 lotto. The money was good, and you couldn’t beat the hours, but I knew pretty early on that I wanted to pursue a career in art.

 

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of? 
Hands down my favorite project was Transfurter. We had a lot of freedom with the designs and story, and it was a very homegrown production. I often compare this project to how a garage band works – very DIY, gritty, and a fair amount of improvisation. And just like a Garage band, that unkempt feel translates into something beautiful when it all comes together in the end. It’s truly satisfying.

 

Where are you from and how did you get into the animation business? 
I’m originally from eastern Long Island, which made my choice to go to SVA very easy. I interned at a bunch of Animation studios like B3, NOODLE SOUP, WORLD LEADERS, and 4KIDS ENTERTAINMENT. NOODLE SOUP, provided me with a job opportunity on the pilot episode of VENTURE BROTHERS. After school ended, I had my first Continue reading

Nico Colaleo

What is your name and your current occupation?
Nico Colaleo – animatic editor at Titmouse LA. Currently on the team for a new animated/action show for Disney Channel coming in 2012.

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
Hmm, a lot of your standard boring normal jobs. Cashier (retail slave) for 3 years. Restaurant waiter, for way too many years to mention. The most interesting job was being an Audio/Pyro Technician at a western-themed theme park. I sat in hidden booths during the cowboy stunt shows and played all the SFX/music with the mixing board and got to push buttons and make things explode for the audience. A pretty crazy job, but I got fired after 6 months for showing up late too many times (the park was in the middle of the desert, almost an hour outside of town!)

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
Most of 2010 I worked at the post studio that is responsible for digitally restoring all the classic animated Disney films for whenever they get re-released out of the Vault onto home video. During my time there, I got to help restore the Bluray releases of Alice in Wonderland, Bambi, Winnie the Pooh and Fantasia that are in stores now. So it feels pretty cool whenever I see those classic films on sale while I’m out shopping and to realize, “Oh yeah, I helped restore those!”

How did you become interested in animation?
Pretty much by growing up with the classics. Looney Tunes, Popeye, Tom & Jerry, Disney stuff. I’ve watched cartoons ever since I was a Continue reading

Randall Kaplan

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What is your name and your current occupation?
Randall Kaplan. I’m a filmmaker, animator, freelance artist and designer.  I’m making an animated horror film called ‘Boxhead’.

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation? 
I bar backed for a heavy metal bar (cleaning up vomit) and worked at Starbuck’s (cleaning up vomit). I also edited wedding videos for many years (not exactly true to my sensibility.)

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
Well, I’m very proud of my 5 original short films that were distributed in the anthology, ‘Beneath the Flesh’.  Aside from that, I worked as an editor on Beavis and Butt-head and also did some voices for the show. I’m very happy about that. I’m also very proud to have designed the creatures in an upcoming horror movie called ‘Crabs!’ Yes…that’s the title.  There was also this one wedding video I edited that was just gorgeous.

Where are you from and how did you get into the animation business? 
I’m from Brooklyn back when nobody wanted to go there. I grew up around animation. My mother is in the business and for many years I did my best to avoid it.  One day Continue reading

Craig Bartlett

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What is your name and your current occupation?
Craig Bartlett, creator and exec producer, Dinosaur Train, PBS Kids.

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
Matt Groening used to say that you need to do 10 years of awful jobs before you get to the good ones. I washed dishes, washed cars in the Northwest in winter, waited tables, worked in a pea cannery – that one was the worst. It was hot, steamy, deafeningly loud. And we were canning peas! Who eats canned peas?

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
I worked for Bob Rogers on several special-venue films, for worlds fairs – I made two short 360-degree films, one for Basque Spain and one for a Korean worlds fair that shot in seven locations around the world. We also did permanent installations like Mystery Lodge at Knott’s Berry Farm, and the Shuttle Launch Experience at the Kennedy Space Center for NASA. Those jobs were always fun because they got me out of town and out of our little entertainment bubble. Also I got to get intensely into subjects I was interested in, like the space program and Northwest Indian art.

How did you become interested in animation?
I grew up wanting to be an artist, so I went to art school in Portland for a traditional art education. But it seemed to me that the whole fine art world was too serious. Then I saw the “Tournee of Animation” that played in our art museum’s theater, and the short films I saw there seemed to combine fine art with storytelling, and they were just weirder and funnier than the stuff I was studying. So….. Continue reading

Michael Fry

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What is your name and your current occupation?
Michael Fry.  I write the comic strip Over the Hedge.  And I’m President of RingTales LLC.  RingTales animates print comics for all digital media.  We have the exclusive right to animate Dilbert, The New Yorker Animated Cartoons, Pearls Before Swine, Over the Hedge and many other comics.

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
I was fortunate to become a full time cartoonist a couple years out of college.   Before that I bar-tended, did a lot of freelance work.

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
The DreamWorks Animation version of Over the Hedge. Committed,  a prime time animated series of one of my other comics, produced by Nelvana.

How did you become interested in animation?
I’ve always wanted to see my characters Continue reading