Animaniacs
William Giamas made Sally Tilde with his bare hands. He constructed her hips, her lips and paid extra detail to her blond pigtails.
He started making her when he was 16 and continues to make improvements on her as the years pass. Sally is one of 17 people Giamas created to live in Jojo Vill, a small island village surrounded by a larger city.
Giamas plays creator over the people and city he created, three years in the making.
Giamas has been working on his animated series, titled ‘Jojo Vill,’ and has already created five episodes using a program called Macromedia Flash. He is currently working on a sixth episode, as well as starting another series. And it all happens on his computer screen.
Giamas spends more than two hours a day on his work, creating his own characters and worlds. Although the animation process may seem daunting, interested students are willing to dedicate themselves to their projects.
‘Animation can be a hard and tedious job to do, but after you’re done and you see your drawing come alive, it makes it all worthwhile,’ said Giamas, a sophomore computer arts major.
Giamas gets the opportunity to be an animator on a daily basis at the transmedia department of the College of Visual and Performing Arts at Syracuse University
His projects range from animated cartoon series to 3-dimensional moving animations. As part of his intermediate 3D animation course, Giamas makes the bone structure for models that are used in animated series.
Giamas would ultimately like to create an animation production company as well as direct and produce a professional animation series for television. Giamas prefers 2D animation because it is the medium with which he grew up, but does not object to potentially working with 3D animation in the future.
The computer art courses allow students like Giamas and junior Meg Grube to pursue their animation interests, a career field that continues to grow with emerging technology and advances in video game design and computer arts. Their courses include Introduction to 3D Computer, Animation and both 2D and 3D Computer Gaming, among others.
Grube, a computer art major, wanted to major in animation when she got to SU. However, since there is no animation major at SU, Grube had to look into other options. For her, this also meant computer art.
The more advanced classes carry 3D animation from pre-production to post-production. ‘We have several classes taking people through the entire production pipeline of digital animation,’ said Andrew Blackmore, a senior computer arts major.
Blackmore said he is more interested in the visual effects and character modeling, by digitally sculpting the characters and environments for animations and video games.
‘My aspirations aren’t quite as focused as they used to be. I feel like a lot of people go into animation thinking they’ll grow up and work at Disney or Pixar. … While it would be great to work in LA for a major studio, I believe just doing this type of work for any company would be rewarding for me,’ Blackmore said.
Students are not the only members of the Syracuse community who are pursuing animation projects outside of the classroom. Diana Salles, a transmedia studies assistant professor, has worked as a video game illustrator and animator over the past decade.
Some of her endeavors include developing the first 3D polygon football player for Madden Football and working on Guitar Hero III for PlayStation 2. Adjunct professor David Hicock, also of the transmedia department, has worked on titles like Nickelodeon’s ‘The Fairly OddParents,’ among others.
Grube hopes to become an animator in any industry, but she admits that she has a lot of work ahead of her.
‘It’s an extremely competitive market, particularly given the state of the economy. A lot gets outsourced … It’s as tough as any other job,’ Grube said.
She said animation is not an easy field and it may not be for everyone. There is a lot of detail and observation involved in becoming a successful animator.
‘You have to be aware of every single movement, down to fingers and wisps of hair, and how they contribute to the overall picture,’ she said. ‘You need to observe people, animals and things, and how they move and think. But if you can put up with all of that, it’s incredibly rewarding.’
– feature editor Rebekah Jones contributed reporting to this story
Published on January 28, 2009 at 12:00 pm
