Category Archives: Artists Interviews

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Olatokunbo Betiku

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What is your name and your current occupation?
My name is Olatokunbo Betiku, but most people call me “Ola.” I am the Co Founder of Outside The Box Vision, where I do a bit of everything. I am also the Creative Director at No Limit Forever.

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
I used to teach elementary art classes. Kids are great to work with but they get bored easily. The job always seemed to be more about dealing with rowdy behavior and less with teaching art. I did enjoy it most of the time and it also gave me plenty of practice for dealing with other professional artist in the future. Most of whom can be children at times.

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
For the last few years our company along with Urban Born have been going to schools and promoting literacy and health to young students. I really liked taking our characters to schools and putting on shows for kids. I think it is important to do a bit of volunteer work and promote things like literacy and good health.

How did you become interested in animation?
Since the age of 8, I have been reading books and learning about the animation and entertainment industry. I used to watch a lot of Disney shorts and cartoons on TV as kid. I remember seeing Continue reading

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Larry D. Whitaker

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What is your name and your current occupation?
Larry D. Whitaker (director and animation director)

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
(Painting houses and graphic design for small business).

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
 (Tigger Movie, Space Jam, Mighty Joe Young, and Tiny Toons)

How did you become interested in animation?
( I was always drawing since I can remember and was very involved with both art, writing and drama as a student before college.  I went to school in Oklahoma, and had art class as part of the curriculum from K-12th grade.  While in jr. high and high school, I was heavily involved in Continue reading

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Becky Wangberg

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What is your name and your current occupation?
Becky Wangberg. I am the Executive Assistant to Butch Hartman on TUFF Puppy and The Fairly Odd Parents.

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
I used to be an Office Manager for a small production company that mainly does commercials and music videos. Before I got hired I was their intern, and my first weeks there I had to clean the garage and clean the BBQ. I also did the weekly grocery shopping, and even acted as a personal chef and valet driver.

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
I co-wrote a short film that combines live action, CG & 2D animation, and it just got accepted into its 50th film festival! I’m also currently developing a drama pilot with some friends that I’m really excited about.

Where are you from and how did you get into the animation business?
I’m from Sacramento, CA and I got my degree in Screenwriting at Chapman University. When I was in school, I interned at the Nickelodeon Animation Studio and loved the culture there. Though I actually interned in Live Action Development and Current Series, we were stationed at the Animation Studio, and it became my goal to Continue reading

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Jean Ann Wright

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What is your name and your current occupation?
Jean Ann Wright, Animation Pre-Production Consultant/Author (“Animation Writing and Development”, Voice-Over for Animation” along with MJ Lallo, 6 chapters in “Write Your Way Into Animation and Games” by Christy Marx).
What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
Professional Dancer, Telephone Information Operator, Game Show Production Assistant, and (during a break in animation jobs) Buyer of all the cars and trucks on “The Price Is Right” game show.
What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
 “The Flintstones”, “The Jetsons”, “Scooby Doo”, “The Smurfs”
How did you become interested in animation?
I had been interested in writing and illustrating children’s books, but animation provided a full time job and my various somewhat unrelated skills could be used.

Where are you from and how did you get into the animation business?
I was born in Canton, Ohio, (USA) but I grew up in Burbank, California (home of the Disney Studios) and grew up with kids whose fathers’ worked for Disney.  I had just finished an art major after returning to college when Continue reading

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Ivan Pinzon

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What is your name and your current occupation?
Ivan Pinzon, Principal Engineer, SketchBook Dev Lead.

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
I worked for Imaginova Corp, developing an Astronomy App called “Starry Night”.

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
My current project, SketchBook for iOS and for desktop and Starry Night
Where are you from and how did you get into the animation business?
I was born in Bogota, Colombia and 14 years ago I moved to Canada. I got involved with the digital artist world when I joined Autodesk to work in SketchBook.

 

What’s a typical day like for you with regards to your job?
It’s a combination of different things: code, debug, investigate and learn, plan and schedule future releases and a bit of customer support.
What part of your job do you like best? Why?
I really like to investigate and play with new concepts and ideas, try to find something that is going to be useful for our users.I also enjoy optimizing code. Faster is better.

What part of your job do you like least? Why?
Finding / reproducing bugs that caused our users to lose work. It’s frustrating to get these complains and more frustrating sometimes to not be able to reproduce these issues.

What kind of technology do you work with on a daily basis, how has technology changed in the last few years in your field and how has that impacted you in your job?
My main development machine is a Mac and developing for iOS requires to have some iPads, iPhones and iPods. It’s incredible how technology has evolved. The latest iPhone/iPad are more powerful than the computer I had a few years ago. This has allowed us to push for unbelievable features for a mobile device. Something that a few years ago was just crazy to even imagine. The current trend were mobile is getting closer to desktop is very interesting. Seems that these 2 will eventually merge.

What is the most difficult part for you about being in the business?
Keeping up-to-date with all the technology changes and being able to take advantage of them in a short period of time. It’s both challenging but at the same time motivating.

If you could change the way the business works and is run how would you do it?
I would like to spend more time investigating to find new innovative tools. But, work has to be done so finding a good balance is never easy.
In your travels, have you had any brushes with animation greatness?
I’ve had the chance to watch and listen to a few amazing guys, from sketching artists to animation professionals from studios like Pixar and Marvel. Different techniques and tools.  This has given me a chance to understand what artists need and with this I try to find a fun, simple and effective way to expose this in our software.

Describe a tough situation you had in life.
Leaving my family and my past in my home country and starting from scratch again in Canada while keeping my wife and kids afloat
Any side projects you’re working on that you’d like to share details of?
All I can say is that I’m working in some interesting technologies/features that I hope eventually are going to see the light of day.
Any unusual talents or hobbies like tying a cherry stem with your tongue or metallurgy?
I love airplanes. I have a private pilot license although I haven’t flown in a few years and I like to build and fly aerobatics model airplanes.  I’m lucky to have my son Nicolas as my partner and we compete in Canada and the US.  I also like to play the piano.

Is there any advice you can give for an aspiring animation student or artist trying to break into the business?Although I’m not an artist, I’ve had contact with many that have started from zero and have been persistent enough to develop a clear style and technique that differentiates them from the rest, finally becoming successful and recognized. Take advantage from the social networks: Deviant Art, Flickr, Facebook, Twitter, …