View my animation samples! I studied animation at Grand Valley State University. I don’t do much animating these days, but my cartooning and comic making definitely sprung from learning about animation in college.
Lunch Date
My animated short Lunch Date appeared in a few film festivals: 2004 Grand Rapids Festival of the Arts (Winner, Best Student Animation), 2005 Muskegon Film Festival, 2005 Nontzeflash Animation Festival (where I was one of only four Americans selected). Animated in Flash and full of my usual weird sense of humor. WARNING: this one is a tad on the gross side.
Out of Rum
I received a special scholarship by the Grand Valley State University School of Communications to attend a stop-motion animation workshop in Grand Rapids. I made the following short at the workshop. It was a lot of fun! I learned how to make an armature and everything.
No Trombones
In 2005, I captained the Grand Valley State University “Cartoon Challenge” Team, “Hogan’s Zeros” at the Kalamazoo Animation Festival International. Teams had less than a week to finish a thirty-second public service announcement based on the topic they received. This was a great experience, and I’m thankful for the opportunity I had to represent my school and help produce this cartoon.
Watch No Trombones!
The Grand Valley State University team was the second team to finish (and not every team even finished). As team captain, I directed the production of the short (all of the team had creative input), delegated duties, drew backgrounds, created special effects and edited the short together in Final Cut Pro (…and helped choreograph the dance the characters do at the end).
Advice
For my senior animation project, Advice, I experimented with mixing live action footage with animation in Flash. This was A LOT of work. But, I’m happy with the result.
Tracker Joe’s Space Safari
I created the short cartoon Tracker Joe’s Space Safari as an entry for an animation contest. In addition to writing and animating, I did all the voice work and recorded the theme song.
Watch Tracker Joe’s Space Safari
Sound of the Beast
I experimented with rotoscoping–tracing over video–for Sound of the Beast. The source video and sound is me playing a bass guitar.
$2 a Day Diet
A classmate and I animated paper cutouts for a short about people who only have $2 a day to spend on food.