Lipscomb University presents Animators After Dark featuring Tom Bancroft, Tim Hodge, John Pomeroy, Scott Sava and Doug TenNapel
Kasie Corley |
See the latest information about the 2019 event here.
0/2/05/2018
Lipscomb University’s George Shinn College of Entertainment & the Arts presents Animators After Dark at the Hutcheson Gallery on March 19, beginning at 6 p.m.
Animators behind fan favorites such as “Beauty and the Beast,” “Aladdin,” “Toy Story,” “The Lion King,” “Pocahontas,” “Mulan,” Tarzan” and “VeggieTales” share their after-hours creations at this unique event. Featuring renowned animators Tom Bancroft, Tim Hodge, John Pomeroy, Scott Sava and Doug TenNapel, the show gives the public a glimpse into what these creative minds develop at night. 
“A couple of my friends asked me if I wanted to find a gallery and do a showing together. I thought, why don’t we do this through Lipscomb University and share everything we do that isn’t animation. If animation is our day-job, this is what we do at night - this is art as our hobby, not our job,” said Bancroft, Artist-in-Residence in Lipscomb University’s George Shinn College of Entertainment & the Arts.
“I think the show will have a nice variety of work. We do pretty cartoony things during the day, and this provides us an opportunity to share more realistic and serious work. Our after-hours work still has similar elements to our day-work as we are all attracted to personality and character,” said Bancroft.
“John Pomeroy is going to show his Civil War paintings, which are historical period pieces telling a story with characters, but in this case historical characters. Scott Sava will share his pop-culture paintings of film stills. Tim Hodge has his watercolors with a mix of serious subject matter, and some lighter topics but none of which are landscapes. Doug TenNapel will share some color pieces, as well as black and white pieces.”
Describing his work in the show, “I am going to be showing this children’s book I illustrated. It’s still cartoony, but is something I couldn't do during the day. It’s ‘The Mermaid Who Wanted To Fly.’ I’m going to share a lot of those illustrations. It’s not dramatically different for me, but it’s a different subject matter,” said Bancroft.
Bancroft, an industry veteran, began his art interest during high school, but found his true love was comic strips and cartoons. “I wouldn't say that I set out to be a Disney animator when I was little. It wasn't on my radar because comic strips were the big thing. Garfield, Peanuts, Calvin and Hobbes; it was the heyday of comic strips and the last golden age before they died,” said Bancroft.
“That evolved into discovering animation just out of high school. A friend of mine introduced me to some stop-motion animation. He showed me a clay-animated film he created.”
Inspired by what he saw, “My twin brother and I made a clay-animation film. Seeing something like that come to life; it’s magical. A character you created and sculpted, and then frame-by-frame shot it moving a little bit, by a little bit—even as crude as it was—that magical moment of seeing it come to life and move around is the kind of thing that addicts you right away.”
Located in California at the time, it was only natural for Bancroft to attend the California Institute of the Arts, the school founded by Walt Disney. This led to an internship with Disney around the time of “The Little Mermaid” being developed.
“It was a good time to go into Disney. From there, it was just training on the job at Disney,” said Bancroft.
Experiencing the transition from traditional animation to computer animation Bancroft respects the new challenges present within the industry. “Most people think the computers do all of the work, but that’s not the case,” said Bancroft.
“Every step of the process has to be designed and then each frame must be reviewed. When drawing Ariel, turning her head in the drawn animation is hard because you have to make her look like Ariel and know how she looks at every single angle. That goes away with computer animation because you can model the character almost like it’s clay, and turn it to be consistent so it will always look like Ariel,” Bancroft explained.
“However, the flexibility that I can now make Ariel have a goofy face really quickly with a drawing in a few seconds, I have to re-rig the model which can take several days. Getting the life we can put into a drawing into the computer animation is pretty difficult to do. So there are pros and cons to the new technology for sure.”
Due to this level of detail and time-commitment to creating a character, this group of animators can reconnect with art after-hours. “All of these projects that we do on the side are our release. It’s our chance not to be governed by an art director or a deadline. We’re just doing art for art’s sake. We’re creating on a subject we want to explore, be it the Civil War, or mermaids, or telling a story with our own characters instead of Mickey, Donald or Goofy. It’s a way to explore our own stories and joys artistically. It’s a release,” said Bancroft.
Bancroft understands and prioritizes the importance of this with his students. “As soon as you apply rules to anything, it loses its fun. The joy you get from anything creative when you’re a kid is that pure imagination, and there are no rules. You’re making up whatever you want to make up,” said Bancroft.
“All of that goes away as soon as you go to art school. You add rules, grades and deadlines. It’s the beginning of the real world. I’ll walk in and tell my students we’re going to focus on perspective, and I hear groans. But it is important.”
“But at the same time,” says Bancroft, “I teach my students here at Lipscomb to have the same sensibility. Yes, they are learning right now and need to do well on their assignments. But they still have free time. I encourage them to be entrepreneurial, and sometimes we work that into the program,” said Bancroft.
“We do that in this event by showing that we’re really interested as professors and professional artists in trying other media.”
This spirit helps the students, with Bancroft’s guidance and direction, to develop innovative and fun products; some of which will be released in the Apple store and Google Play store in the coming months.
“They love the idea of people seeing their work not only on social media, but also buying video games they’ve worked on. We’re excited about getting them into the world as much as possible.”
Bancroft’s dedication to providing his students with this artistic freedom after hours is a product of the forward-thinking and innovative mindset existent within the George Shinn College of Entertainment & the Arts at Lipscomb University.
“It’s being blessed here, and the energy we have within the arts program is infectious. Within Lipscomb as a whole, I’m really proud to be a part of a program like this, and we’re putting the best foot forward in every aspect,” said Bancroft.
Want to learn more about the George Shinn College of Entertainment & the Arts? Visit us on our website.