- Are the Sophomore, Junior and Senior studios all group projects or just
some of them?
Most courses in the first two years are skills related and are individual
projects. They are building towards the Sophomore Progress Portfolio that
is the prereq for the junior group project.
Sophomore Studio 1 is a traditional animation studio, building on the
skills learned in Animation Principles. During this same year students
will do stop motion animation and CG animation using Maya. The projects
are all individual projects at this point.
Sophomore Studio 2 is layout and BG. Some of the work is done on paper
but the final layouts and backgrounds are done digitally, mostly in
Photoshop although some of the faculty have taught some Illustrator in
this class. Recently we have added more color theory here. This class is
also individual projects.
Junior Studio 1 and 2 is a year long course that requires students to work
in a group of (ideally) 5 students.. They come up with a story and take
if through the full production pipeline. I don't specify content, only
production quality. I encourage them to come up with the story, decide
the look and then define the pipeline and tools needed to get that look.
All students know After Effects and Photoshop at this point. We teach
Toon Boom here, and they have the option of taking the Flash class during
the junior year. Teams generally mix traditional and digital styles based
on skills in the team and the art direction.
Senior Studio 1 and 2 is a year long project that can be individual or
group driven. Because they are conceiving and completing a 2 minute film,
even individual projects will have support from other students, but the
idea, the story, direction and art direction must all come from the
student. We do allow small teams of up to 3 to work on a project together
but they must all take clearly defined leadership roles. For instance one
student might storyboard and direct, one student do art direction and bgs,
and another be the animation lead. This year's senior studio has 3 teams
and 2 individual films I think, maybe 3 individual films.
- Is there dedicated workspace for each student for each of the three
studios?
Freshman and Sophomore classes that require traditional animation
equipment meet in the Freshman/Sophomore dedicated studio. It's open 24
hours a day but it's unlocked so anyone can get in and there are no
assigned spaces. Freshman and sophomore classes that require computers
meet in the computer labs which are maintained by IT and are shared with
other departments.
Juniors have a dedicated locked lab arranged as a bullpen. They assign
themselves seats, have places to lock up equipment and are required to
have a lap top at this point. The students all have keys to this room
which is available 24 hours. We have two macs with appropriate software,
a large format scanner w/PC, and a digital lunchbox pencil test system in
Junior Studio.
Senior studio has a locked dedicated lab arranged in cubicles. Students
draw desks by lottery but some desks that are specifically designed for
traditional animation are reserved for students doing traditional
animation. There is a pencil test system using Dragon Frame in the senior
studio and they are located right near the labs.