Tell us a little about yourself and your career.
The older I get, the longer this story gets. I’m originally from Maryland, about 15 minutes outside D.C. I grew up being good at a lot of things (including drawing) but not really sure what I wanted to do. During my junior year of high school, I happened to watch the behind-the-scenes interviews for the Disney movie Tarzan, and a light bulb kind of went off. From there I set out to be an animator. I took a ton of art classes my senior year and researched animation schools. SVA [School of Visual Arts] was at the top of my list, and I was able to get in. Four years later (2006), I graduated and hit the streets of New York on a quest to become a successful traditional/hand-drawn animator.
My first job was as a digital character animator on Nick Jr.’s Wonder Pets! It was a great experience and I made a lot of lifelong friends, but I wasn’t drawing (which was one of the main reasons for picking this field in the first place). When the show ended, I spent the next few years working at several different commercial houses and small studios on a wide variety of projects before landing at Titmouse NYC as an in-house traditional animator in 2012.
For the next six years I worked on several projects for them while expanding my skill set into the arenas of sheet timing (animation direction) and storyboarding. In 2015, with some gentle yet insistent nudging from my wife, we packed up our lives and moved across the country to California. Since the move, I’ve worked at most of the major studios doing either storyboards or sheet timing. I’m currently storyboarding at Nick on an unannounced project.
Who are your inspirations in the field of animation?
When I first started animating, Disney animators Glen Keane, Nik Ranieri, and Sergio Pablos were inspirations. When I moved into storyboarding, Avatar: The Last Airbender, Batman: The Animated Series, and Gurren Lagann were hovering around the top of my inspiration list. Lately, I’ve been mostly inspired by the people I work with. The longer I spend in this field, the more appreciative I am of the talent in every department of a production. On every production I’m a part of, I usually spend a piece of my day peeking over artists’ shoulders and asking questions or (especially nowadays) just cruising the server and seeing what everyone is creating. There’s always something to learn, and I’m surrounded by experts.
What challenges have you faced in navigating a career in animation?
In the beginning, my main challenge was getting my name out there on the contact lists of people who were doing the hiring. The animation industry was kind of sparse in NYC after I graduated, so it took quite a bit of networking and portfolio building to get the employment ball rolling. It took some time to spread my net far enough to line up enough jobs to keep the lights on. Also, as a product of not knowing when the work would dry up, I got used to working three to four jobs at a time (not always successfully). It’s given me a good work ethic, but to this day I have a hard time turning down jobs.
What do you hope to accomplish as an artist in the animation industry?
To tell stories that people are captivated and inspired by. I love stories where you get so wrapped up in the world, the characters, and the journey that you’re kind of sad when they’re over. You’re flung back into reality, and the only way to fill the void is to run it back and watch it again to relive the experience. Being transported like that is one of the things I love about this medium, and I hope I can be a part of creating that experience for someone else.
Please give us a glimpse of what’s up next for you.
I have a few story ideas that I’ve developed, and I plan to create a short film with one of them in the near future. I figure why wait for the right story to come along when I have the skill and connections to do it myself.
Discover more about Aaron and his work:
Brewtoons.com
instagram.com/brewstuff
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