The animation industry has been a popular and fascinating industry for decades, not only for avid viewers of film and television animation, but for artists, aspiring to bring their creativity to the professional table. John Keane is one artist who has done just that. I had the pleasure of interviewing Keane and learning a little more about trends and the ins and outs of the animation industry.

Photo Created by Artist John Keane

P. What inspired you to get into the animation industry?

K. Getting into animation was actually an accident. I wanted to draw comics, and thought that having an animation background would allow me to draw the kinds of things I wanted to. I then fell in and out of animation for a while after school and had actually sworn off it when I moved to Canada in 2005. But I found myself being dragged back into it having entered into a development project with a producer in 2007. Since then, I’ve been working almost exclusively in animation providing services in storyboards and character design and development.

In short, I started out in my career with no intention to work in animation, yet here I am.

P. What kind of things do you like to draw?

K. I like to draw pretty much anything that pops into my head which more often than not happens to be people and characters. However, most of my drawing tends to be problem solving, so when I have to approach drawing professionally I can handle what is being asked of me. Drawing in animation, and even comics, involves drawing a lot of stuff you’d rather not be drawing at all, so the rule of thumb is to learn how to draw well in general and don’t over specialize in only one area. Be the best at what you do best, but be strong in other areas. This versatility can keep you employed. Being more versatile is great for TV.  Being more specialized can work to your favor in feature. In my opinion, drawing in general is more important than drawing only what I like.

P. What genres of animation, would you say, are the most popular in the animation industry?

K. It depends on what area of animation you’re talking about. Feature animation; the genres haven’t changed much over the years. Apart from the few excellent autobiographic films which were adapted from comics–like Pesepolis–the bulk of animation tends to be action-adventure/fantasy, genres. The most recent being Tangled.

In TV, the predominant genre is comedy. Apart from the Big Two (Marvel and DC) shows, like Spiderman, Superman, Batman, X-Men etc, the feeling is that most kids get their action adventure fix from these shows and from video games, so the bulk of the remainder in TV tends to be comedy. To be more precise, the genres are usually crossed: comedy/fantasy, comedy/action-adventure. The shows, Fairly Odd Parents, Invader Zim, Atomic Betty, Spongebob and Samurai Jack are all examples of these genre crossovers. That’s mostly in the kid’s end of the industry. For adults, we’ve always seen comedy as the predominant form in TV animation. The Simpsons, South Park, Family Guy, Robot Chicken and Aqua Team Hunger Force are the ones that first come to mind.

P. How often do trends change in this industry?

K. I don’t know how often trends change. There just seems to be a general back and forth between animation and live action. Disney and Cartoon Work and even Nickelodeon seem to have much more live action–that is shows with real people in them–than animation. The latter took a back seat in the last eight years or so. I think animation is starting to make a comeback but, the main issue I feel is that animation is expensive to produce and it takes a long time to do it. Live action can be done much faster. A 21 minute live action show can be shot in a few days, whereas 21 minutes of animation essentially takes months of planning, design, etc to make it happen. Also, people don’t often realize how long it takes the product to reach the public. From the time something is conceived of, it can take four to five years for it to be released. It’s impossible to figure out what the public actually wants four years down the road, or even six months down the road for that matter. So it’s constantly a guessing game as to what the marketplace will accept at any given time which is why, when a movie or a show is a hit you’ll see a whole slew of similar content following it.

P. What kind of trends would you like to see take off?

K. I’d like to see more shows using an over arching story line instead of the loose episodic material that predominates at the moment. Shows like X-Men have a story arc that flows through the run of the series. But other shows don’t seem to get the same treatment as most shows tend to get only a maximum of two seasons of airtime. I’d very much like to see shows that run for two seasons with 52 episodes and have a solid story arc, so when we look back we will have a back catalog of strong, self contained stories. I feel that it would bring stronger writers and creators into the fold and generate more funding to produce a far greater range of animation for a wider audience.

HBO was responsible for luring film actors and directors into TV, which has ultimately raised the bar for TV shows. I’d like to see the same thing happen in film animation.

P. What piece of advice would you give to an aspiring animator?

K. Go to school and learn to draw as well as you can. Having a strong illustration/fine art background before working in animation would be a great bonus. Don’t fall in love with your drawings. Observe, draw then repeat. Even if you want to do 3d animation, having strong drafting skills will benefit you.

Watch a lot of film and TV shows, not necessarily animation. Watch bad movies too. You can learn a lot about what not to do from bad movies. Don’t just watch stuff that interests you. Watch anything that is recommended. You’d be surprised at how well you can learn from movies and TV shows. You can learn a lot about storytelling by watching a series over and over. You start to see the kinds of tricks that are used in a story to achieve certain effects. Because TV has a such a strong formula for the different styles of shows, you can become pretty good at figuring out what works and what doesn’t work in a story.

Learn as much as you can about storytelling. Read whatever books you can get your hands on about the subject.

And number one, surround yourself with people who share your passion and understand your obsession. Animation involves many long hours, weekends and nights of difficult work which you can’t do on an ongoing basis without being absolutely driven to do it. And not just animation. Any kind of drawing requires a single mindedness that some people find difficult to deal with. So, having people around you that understand the process and the drive to do this job is a must.

To learn more about Keane and his work, visit his blog at http://critterscribble.blogspot.com

http://critterscribble.blogspot.com/2010/12/something-for-today.html