Animation Mentor
Celebrates Its First Birthday!
Celebrates Its First Birthday!
In celebration of Animation Mentor’s One Year Anniversary, we caught up with the three founders, Bobby Beck, Carlos Baena, and Shawn Kelly…
Animation Mentor:
How did Animation Mentor start? Can you share with us how you got your ideas off the ground?
Bobby:
In all honesty it started with a need, something we felt had to happen. Most ideas are born in a "Flash." I had this "FLASH" on the way home one night from teaching animation after hours at a San Francisco college. I felt things could be done better, but to change what needed to happen would mean a lot of red tape and unnecessary pain. I decided it would be best to develop something from scratch and build it with quality in mind from day one. Giving people the "magic" behind animation, and in a BIG way! Shortly after I had this "FLASH" I pitched it to Shawn, and shortly thereafter to Carlos who are like brothers to me. They share a passion for life and creativity that is contagious and genuine. I knew getting this energy together would make sure that it actually came to life. If one person ever got "down" the other two could "pick them up" and we continued to pull each other along in this way over the next couple of years. When I pitched out the first idea of Animation Mentor I promised them it could be done in 3 months with little upfront capital. Ha ha, was I wrong, but we knew it was going to be amazing so we pressed on. Originally we were going to do Animation Mentor feedback sessions through telephone conferencing. People would send their stuff to a website and we'd call them up and give them feedback. Eeek! We decided it would be best to work on exactly what we wanted instead of limiting ourselves by what was possible given the technology available. From there we designed Animation Mentor via Photoshop and Word docs. I actually took those Photoshop mock-ups and made an HTML version of the entire site so that we could pitch it to potential developers. After two solid years of hard work and late nights we were able to announce AnimationMentor.com on June 6, 2004. The response was amazing and we were excited people felt as excited about it as we had been in putting it together!
Carlos:
The first year and a half we used to meet either at Berkeley's Mel's Diner or San Leandro restaurants, but I remember us meeting mostly at Shawn's house. At first it was to discuss important things like curriculum, characters for students, mascot, methods of teaching, look of the website, concept tests, etc. It's amazing how little we knew about what we were getting ourselves into. Up to this day, every now and then, we still meet at Mel's Diner. :)
Shawn:
Yeah, I'd say that between the three of us, we came up with the ideas of what Animation Mentor would eventually become relatively quickly. The main ideas of the school were all there within a few months of meeting and working things out, but it's the “getting those ideas off the ground" thing that ended up being a whole lot harder than we anticipated. Like Bobby said, we thought it'd just take a few months to create the whole thing, but in reality it was years of hard work, long hours, and every nickel we had. That said, it *was* a lot of fun, and I'd do it again in a heartbeat. Especially after seeing the response of the students, and just seeing them improving so dramatically - it was so worth it!
Animation Mentor:
Were there any hardships during the first few months of launch?
Bobby:
We were denied by the Board of Education the first time we applied. This set us back a full quarter. During this time we had an office, full-time staff, lots of bills to pay and very little money to float the company. December 2004 was one of the hardest months of my entire life. I had just left PIXAR to head up Animation Mentor as the full time CEO/President and we were already on the verge of closing before we ever opened. Luckily I was able to find an expert in the field of the Board of Education and he helped us meet the criteria we needed in order to be approved and open our doors. We were the second online school in California to be approved by the Board of Education and they did not make it easy for us. The first day of class was March 27, 2005 and everyone at Animation Mentor Headquarter huddled together around a 20" monitor and as 12:00pm came, the students began to flood in. We watched the activity and within the first minute we had our first student avatar image uploaded by Kenshi Westover. At that moment we all sat back in amazement as we saw Animation Mentor take on a life of its own. Of course there were the inevitable technical problems, but I really saw those as part of operating of something this new and ambitious. We have truly pioneered something very different than I have ever seen on the net and anyone involved in Animation Mentor knows this to be true. It is an experience that I find to be the most fulfilling I've ever been a part of.
Carlos:
It was mostly communication and trying to understand how the three of us work and at what pace. Bobby works considerably faster than any other human being on the planet. We all know that. So trying to find a pace in terms of duties, who does what, who's good at what, was always a topic of discussion...especially since we were going to be working together for many years to come. Also, when it came to making decisions, it really helped that it was the three of us working together.
Shawn:
That actually ended up being an incredibly powerful dynamic for us. Having the three of us caring so passionately about the project, always resulted in the best ideas, every single step of the way, and when we did inevitably disagree about something, the three-man-team really did help a lot in finding common grounds.
The other big obstacle, of course, was our full-time jobs. Obviously we all already had our dream jobs, so by the time we realized that we were going to need someone to run this thing full time, it was a little scary for a moment. Personally, I was skeptical that we could find and hire a CEO who cared about Animation Mentor as much as we do, and who knew anything about animation in the first place. It was a big dilemma, especially for Carlos and I, who both adamantly wanted to keep our day jobs. On the other hand, Bobby had been taking tons of business classes and was falling in love with the art of creating and building a solid company. Him stepping up to the plate and offering to run Animation Mentor full time certainly wasn't a decision he made lightly, but it ended up being the absolute best thing that could have ever happened to the school, and I'm sure every single student knows it.
Animation Mentor:
Animation Mentor takes pride in its curriculum. Can you tell us how you solidified the curriculum?
Shawn:
The curriculum is the lifeblood of the school. We knew right away that it would be the foundation of the whole school, and that if we didn't nail it there'd be no point in creating Animation Mentor in the first place. The whole idea of Animation Mentor stemmed from our frustration with the state of many current animation schools, and how lacking their curriculum is in actual animation training rather than software training. So for us, creating a new curriculum was the single most important step. We worked hard to make sure it was the best we could make it, and I think it has served us well.
But obviously, that could never have been enough. The feedback we get from the students is invaluable, and we're dedicated to constantly improving and updating the curriculum, assignments, lectures, etc. Like animation itself, we'll never really be "done" with it!
Bobby:
The curriculum continues to be improved each quarter. That's part of our mission. We don't ever want to think we are "done" with Animation Mentor. It is an evolving and ever improving entity. The most important thing is that our students learn and come out on the other end with the tools and mindset to be great animators. That will always be the goal of the school.
We poll students twice quarterly and get their feedback on areas of improvement. We don't just send those surveys out, but we listen and read every single one of them. This is what keeps us connected to our students and their needs. If we hear something can be done better, it is not uncommon for that change to happen immediately or at least within the following quarter. That's what keeps us on our toes. We stand behind our goal to make Animation Mentor the best animation school in the world and knowing how picky we all are I know that we will always continue to strive to be the best that we can possibly be.
Carlos:
Classes 1 and 2 Bobby and Shawn knocked it out of the park with their previous mentoring skills. Then we would all get together to review the entire curriculum... what's working, what's not. I mostly worked on giving suggestions for Class 3-4 (acting, entertainment, subtext, subtlety) of the curriculum in terms of what classes could be in there and why. But I always felt Bobby and Shawn were stronger in the curriculum area than me, actually. At one point in the last three years, I started focusing more on the hands-on stuff, such as doing animation for the school, lectures, etc. I would pitch in every now and then on the curriculum, but they both came up with such great ideas that I found myself nodding in many of these meetings and agreeing to the great suggestions and ideas presented.
Animation Mentor:
How was the transition from version 1 of the website to version 2?
Bobby:
The transition was inevitable. Working on a site for two years in development pushing technology that was not "quite ready" meant that changes needed to take place. When we got under the hood of V1 and brought development in-house, we knew it would be more efficient to go into development on V2 instead of trying to patch V1. This was not the most cost efficient decision to make, but it was the decision that needed to be made, and I'm glad we did. The result in the launch of V2 was extremely seamless. We are finishing up our first quarter with V2, and it’s as if V2 has always been there. It just works, and works very well.
Carlos:
The transition from working with programmers overseas... to working with in-house programmers like Dan and Bennie... well, it was not only necessary, but a gift from heaven, in my opinion.
Shawn:
Totally! The first version of the site was truly visionary, in my opinion. There wasn't anything like it, and we couldn't have been more excited about it. But as soon as we beefed up our in-house programming staff and really started writing up our dream-list of what V2 would entail, it was quickly clear that V2 would be better than V1 in every single way. We basically stuck to our theory of not letting technology hold back our ideas, and just designed on paper exactly what we'd do if technology wasn't an issue at all. Lucky for us, we have some amazing programmers who don't let technology hold *them* back either!
Animation Mentor:
Lastly, this has been an amazing year for all of us here at Animation Mentor. Do you have any final thoughts on how this past year has been for you?
Bobby:
I am truly proud to be a part of something that gives people hope and gives them the tools they need to take those hopes and dreams and turn them into reality. The feeling I get when I wake up every morning before I come to work is a feeling of pure happiness and enthusiasm. I know we are building something unique that stands for quality inside and out. The team at Animation Mentor truly embodies this passion, and it comes out in their care and dedication. I am so proud to work with each and every person involved. They inspire me beyond belief, and make me want to do the best I possibly can.
Carlos:
Couldn't be happier, and certainly couldn't be more proud of the entire team and group of mentors.
Shawn:
Not in our wildest dreams did we imagine the team we have working with us at the headquarter, nor did we dare hope for anything approaching the roster of mentors and teachers who are currently rocking Animation Mentor! It's been such an amazing feeling to watch the school grow, and to see the students’ work skyrocket in quality. There's something truly magical about watching this "old guard" of today's top animators passing along their hard-earned knowledge to such an eager group of excited students. I look forward to the day when those students are experienced animators themselves, and are mentoring a whole new generation of students at Animation Mentor, and pushing this art form that we so love towards growing into something even more amazing than anything we've seen before!
In closing, I'd say that although this year has been an amazing ride, a ton of fun, and the culmination of years of work and dreams, you truly haven't seen anything yet! We're just getting started.
How did Animation Mentor start? Can you share with us how you got your ideas off the ground?
Bobby:
In all honesty it started with a need, something we felt had to happen. Most ideas are born in a "Flash." I had this "FLASH" on the way home one night from teaching animation after hours at a San Francisco college. I felt things could be done better, but to change what needed to happen would mean a lot of red tape and unnecessary pain. I decided it would be best to develop something from scratch and build it with quality in mind from day one. Giving people the "magic" behind animation, and in a BIG way! Shortly after I had this "FLASH" I pitched it to Shawn, and shortly thereafter to Carlos who are like brothers to me. They share a passion for life and creativity that is contagious and genuine. I knew getting this energy together would make sure that it actually came to life. If one person ever got "down" the other two could "pick them up" and we continued to pull each other along in this way over the next couple of years. When I pitched out the first idea of Animation Mentor I promised them it could be done in 3 months with little upfront capital. Ha ha, was I wrong, but we knew it was going to be amazing so we pressed on. Originally we were going to do Animation Mentor feedback sessions through telephone conferencing. People would send their stuff to a website and we'd call them up and give them feedback. Eeek! We decided it would be best to work on exactly what we wanted instead of limiting ourselves by what was possible given the technology available. From there we designed Animation Mentor via Photoshop and Word docs. I actually took those Photoshop mock-ups and made an HTML version of the entire site so that we could pitch it to potential developers. After two solid years of hard work and late nights we were able to announce AnimationMentor.com on June 6, 2004. The response was amazing and we were excited people felt as excited about it as we had been in putting it together!
Carlos:
The first year and a half we used to meet either at Berkeley's Mel's Diner or San Leandro restaurants, but I remember us meeting mostly at Shawn's house. At first it was to discuss important things like curriculum, characters for students, mascot, methods of teaching, look of the website, concept tests, etc. It's amazing how little we knew about what we were getting ourselves into. Up to this day, every now and then, we still meet at Mel's Diner. :)
Shawn:
Yeah, I'd say that between the three of us, we came up with the ideas of what Animation Mentor would eventually become relatively quickly. The main ideas of the school were all there within a few months of meeting and working things out, but it's the “getting those ideas off the ground" thing that ended up being a whole lot harder than we anticipated. Like Bobby said, we thought it'd just take a few months to create the whole thing, but in reality it was years of hard work, long hours, and every nickel we had. That said, it *was* a lot of fun, and I'd do it again in a heartbeat. Especially after seeing the response of the students, and just seeing them improving so dramatically - it was so worth it!
Animation Mentor:
Were there any hardships during the first few months of launch?
Bobby:
We were denied by the Board of Education the first time we applied. This set us back a full quarter. During this time we had an office, full-time staff, lots of bills to pay and very little money to float the company. December 2004 was one of the hardest months of my entire life. I had just left PIXAR to head up Animation Mentor as the full time CEO/President and we were already on the verge of closing before we ever opened. Luckily I was able to find an expert in the field of the Board of Education and he helped us meet the criteria we needed in order to be approved and open our doors. We were the second online school in California to be approved by the Board of Education and they did not make it easy for us. The first day of class was March 27, 2005 and everyone at Animation Mentor Headquarter huddled together around a 20" monitor and as 12:00pm came, the students began to flood in. We watched the activity and within the first minute we had our first student avatar image uploaded by Kenshi Westover. At that moment we all sat back in amazement as we saw Animation Mentor take on a life of its own. Of course there were the inevitable technical problems, but I really saw those as part of operating of something this new and ambitious. We have truly pioneered something very different than I have ever seen on the net and anyone involved in Animation Mentor knows this to be true. It is an experience that I find to be the most fulfilling I've ever been a part of.
Carlos:
It was mostly communication and trying to understand how the three of us work and at what pace. Bobby works considerably faster than any other human being on the planet. We all know that. So trying to find a pace in terms of duties, who does what, who's good at what, was always a topic of discussion...especially since we were going to be working together for many years to come. Also, when it came to making decisions, it really helped that it was the three of us working together.
Shawn:
That actually ended up being an incredibly powerful dynamic for us. Having the three of us caring so passionately about the project, always resulted in the best ideas, every single step of the way, and when we did inevitably disagree about something, the three-man-team really did help a lot in finding common grounds.
The other big obstacle, of course, was our full-time jobs. Obviously we all already had our dream jobs, so by the time we realized that we were going to need someone to run this thing full time, it was a little scary for a moment. Personally, I was skeptical that we could find and hire a CEO who cared about Animation Mentor as much as we do, and who knew anything about animation in the first place. It was a big dilemma, especially for Carlos and I, who both adamantly wanted to keep our day jobs. On the other hand, Bobby had been taking tons of business classes and was falling in love with the art of creating and building a solid company. Him stepping up to the plate and offering to run Animation Mentor full time certainly wasn't a decision he made lightly, but it ended up being the absolute best thing that could have ever happened to the school, and I'm sure every single student knows it.
Animation Mentor:
Animation Mentor takes pride in its curriculum. Can you tell us how you solidified the curriculum?
Shawn:
The curriculum is the lifeblood of the school. We knew right away that it would be the foundation of the whole school, and that if we didn't nail it there'd be no point in creating Animation Mentor in the first place. The whole idea of Animation Mentor stemmed from our frustration with the state of many current animation schools, and how lacking their curriculum is in actual animation training rather than software training. So for us, creating a new curriculum was the single most important step. We worked hard to make sure it was the best we could make it, and I think it has served us well.
But obviously, that could never have been enough. The feedback we get from the students is invaluable, and we're dedicated to constantly improving and updating the curriculum, assignments, lectures, etc. Like animation itself, we'll never really be "done" with it!
Bobby:
The curriculum continues to be improved each quarter. That's part of our mission. We don't ever want to think we are "done" with Animation Mentor. It is an evolving and ever improving entity. The most important thing is that our students learn and come out on the other end with the tools and mindset to be great animators. That will always be the goal of the school.
We poll students twice quarterly and get their feedback on areas of improvement. We don't just send those surveys out, but we listen and read every single one of them. This is what keeps us connected to our students and their needs. If we hear something can be done better, it is not uncommon for that change to happen immediately or at least within the following quarter. That's what keeps us on our toes. We stand behind our goal to make Animation Mentor the best animation school in the world and knowing how picky we all are I know that we will always continue to strive to be the best that we can possibly be.
Carlos:
Classes 1 and 2 Bobby and Shawn knocked it out of the park with their previous mentoring skills. Then we would all get together to review the entire curriculum... what's working, what's not. I mostly worked on giving suggestions for Class 3-4 (acting, entertainment, subtext, subtlety) of the curriculum in terms of what classes could be in there and why. But I always felt Bobby and Shawn were stronger in the curriculum area than me, actually. At one point in the last three years, I started focusing more on the hands-on stuff, such as doing animation for the school, lectures, etc. I would pitch in every now and then on the curriculum, but they both came up with such great ideas that I found myself nodding in many of these meetings and agreeing to the great suggestions and ideas presented.
Animation Mentor:
How was the transition from version 1 of the website to version 2?
Bobby:
The transition was inevitable. Working on a site for two years in development pushing technology that was not "quite ready" meant that changes needed to take place. When we got under the hood of V1 and brought development in-house, we knew it would be more efficient to go into development on V2 instead of trying to patch V1. This was not the most cost efficient decision to make, but it was the decision that needed to be made, and I'm glad we did. The result in the launch of V2 was extremely seamless. We are finishing up our first quarter with V2, and it’s as if V2 has always been there. It just works, and works very well.
Carlos:
The transition from working with programmers overseas... to working with in-house programmers like Dan and Bennie... well, it was not only necessary, but a gift from heaven, in my opinion.
Shawn:
Totally! The first version of the site was truly visionary, in my opinion. There wasn't anything like it, and we couldn't have been more excited about it. But as soon as we beefed up our in-house programming staff and really started writing up our dream-list of what V2 would entail, it was quickly clear that V2 would be better than V1 in every single way. We basically stuck to our theory of not letting technology hold back our ideas, and just designed on paper exactly what we'd do if technology wasn't an issue at all. Lucky for us, we have some amazing programmers who don't let technology hold *them* back either!
Animation Mentor:
Lastly, this has been an amazing year for all of us here at Animation Mentor. Do you have any final thoughts on how this past year has been for you?
Bobby:
I am truly proud to be a part of something that gives people hope and gives them the tools they need to take those hopes and dreams and turn them into reality. The feeling I get when I wake up every morning before I come to work is a feeling of pure happiness and enthusiasm. I know we are building something unique that stands for quality inside and out. The team at Animation Mentor truly embodies this passion, and it comes out in their care and dedication. I am so proud to work with each and every person involved. They inspire me beyond belief, and make me want to do the best I possibly can.
Carlos:
Couldn't be happier, and certainly couldn't be more proud of the entire team and group of mentors.
Shawn:
Not in our wildest dreams did we imagine the team we have working with us at the headquarter, nor did we dare hope for anything approaching the roster of mentors and teachers who are currently rocking Animation Mentor! It's been such an amazing feeling to watch the school grow, and to see the students’ work skyrocket in quality. There's something truly magical about watching this "old guard" of today's top animators passing along their hard-earned knowledge to such an eager group of excited students. I look forward to the day when those students are experienced animators themselves, and are mentoring a whole new generation of students at Animation Mentor, and pushing this art form that we so love towards growing into something even more amazing than anything we've seen before!
In closing, I'd say that although this year has been an amazing ride, a ton of fun, and the culmination of years of work and dreams, you truly haven't seen anything yet! We're just getting started.