Ultraviolet light casts a blue glow over the dark studio, and TV screens encircle long tables and chairs meant to seat the attendees of the Student Animation Exhibition. Electronic music thumps in the background, and a cool draft falls over the spectators moving about.
The radio-television-film department hosted the “RTF Animation Celebration” on Feb. 27 at the Jesse Jones Communications Building B. This all-day event celebrated animation through presentations, discussion and screenings. Among the day’s festivities, 250 animation students showcased their work and collaborated with peers, faculty and industry professionals over snacks and refreshments during a one hour exhibition period. Ben Bays, a radio-television-film professor, was the lead contributor in holding the event.
“I try to create one day where I take a topic (like) animation, and I explore all of the different dimensions of it here in the Department of Radio-Television-Film,” Bays said. “It exists in other sort of units, but I think it’s very special here in RTF, because we have scholarship around it.”
The celebration allowed Josceline Roeper, a computer science and economics junior, to see her project displayed on the big screen for the first time. Roeper’s animation, “Ice Skittering,” features a pair of skaters gliding on skates and twirling into the air. As a newcomer, Roeper said she felt pleasantly surprised to have her animated short featured.
“I feel a little bit appreciative that even non-majors, or first-time animators are getting their stuff shown,” Roeper said. “You usually see really advanced stuff. But I believe one of the speakers said that first-time animators, first-time animators get natural, like it’s imperfect, so it gives a bit of charm.”
Claire Anzalone, an animator who worked on Netflix’s “Apollo 10 1/2: A Space Age Childhood” and season two of Amazon Prime’s “Undone,” attended the event. She said she knows firsthand the importance of staying involved in the ever-changing world of animation.
“In animation, you need to get to know others in your field,” Anzalone said. “It’s a big thing, networking, so always be open to learn because animation is always changing.”
Anzalone, who graduated from Austin Community College, said networking events help animators grow because they allow them to see what styles others are doing and see what’s new.
“For a while it was like Disney peak standard of like ‘Wall-E’ and ‘Tangled’ and stuff — like you wanted to get as close to realistic as you could,” Anzalone said. “But now we’re kind of going back.”
Each TV at the celebration played various animators’ creations stitched together in a continuous loop. Bays said each of his animation students received the much-deserved recognition for their hard work and efforts.
“I want to make sure that anybody who is putting in the effort and drawing those frames gets time on the big screen as well,” Bays said.
