Why do you like animation?
I like pulling the pieces together – pictures, sound, scenes, angles, music, editing and pacing. With animation, you can emphasize and exaggerate some things and ignore other things.
Tell us about your short in this year’s festival.
This was a music video done for Duluth’s Homegrown festival. For 5 years, filmmakers have been given a random song from a local band and then they make a video for it. The first year, we only had a weekend, but after that the timeline has stretched to a couple of months. This is my 4th contribution to the Homegrown Music Video Festival. I’m lucky the Keepaways were willing to play along and have some fun with this, they really made it come together.
Do you do other kinds of art that inform your animation work?
I am an illustrator, designer and I do some photography. I worked for 10 years as an advertising art director, and got involved with TV production for clients, and did animated solutions for many of them. I still do several animated commercials a year for my own clients now.
Who are some of your favorite/inspirational animators?
Too many to list, but John K., Daniels, Craig McCracken, Chip Waas, and countless people I’ve never heard of who put their work on Vimeo.
Is Minnesota a good place to do animation? And what do we need here to make it a better place for animation?
I think it’s pretty good, I manage to make a living from a combination of animation, design and illustration, so I feel really lucky. And people seem open and receptive to animation and different styles.
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