Products of Learning Open New Doors
Schools and studios are getting into the educational products business. While only a few have jumped into the game, it won’t be long before others discover what can be a welcome revenue stream.
With the cutbacks at animation studios producing television series and features in North America, as well as harder economic times, those seeking employment are advised to freshen up their job skills. Plus many animators and production people are finding they need to transition from 2D to 3D. So there is a boom in animation education/training and the need for products to help students practice or even learn on their own at home via products and online courses.
The increase in software and hardware products plus the steady stream of updated versions has been accompanied for some time now by instructional manuals, books, videos, CD-ROMs and DVDs. It’s a nice additional revenue stream for the manufacturers of software/hardware and given rise to companies specializing in distributing books and products.
Animation World Magazine caught up with a few of the institutions and studios that have grown wise to this and are making forays into the field of educational products to augment income for their core business.
The Vancouver Institute of Media Arts in Canada launched a series of online lessons and lectures featuring the late Academy Award-winning animator, Lee Mishkin, offering lessons he developed with the faculty for the VanArts Classical Animation Program. Not a bad idea for preserving the inspiration and ideas future generations might draw from inspiring teachers and important animators, even after they are gone.
“We started thinking about distance education/online training around 1997,” said Alan Phillips, president/registrar at Van Arts. The initial idea was to create high-quality animation education product that would reach several markets, from wannabe animators to educators to industry people getting back to basics. To accomplish this, we created the Lee Mishkin Lecture Series and online animation lessons. Lee was the founding director of VanArts’ classical animation program and a highly acclaimed Hollywood animator with five decades of experience and an Academy-Award winning film.”
After VanArts launched the lecture series and initial online lesson, The Bouncing Ball, Phillips said, “We are encouraged by the growing worldwide interest and orders we have received to date. The bouncing ball lesson was prepared by Lee Mishkin and other senior faculty in consultation with the University of British Columbia, Distance Education & Technology Unit. To view sample video clips from the lecture series or bouncing ball lesson, please visit www.vanarts.com/online/index.htm.
The course is structured so that students develop the ability to create drawings that are living, breathing characters behaving in distinctly personalized ways on screen. Lessons in the series cover the basic principles of classical animation including the bouncing ball, inbetweening, sack jump, character design, action analysis and the walk cycle.
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