SIGGRAPH 2019 Student Work Online

The SIGGRAPH 2019 Faculty Submitted Student Work Exhibit is now online! Check out the link HERE. The following images are accompanied by the assignment sheets - contributing to a huge resource of projects/assignments for other schools to see. There's a lot of hard work in these projects and I'm very proud of all the students accomplished!

APSU Student Work at SIGGRAPH 2019

Some Austin Peay student work from animation and visual effects was chosen to be shown at this years SIGGRAPH conference in LA. APSU joins a list of 34 other schools who's student projects were chosen to be screened all conference long at the Education Committee Booth.  Soon after the conference it will be made available on the website for other educators to view and be inspired from.

You can find the press release HERE

Storyboard Workshop

I had the chance to attend CTN workshop on Storyboarding with Jordan Koch this weekend in LA.  It was great to hear all the advice Jordan had to share with the attendees - it wasn't "how to storyboard" but instead focused on the "why" and visually telling the story.  Any workshop where the presenter references The Muppets, Jaws, theatrical set design, and the youtube channel "Every Frame A Painting" is right up my alley!!!

Jordan currently boards for Loud House and Tom & Jerry - you can check his work out more at:
https://twitter.com/jordang_koch
https://www.instagram.com/_jordanimation

He was also nice enough to give all the attendees a special signed print

More TN Art Conference Photos

The conference posted a huge selection of photos taken by the talented Karen Orozco (who I also had as a student once!).  Fun seeing all the reactions to people trying VR for the first time.

VR at TN Arts Conference

This past week I had the awesome chance to hold several VR workshops for the artists and art educators at the Tennessee Arts Commission’s 2018 Tennessee Arts and Arts Education Conference.  The event was titled "Design Thinking: A Pathway for Innovation in the Arts" and was held at APSU this year.  It was a lot of fun to have people explore virtual painting, sculpting and animation for the first time and talk about the possibilities that VR opens up for students. APSU featured us in a video and press release that you can read below or HERE

APSU’s CECA highlights art innovations on campus during state conference 

More than 200 art educators, administrators and artists from across the state visited the Austin Peay State University campus this month to discover new, innovative ways to teach and advocate for the arts in the coming year. Austin Peay’s Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts (CECA) hosted the Tennessee Arts Commission’s 2018 Tennessee Arts and Arts Education Conference, which allowed CECA to show off the groundbreaking projects taking place at Austin Peay. 

“It was an honor to host this conference at Austin Peay and be able to showcase our amazing facilities and faculty, many of whom were session presenters,” Dr. Janice Crews, CECA director, said. “Providing meaningful resources to arts professionals and getting such positive feedback made it all worthwhile.” 

Scott Raymond, APSU assistant professor of art + design and former DreamWorks animator, unpacked two of the University’s new virtual reality systems so attendees could walk through 3D virtual paintings they made. 

“Coming from digital animation, virtual reality is really taking off,” Raymond said. “They’re making interactive cartoons and shorts. And for artists, you can now paint and sculpt in a three-dimensional space.”   

Educators from public and private schools took turns donning the VR headsets and hand controllers, and then they created wild, three-dimensional works in their own personal worlds. Down the hall in the APSU Art + Design Building, a group of music teachers huddled in a classroom, learning to play the Beatles’ “Let It Be” on ukuleles. 

Other sessions included incorporating visual arts in elementary music, presented by APSU music professor Eric Branscome, and improv for everyone, led by APSU theater professor Talon Beeson. Arts administrators participated in sessions on grant writing, strategic planning and more. 

The three-day event, titled “Design Thinking: A Pathway for Innovation in the Arts,” marked the first time APSU has hosted a Tennessee Arts Commission Conference.

Bink at CTNx This Year

 

While I'm unfortunately unable to attend CTNx this year, it's fun to see that Bink and Eric Miller Animation are going to be there in booth form!  Pretty fun to see the 3 foot cutout of Bink from one of the promo poses I did :)  Hope they have a great time at the conference!

Presenting at SECAC Conference

I had the chance to present a paper and give a talk at the SECAC Conference this week.  It was part of the "Graphic Design Beyond" panel, and the talk was co-presented with my colleague Patrick Gosnell.

Our presentation was titled "Making Design Active: Fusing Principles of Animation and Graphic Design Through Student Collaboration" - which details a collaborative project between Patrick's design students and my animation students.  The students were put into groups and had three weeks to develop and create an animated gif for a Motion Poster.  It was fun to get to present our experience to everyone else at the conference.

Of course, the conference ends at 5pm each day, so one is required to check out the local tiki bar...

CTNx Conference Weekend

The artists booths in the giant (and not waterproof) tent

This weekend I was able to attend my first CTN Animation Expo conference back in Burbank.  It was my first time going back to visit since we left California 16 months ago.  The conference was a lot of fun - about half the conference was panels and speakers and the other half was a big artist floor where people had tables selling their arts (alongside studio recruiting booths).  I got the chance to talk to artists like Brittany Lee, Goro Fujita, Bobby Chiu, and The Bancroft Brothers.  It was a last minute trip, so I wasn't able to get into the big panels, but was still able to hear Ian McCraig, the ASIFA-Animation Educators forum with Tom Sito, and even our friend Shannon Thomas.

The best part was being able to catch up once more with friends and co-workers that I haven't seen for over a year.  That's the toughest part about leaving California was leaving a decade of amazing friends behind.  So it was wonderful to see everyone.  I even had the chance to meet my old mentor from college Tad!

The ol' crew meeting up for drinks

Floyd Norman live demo

Tad!  It's Tad!

Conference Panel at ETSU

Today I had a wonderful chance to speak at a panel as part of the iDMAa conference at Eastern State Tennessee University.  The panel was "Entrepreneurship and Professional Practice: What They Don't Teach You in School" - and was I believe a very valuable discussion.

Having just made the transition from the Professional World to Academics, I see the difference between the perceived job environment out there and the reality.  So it was a great chance to share some insights and give some pragmatic viewpoints.  I've always felt that schools are very concerned with teaching students how to get jobs, but not necessarily how to be great employees and keep those jobs.  One of the most helpful classes I had back in undergrad at UNL was a "Business of Theatre" class that William Kenyon, the lighting professor taught one semester.  It covered freelance strategies, taxes for artists, getting covered by insurance, contracts, etc.  Talking to others at this conference, I think a "professional practices" class is essential for any arts program in this day and age.

Conference web site:  http://idmaa.org/conferences/east-tennesseee-state-2015/

I have to add that I was only able to attend because my amazing wife, Heather Abels, stayed home with our two sick kids that day.  You'll notice that her name is on the panel poster as well.  One of us had to cancel, and she graciously as bowed out so that I could attend.