New Animation school by Silvain Chomet

[Peter Wassink]

This famous 2D animation Director is starting a new animation school in Paris, with a very traditional curriculum and a strong emphasis on anatomy and figure drawing.
They first year students start with animating on Paper and in the second part of the studies shift to TVPaint as the main animation tool.

Its an interesting approach to design a course in such a way that the students work their way through animation history, acquiring their skills parallel to the way the artform developed.

https://www.sylvainchomet.com/why?fbcli ... vLACAtQimI

[Paul Fierlinger]

The curriculum is extremely interesting and sounds like something I had naively tried to create in my own teaching experiences with the exception that I had only a semester or two at the most to work with my students. Of course I had to fail in most cases and usually had the hardest time with students who fought against my tutelage methods. To require that they start with stick figures before we get onto any other subject was taken by most students as a personal affront, actually an insult and stupidity demeaning of their talents. They wanted me to teach ONLY how to draw a cycle, how to draw body parts on separate layers, how to draw lip sync and how to accurately time their actions to give their work a slick and professional look. By the end of the semester they were expecting to have been taught and complete a short to become the crown jewel of their resumes. That was it and I see many new members coming here on the forum with the same expectations.

I eventually quit teaching both in schools and helping out with advise here on the forum when criticisms of my work were hurled at me by immature animators and one rude member of the TVP team.

Sandra and I were once invited to talk about our work at the DigiPaint animation school in Seattle, Washington and to our greatest surprise we learned that the student's first year was devoted only to pencil on paper animation and drawing studies of live models, having to complete something like 50 drawings per day. Not to our surprise, we were told that every student goes directly from school into the animation industry, some being recruited before they actually completed the four year study.

I was impressed that the Chomet new animation school gives so much importance to the art of animation besides the craft and wish them the best. It sounds like he has all the right ideas.

[healthfreak]

This is a fascinating approach which may prove effective.