I had the extreme pleasure of meeting artist Dan Jones this past June. Dan is from Animation Collaborative, located right across the street from Pixar’s studios in Emeryville, CA. This fantastic resource offers students an opportunity to learn from professionals currently working in the field of animation. Their Instructors have a variety of backgrounds, having worked at Pixar, Dreamworks, Warner Bros., Sony, Disney and BlueSky. Students receive critique and feedback on how to raise the quality of their work to a professional level. Dan, who is a student at the animation school, has put together one of the most personal pieces we’ve seen here on PixArt. Take a look at this month’s featured PixArt piece after the break!
Name: Daniel Jones
Links:
Twitter: @Dan_Jones
I currently live in…between San Diego and Berkeley, CA. Today, San Diego.
I consider my hometown to be…El Cajon, CA
My Favorite Pixar Movie is …
My favorite Pixar movie is Wall-E. From the teaser, I knew it was going to be something special. I decided I wanted to work in the animation industry after watching it.
My Favorite Pixar Character is…
Favorite character is a tossup between Wall-E and Dug.
Tell us about your piece:
A couple years ago, my brother and I were in Mexico and there were murals of cartoon characters everywhere we went (mostly Toy Story). I like to think it is because friendship is so valued in that area–everybody called us Amigo down there. I think at a certain time, you choose to make your siblings your friends. We became Amigos down there.
Who/What inspires you?
I love watching professionals draw, seeing how they interpret people.
Recommend something, anything to our readers:
The Natural Way to Draw
by Kimon Nicolaides was recommended to me by Tom Gateley (a figure drawing master). It has made drawing really fun for me. Also, I’ve been attending a brand new school near San Francisco called Animation Collaborative, where all the teachers are either from Pixar, Dreamworks, or Disney. I would recommend it to anyone. I’ve never learned so much in my life.
Shameless self-‐promotion:
I’m in pre-production on an interactive iPad book coming out next winter. I can’t wait to share it with you! Follow me on Twitter for updates.
Our thanks to Dan for contributing. Make sure you check out the Animation Collaborative website. It is a wonderful resource for aspiring animators.
View all our PixArt pieces here.
