Tag Archives: Cartoonist

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Ray Alma

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What is your name and your current occupation?
Ray Alma.  I currently work full time doing storyboards and animatics at Larry Schwartz and His Band (formally Animation Collective)  I also freelance as an illustrator for magazines and do freelance storyboarding for advertising.

 

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
I spent 2 weeks working as a staff artist at World Wrestling Entertainment in Stamford, CT. I had to draw wrestlers for comic books and lunchboxes, that kind of stuff. They let me go because they didn’t think I drew leg muscles well enough.

 

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
I was a fairly regular freelance artist contributor to Mad magazine from 1996 to about 2003. Mad magazine inspired me to become a cartoonist so being able to become one of the “Usual Gang of Idiots” was a life long dream.

 

How did you become interested in animation?
I always loved animation, and when illustration work started to Continue reading

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Dave Redl

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What is your name and your current occupation?
Dave Redl.  Gun for hire cartoonist/animator/animation director and for corporate America, “New Media Director” (which means I make stuff move on computers.)

 


What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
I worked in construction building low income housing in Newark NJ where I saw a 10 year old strip an abandoned car under a minute while nailing up roofing shingles.  I worked in a garden center that was struck by lightning and crashed a golf cart used to transport flats of geraniums because I was listening to Led Zeppelin on my Walkman.  I worked a night shift at a factory loading clothes onto trucks with a dude named Steve, also a Zeppelin fan, who proudly showed me a corner in the rafters that was hidden from security cameras, perfect for naps and complete with a potato sac bed.  Unfortunately, I split before solving the mystery of which restroom was used by fellow co-worker, “Roberto” who had ridiculously enormous and feminine breasts.

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
All of them.  If they put food on the table and made my boss happy… I was proud of them.  Not every gig you get looks good, possibly due to “tweaking” or “corporate politics” so you must find pride in doing what you can with what you got.  For example, I was Layout Animation Supervisor, where I drew nothing for a TV show canceled during production!  But the people I worked with had kind things to say.  That left me proud of being a good boss even though I have nothing on my reel to show for it.

 

How did you become interested in animation?
For as long as I can remember.  But growing up on The Smurfs, I preferred

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Ralph Kidson

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What is your name and your current occupation?
Ralph Kidson  Cartoonist/Writer/Storyboard Artist

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
I worked briefly for a charity-run home for young autistic people, some of whom were VERY challenging…quite often you were just trying not to get punched in the head! Useful life skill I suppose… Ummm…jet-washing UPS vans, at night, in Winter. One time I stepped backwards to admire my handiwork and fell head-first into a massive bloody ditch, to much general amusement. Awful.

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
Definitely this current Wildseed project, it’s very exciting, Miles and Jesse have assembled some seriously talented bods in the animation field. We’re like the Avengers. I’d have to be the crap bloke who shoots arrows though ‘cos I’m very new to the industry. Hawkeye.

 

Where are you from and how did you get into the animation business?
I’m from the giddy, exciting, dangerous world of Small-Press Comics…making my own comics and selling them in shops and comic-fairs for the last 20 years! I got into animation via Continue reading

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Dan Shefelman

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What is your name and your current occupation?
Dan Shefelman, Cartoonist, Director, Head of Story, Writer.
What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
Hanging 200 feet on the side of a building painting a trompe l’oeil mural on Park Avenue in NYC. The owner of the company was color blind but we were’nt supposed to know. So he would come to the site and tell us to add more red. We would do nothing and the next day he’d say it looked much better. The union guys on the site hated us because we were non-union. They would tip over our paint. Once I got stranded 200 feet up on the scaffold when the electrician shut off the power at quitting time. I had to swing like Spiderman on my safety line over to a fire escape and climb down. I finally quit the next day when I realized I was risking my life for “art”.
What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
Teaching storyboarding at NYU. It’s so great to see new talent develop. I did a flash political web cartoon during the 2008 election on CNN.com. Wrote, designed and animated it. I love the collaboration of big productions but it’s always very satisfying to do everything on your own.  I have always been proud of working on the story team at Blue Sky on Ice Age. It was the first feature for Blue Sky and it was great to be there in the beginning as we all flailed our way to discover how to get these monsters done. I am particularly proud of the cave painting sequence I storyboarded which dealt with difficult issues of loss and forgiveness in a family movie without terrifying the kids in the audience. The big challenge was to Continue reading

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Jerry Fuchs

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What is your name and your current occupation? 
My name is Jerry Fuchs, and I am a cartoonist who animates. I am self employed at Fooksie, LLC. I create cartoons, comics,illustrations, and animations,(both Flash and Traditional).
What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
Well, I am 48, so I have had the opportunity to:  Worked in high school as a janitor, and in the school’s kitchen, in the summers I drove a dump truck and laid cement, fixed pot holes, pulled dead sheep out of settling ponds, (don’t ask), and did a lot of painting.  While attending the Joe Kubert School I worked in a bodega in Dover, being part grocer, part deli-man, and part bouncer.  I have worked in the optical field, selling eyeglasses and doing contact lens trainings. I have also taught karate classes.

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What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of? 
While working at Stone Mountain Productions as the Art Director I was very proud of the laser modules we created that were shown in Dorney Park, Cedar Point, and the State Fair of Texas, as well as Stone Mountain Park in Georgia.  In 2009, my first foray into the Independent Film Festival circuit, “Loser Pays, Winner Stays “, came in second in its division in the DRAGON*CON Independent Film Festival.

 

How did you become interested in animation? 
I have always loved cartoons and comics. Growing up there was an unwritten rule in the house, if there was anything animated during primetime, I had control of the set. My Saturday mornings were filled with Continue reading

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J.J. Sedelmaier

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What is your name and your current occupation?
J.J. Sedelmaier. This week I’m a filmmaker, graphic designer, cartoonist, author, curator. . .

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
I don’t know if it’d be classified as “crazy” but in school and right out of school, I worked as a waiter/bartender/asst manager in restaurants (this best thing I could have done to prepare for running a business), and also worked as a furniture stripper/salesman.

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
In terms of longer form stuff, launching Beavis and Butthead for MTV, creating the Saturday TV Funhouse/Saturday Night Live cartoons with Robert Smigel (especially The Ambiguously Gay Duo !), the co-creation with Stuart Hill of Captain Linger for Cartoon Network, doing the Harvey Birdman Attorney at Law pilot for Adult Swim, and designing the Tek Jansen character and launching the cartoon series for The Colbert Report. In terms of our short form/commercial stuff, some of the highlights have been, Continue reading