Animation Director Advice…And a Surprising Revelation

The Women in Animation (WIA) New York City chapter on Tuesday, October 10, hosted a sit-down with 4 animation directors at the School of Visual Arts.

From WIA:

Co-President Marge Dean (GM for Stoopid Buddy), Mark Osborne (Director of "The Little Prince" and more), Sarah Ball (Director of "Chuggington" and "Bob the Builder" and more) and Cecila Puglesi (Director of "Shift"). 

Our speakers will talk about how they became animation directors and about animation directing in general. Marge Dean will share with us the important work WIA is doing to realize a 50/50 gender balance in creative leadership positions within the animation industry by 2025. Inspiring you to become an animation director will certainly help in attaining this goal.

Here's what I took away from the evening:

1. It's important to make an animated short. It can open doors.
2. It's more important to finish something than to spend endless amounts of time making it perfect.
3. Say "yes" to things that you can't necessarily at that moment see where they will lead.
4. Have patience and perseverance.
5. Create your own opportunities.
6. Most of American animation is either for kids or comedy.
7. If an animated short is really funny and has a unique voice, the quality of the animation doesn't have to be high.
8. The Powers That Be feel that good animation isn't funny.

It's this last point that shocked and disheartened me. I had always assumed that the low quality of tv animation was the result of a lack of craft and skills combined with the never-ending need to keep the budget low.

It never occurred to me that people believe that you can't have funny animation that looks good!

I'm not going to let this dissuade me from bringing to my ideas the highest quality I can create. It does, however, make me realize that if I want to pitch an artistically high quality show, it's necessary that I prove that it's economical.

Thank you to the panel for their insights and suggestions!

Old School vs. New School

The competition is huge. AND talented.

I’ll never draw as well as many other artists. I’ll never animate as well as many other animators.

So how do I stand out from the crowd?

I think I figured it out! I’m going to go “old school.”

It wasn’t hard coming to this decision. I’m Gen X. I’m from the generation that remembers Frank Sinatra and Elizabeth Taylor. My generation didn’t dismiss people like them. We knew they were old but we also had at least seen them when they were young. We didn’t dismiss outright everything that came before us even after we got a Walkman and an Atari. 

I appreciate what came before me. And there’s a lot of great draftsmanship that came before me. I’ve always loved the 40s-60s style of cartooning. Lots of great, expressive, solid drawing. I also love the animation from that period especially the 40s Warner Bros. cartoons.

I’m not forcing myself to diverge from the drawing trends of today. I genuinely dislike what I’m seeing in tv animation and in web comics. I see little to no CRAFTSMANSHIP.

And that’s exactly how I plan to distinguish myself—as a craftsman.

I recently saw a tweet from an artist who said that learning perspective radically improved her art. My first thought was, “Yes, all artists should know perspective!” That’s a major reason Moebius’s work was so amazing.

So despite the huge number of people doing cartoons and animation, only a small fraction of those people have genuine skills. The reason people lack skills is because they don’t want to put in the effort to gain the skills. I’m not judging those people; I’ve been lazy and inconsistent regarding skills development. But I’m also not asking people to support my Kickstarter or Patreon with mediocre skills.

That’s my not-so-secret plan, folks! I’m going to distinguish myself with SKILLS. I don’t see any other way. So let’s keep developing our skills so we can stand out from the crowd!

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See Drawing Skills Improve Quickly!

I’ve talked a lot about improving my drawing by focusing on one skill at a time. In my case, that’s anatomy.

Although I have since stopped, I did, however, have one exception to this rule: mechanical skills.

I came across the mechanical skills exercises in the Scott Robertson “How to Draw” book, a book I recommend adding to your drawing improvement library.

This book is of additional benefit because it includes QR codes and a password to access supplemental videos.

The book begins with what on the surface look like easy, pointless exercises.

Don’t be fooled! These exercises—much like drawing cubes, spheres and cylinders—are EXTREMELY important and useful. They’re essential foundation-building skills and they should not be skipped or ignored. 

I regularly fit these mechanical skills into my daily routine:

1. draw straight lines
   
   
   


2. draw straight lines over a straight line. I got this and the drawing over curves idea from Irshad Karim. (Tip: keep your eyes slightly ahead of your hand to better direct it.)
   
   
   


3. draw over a curved line






4. draw a line through one point





5. draw a line between two points





6. draw curves through multiple points





7. draw ellipses: 
• draw an ellipse then its minor axis





• draw a minor axis then an ellipse





• draw an ellipse in a box





• draw an ellipse between converging parallel lines

I’ve been practicing these faithfully with the knowledge that they will eventually be of use. I check my ellipse drawings with ellipse templates. The exercises's usefulness was revealed first when I watched a video of an artist drawing freehand straight lines—in ink!—for her comic book. People were amazed! 

More importantly, I’ve been using my ellipse-drawing skills in my Proko anatomy drawing. In order to draw the bucket of the pelvis, one must be able to draw an accurate ellipse. That ellipse is the top plane of the bucket and its accuracy determines if the final bucket is correct. 

So all of those seemingly mundane drawing drills ARE beneficial! I’ve created muscle memory and improved my eye-hand coordination. I’ve also noticed that with all of this drawing, I’m seeing mistakes sooner. I’m able to spot incorrect angles and shapes sooner than I did in the past which means I can get to the correct drawing sooner.

David Ogilvy said it best in “Ogilvy on Advertising” (1983) in regard to advertising but it also applies to drawing—"This willful refusal to learn the rudiments of the craft is all too common.” I’m not going to be that artist, the one who refuses to learn the basics. Because it’s knowledge and proficiency of the basics that allows one to stand out from the crowd.

I encourage you to get Robertson’s book and to spend some time on the mechanical drawing skills section. And check out Draw a Box for more helpful drawing drills.

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Excellent Drawing Exercise—The Bargue Plates

I did it again.

In my endless desire to learn to draw EVERYTHING by TOMORROW (yikes!), I overloaded my daily practice. This time it was with a classic method I stumbled upon (I’m always stumbling upon something!) called the Bargue Plates.
I’m a big believer in “old school.” My thinking is, “Why reinvent the wheel?” Other people have figured out how to do this stuff so why not just learn from them and drastically reduce MY learning curve?

One of the skills I need to develop is improving my eye’s observations and the recording of those observations. Practicing the Bargue method seemed like a good way to learn.

Here’s some information from the Artists Network about the Bargue Plates:

This method, based on the teaching model developed by Charles Bargue, was widely used in the French Academy in the 19th and early-20th centuries, and centers around students copying instructional plates developed by the artist. The goal for the student is to improve his or her observational skills and learn to deconstruct complex visual information into large and small forms and shadows and light. Any artist can pursue the Bargue method on his or her own—all it takes is a set of reproductions, patience, and determination. Here are some tips for getting the most out of your self-directed Bargue exercises.

• Don’t get ahead of yourself, which will only lead to frustration. Start with a simple, high-contrast body part, and follow the steps in order. It won’t be long before you can tackle more challenging images.

• Remember that the whole idea with the Bargue exercises is to learn through repetition. Mistakes are part of the learning process and should never be interpreted as failure.

• While working on a drawing, use these helpful techniques to check your progress:

1. Squint. Blurring your vision will help you gauge contrast between values.
2. Turn the drawing upside down occasionally. This helps to provide a fresh perspective and allows you to see shapes more abstractly.
3. Step away frequently to observe your drawing from a distance.
4. Use a small “cut-out window” on a blank piece of paper to isolate areas and compare them to your copy.
5. Have a friend critique your shapes.

Here are some of my attempts at this exercise:





I thoroughly enjoyed doing these exercises and I think you will, too! You'll feel a strong sense of accomplishment when your lines match the originals. Instead of having a “friend” critique my drawings, I scanned them and checked them in Photoshop. The transparency of the original was decreased so I could clearly see the difference between it and my drawing when printed.

But…

They’re also taking time away from my anatomy studies. So I stopped for now BUT I will return to them eventually.If you’re looking to improve your observational and recording skills, I recommend drawing from the Bargue plates. Go here to download all of the plates that have been conveniently resized to letter, legal and tabloid sizes.

Give it a try and tell me what you think of this exercise!

And if you like these blog posts, please leave a comment or become a follower. I respond to ALL of your comments. Thanks!