Watch this short film to get an inside look at the unique inspiration, innovation and passion behind the only online school of its kind in the world for character animation.

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Animation Mentor Fact Sheet

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ABOUT
AnimationMentor.com is the only animation school built by professional animators specifically for people who want to become animators. The program teaches students the skills needed to succeed as a professional animator in the studio environment. By graduation, every student has worked in a production-style environment where mentors, who are working studio animators, stand in for directors, and assignments stand in for film or game shots. Students learn how to accept guidance and criticism, to meet deadlines and to budget and schedule their time to succeed in the working world. At the end of the 18-month program, students leave with a professional demo reel they can use as their résumé to land jobs. Upon graduation, Animation Mentor coaches graduates and connects them to job opportunities with major recruiters, video game companies, and film studios.

Animation Mentor delivers a much more personal and interactive learning experience than other online education programs by pairing students up with professional animators and giving them access to highly interactive communication tools. Some primary features are:

• Focus on character animation
• Online mentor/apprentice teaching model
• High level of interactivity with mentors and other students
• Networking opportunities through the online community
• Innovative use of production-style tools and technology
• Web 2.0 proprietary tools such as eCritiques®, and live Question & Answer sessions
• Personal support
• Caring environment

Year founded: 2005

Founders: Bobby Beck, CEO/president/cofounder; Shawn Kelly, cofounder; Carlos Baena, cofounder

Mission: To provide the most personal and fulfilling learning experience on the planet!

Tuition: US$18,375 | 58%–87% less than competitors

Cost of registration: US$175

Age requirement: 18 years or older

Language requirement: Must be a fluent English speaker

URL: www.AnimationMentor.com

Headquarters: Emeryville, California

STUDENTS
Number of students accepted per enrollment period: Animation Mentor accepts between 150-200 students per term and has over 900 students enrolled in our core program.

Total enrollment: More than 900 and growing

Country of residence: 55% of Animation Mentor students are from the U.S., and the school has students and graduates from more than 86 countries in every continent except Antarctica. These students live in major urban centers such as New York, San Francisco, Rio de Janeiro, Cape Town, Paris, Sydney, Dubai, Singapore, Mumbai, and in small towns and cities wherever there is high-speed Internet.

Average age range of students: 18-35

Male to female ratio: The student population is about 82% male to 18% female.

Production animation industry pay scale: For individuals who work six months or more each year, pay ranges from US$45,000 - US$200,000.

Graduates since inception: Since inception, hundreds of students have graduated from Animation Mentor.

Studios where graduates work: Currently 220 and growing. Studios include Pixar Animation Studios (U.S.), Industrial Light & Magic - ILM (U.S.), Sony Pictures Imageworks (U.S.), Walt Disney Animation Studios (U.S.), DreamWorks Animation SKG (U.S.), Electronic Arts (U.S.), Blue Sky Studios (U.S.), Tippett Studios (U.S.), Aardman Animations (England), Action Synthèse (France), Activision/Shaba Games (U.S.), Bardel Entertainment (Canada), Bungie Games (U.S.), Furia Digital (Spain), Disney Interactive (U.S.), Glasgow Animation (Scotland), HuHu Studios (New Zealand), Ilion Animation Studios (Spain), Iloura Digital Pictures (Australia), Kerozin (Slovenia), Laika Entertainment (U.S.), LucasArts (U.S.), Lucasfilm Animation Singapore, Microsoft (U.S.), Molinare (England), Tata Elxi Limited (India), Ubik Visual Effects (Italy), Ubisoft Entertainment (France), Vetor Zero (Brazil) and more.

MENTORS
Animation Mentor has strong relationships with some of the film industry's best animators from major studios. The school also hires mentors who freelance or own their companies. The school's mentors provide valuable inspiration, guidance, and real-world experiences that enable students to succeed as a professional animator in a studio environment.

Current number of mentors: Animation Mentor has 57 full time and 21 campus mentors in the Winter term of 2009.

Mentor/student ratio: Animation Mentor maintains a ratio of around 14 students to 1 mentor.

Names of mentors: To learn more, visit http://www.animationmentor.com/mentors/mentor-roster.html

Current mentor studio affiliations: The mentors, who teach students after work and on weekends, are employed at leading studios including: Pixar Animation Studios, Industrial Light and Magic (ILM), PDI/DreamWorks, Blue Sky Studios, DreamWorks Feature Animation, Walt Disney Animation Studios, Sony Pictures Imageworks, LucasArts, Nickelodeon Animation Studios, Rhythm and Hues Studios, Tippett Studios, Digital Domain, and Reel FX Creative Studios and more.

SCHOOL INFORMATION
School awards: 2006 Best Practices in Programming Award Gold Level and the 21st Century Distance Learning Award from the U.S. Distance Learning Association; the official honoree at the 10th and 13th Annual Webby Awards.

National Awards:2009 PRSA Bronze Anvil Award – Publications Behind the Character: Job Satisfaction, Career Outlook, and Salary Survey Report

School calendar: This is an 18-month program with quarterly starting dates in January, March, June, and September

Accreditation: The California State Accreditation process is designed only for schools that provide a complete two to four-year liberal arts education. Animation Mentor focuses instead on providing a deep education in a specific skill area, therefore it is not accredited.

Designation: Certificate in Advanced Studies in Character Animation approved by the Bureau for Private Postsecondary Education.

EDUCATION PROGRAM
Type of animation taught: Character Animation

Learning platform: Animation Mentor has developed a host of proprietary tools to help give better support, guidance and feedback to our students. One of the school's tools is the eCritique®, which allows mentors to critique each frame and draw directly on a student's work to correct lines of action, blocking, and movement, and to provide visual direction for how to improve the piece. Each student receives a weekly eCritique for the assignment. To see an example, go to http://www.animationmentor.com/11secondclub/mentorcritique.html where a contest winner receives a free eCritique from a mentor each month.

The school provides direct instruction through rich media lecture and demos, filmed documentary style, with top experts in the field. These are posted on the Web campus for students to download. Students also participate in live, interactive, real-time, weekly Q&A sessions (or classes) with their mentors and up to 15 other students. These sessions make use of Web conferencing technologies, and other tools developed by Animation Mentor. During these sessions, the students and mentors discuss the lecture/demos, their assignments, and other important animation-related topics.

This formal instruction takes place on a Web campus that is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and contains many elements of popular social networking sites like YouTube, MySpace and Facebook. All students have personal profile pages where they post their eCritiques, assignments, tests, and thoughts. Students and mentors are constantly cruising the campus, commenting on other's work and offering helpful suggestions as posts, in the chatrooms, or using a new, proprietary Animation Mentor instant messaging tool. Students also find fellow classmates in their city and country so that they can organize local gatherings. There are Animation Mentor students who meet regularly in NYC, Mexico City and London, just to name a few. The school has been the genesis of many close friendships and is an ongoing networking resource for alumni, students and mentors.

Primary software programs taught: Maya, owned by Autodesk, is one of the most popular and advanced high-end 3D computer graphics and 3D modeling software packages used in the animation, film, TV, and computer and video game industries. The open architecture allows users to script and program actions. In 2003 it won an Academy Award for scientific and technical achievement.

Student material requirements: Students need a fast Windows or Macintosh computer, a webcam for online learning, a sketchbook, and two books (The Illusion of Life and The Animator's Survival Kit).

FINANCIAL
Animation Mentor is a privately held company and does not release financial information to the public.

Top Questions About Animation

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What are some of the exciting aspects of character animation, and how is it different than other computer animation forms?
The phrase computer animation is often used as a catch-all for many computer generated effects including spinning logos, Flash programming on the web or special effects in movies. These are not character animation. Character animation is the process of giving life to a character, whether it is a dog that can talk, a drawn person or an animated object. Character animation creates personality.

How long does it take one person to create one minute of animation?¹
This is difficult to pinpoint, but it can take one animator about 16-20 weeks of full-time work to produce 60 seconds of animation. At Pixar, due to their high level of quality control, animators have been known to work on 2 minutes of film for a year or more.

How many animators typically work on an animated feature film?
It depends on the studio and its needs, so anywhere from 20-80 animators could be working on an animated feature film.

What is the biggest myth about character animation?
A lot of people believe that the computer does all of the work for the animator, but the reality is that the animator is only using the computer as a tool to create detailed animation frame by frame.

What are some of the most challenging aspects of character animation?
Character animators work in fun, collaborative, exciting and detailed environments. They need to have a high level of patience while working with the tiny movements of a character frame by frame. Another valuable skill is the ability to achieve character depth and consistency in movement, facial expressions and motivation – this is important with multiple animators collaborating on the animation of one character in a full length film. Character animators also need to understand the physics of movement, and be able to stay focused over the course of the project while meeting deadlines, and maintaining a sense of confidence in the direction they are taking a character. They also need to be able to think and problem solve creatively.

How do animation teams work together?
Animation teams conduct what are called dailies – a morning meeting led by a supervisor or the director to determine the production's progress. Animators take the day's marching orders from the meeting and proceed to work solo as needed. Throughout the day the animator will show their work to team members, obtain feedback, and then make changes as needed.

What makes a good character animator?
The main ingredient is a passion for animation and a constant desire to learn. One day they could be animating a robot, and the next, a dinosaur. Every day is a new challenge and they never animate the same thing twice. Another thing good character animators do is to really observe the world around them and notice the details about how people and animals move and interact. They are always getting new ideas and learning new ways to do things.

What are the similarities between how modern animators work today as compared to animators of the past?
Animators today use the same principles that animators of the past used. Only the tools have changed. The process usually starts with an animator being given the basics of the shots. They are also given sound clips with voice actors, a script, sound effects, description of what the character(s) does in the scene, and a written description of the scene. Other similar processes include:

• Animators still use frames to illustrate the characters' movements and expressions.
• Animators still use hand drawn thumbnails to check the timing and posing.
• Each animator references a script that defines the character.
• Studios use a storyboard artist to give direction on the story.
• Studios use layout artists who incorporate character models into scenes.

Does a studio generate more revenue from an animated feature film than one with live action?
This is difficult to determine, as every project is unique, however animated films require a lot of creative human resources, and the price of a fully animated feature goes up when celebrity voices are added.

What are currently considered the top character animation studios in the U.S.?
Top animation studios include Pixar, Disney, Industrial Light & Magic, DreamWorks, Sony Imageworks, and Blue Sky Studios.

What are currently considered the top computer and video gaming companies in U.S. that use character animation?
Bungie, Electronic Arts, 2K Games, and THQ Inc.

What's the need for animators in the U.S. gaming industry?
At close to $10 billion in annual revenue, the video gaming industry is one of the fastest growing entertainment segments in the U.S. right now; there are so many positions with good salaries available. According to AnimationArena.com's most recent salary survey, video game annual animation salaries start at around $50,000 and lead producers can make up to $215,000 per year.

(1) http://www.animationarena.com/working-for-pixar.html
(2) http://www.animationarena.com/video-game-salary.html

Animation Mentor FAQ

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When was Animation Mentor founded? What is the background of your founders?
AnimationMentor.com was founded in 2005 by three experienced professionals - Bobby Beck (CEO and cofounder), Shawn Kelly (cofounder) and Carlos Baena (cofounder). As CEO, Beck oversees Animation Mentor's day-to-day business, educational programs and culture.

Before Beck launched Animation Mentor, he worked for Pixar Animation Studios, Tippett Studios, and Walt Disney Feature Animation. Beck was the character animator for the movie Finding Nemo. In addition to their roles in defining the school's direction, Kelly works as a senior animator at Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) and created animation for the movie Transformers, while Baena works as a full-time animator for Pixar Animation Studios where he worked on WALL-E.

The founder's bios can be found here.

Why was Animation Mentor founded?
The Animation Mentor founders saw a need in the market for industry-trained animators who were ready to step into production jobs because many of the traditionally trained art school graduates did not have the skills to work in a production environment. The big demand, as they saw it, was that too many art schools focused on teaching the software and neglected the art behind animation. Animation Mentor was founded with one core question in mind: "If we were to start over again how would we want to learn?"

What does Animation Mentor offer? How is it different from other animation schools?
Animation Mentor started from the ground up with a philosophy that the best way to learn is through the time-tested practice of apprenticeship. The school combines this idea with a custom-built state-of-the-art online education program taught by real-world professionals, or "mentors."

Animation Mentor brings students together from around the world to learn from mentors who are studio professionals, and each other. After graduation, this online community is a rich and vibrant resource for alumni as a place of support and learning as they advance in their careers.

Mentors work at industry leading studios such as Pixar Animation Studios, Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), Sony Pictures Imageworks, Blue Sky Studios, and many others. In fact, Animation Mentor's connection to studios gives graduates an opportunity to be involved with major animation productions such as 2008's Horton Hears a Who! Graduates of the program are able to take the skills learned at Animation Mentor, and immediately apply them to succeed as a professional animator in the studio environment.

By graduation, every student has produced a demo reel and receives support from Animation Mentor to land their first job.

What makes Animation Mentor unique is that it delivers a much more personal and interactive learning experience over other online educators because of its:

• Focus on character animation
• Online mentor/apprentice teaching model
• High level of interactivity with mentors and other students
• Networking opportunities through the online community
• Innovative use of production-style tools and technology
• Web 2.0 proprietary tools such as eCritiques®, and live Question & Answer sessions
• Personal support
• Caring environment

How does learning animation online differ from learning it in a brick and mortar environment?
The online learning environment provides students from all over the world access to the world's best professional animators. They learn from six different mentors over the course of the 18-month program who provide individual guidance, direction and critiques of their work to help them become studio-ready character animators. Other benefits include:

• Students can work and raise a family while in school
• Students don't have to relocate to Los Angeles or the Bay Area
• Students receive more one-on-one time with mentors than they would in a traditional brick and mortar school
• The online campus and e-tools allow students to network, share feedback and input on assignments, and get coaching and support from upper-class members, each other, and campus mentors, all from the comfort of their own home

How is your mentor program different?
Animation Mentor has strong relationships with some of the film industry's best animators from major studios. The school also hires mentors who freelance or own their own companies. The school's mentors provide valuable inspiration, guidance, and real-world experiences that enable students to succeed as a professional animator in a studio environment.

How long does it take to complete the Animation Mentor training program?
It takes 18 months to complete the Animation Mentor training program, including approximately 20-40 hours of course work each week.

What's the profile of the average student?
Typically, the student has some college experience, or is in an entry-level job and wants to start a career in animation. The most successful students have a degree and are working professionals who want to get ahead. There are more men than women, and ages range on average from early to late 20s and 30s with some students in their 40s and 50s.

Where do your students live?
55% of Animation Mentor students are from the U.S., and the school has students and graduates from more than 86 countries in every continent except Antarctica. These students live in major urban centers such as New York, San Francisco, Rio de Janeiro, Cape Town, Paris, Sydney, Dubai, Singapore, Mumbai, and in small towns and cities wherever there is high-speed Internet.

How difficult is it to be accepted into Animation Mentor?
There are a limited number of qualified students that are accepted into the program each term. As a result, acceptance is on a first come, first served basis and includes a basic entry exam that all applicants take as part of our screening process.

What are the top things a student needs to know to excel or do well in the school?
Students need to have the passion, self motivation and time to take full advantage of the 18-month intensive program. A background in art or animation is not required, but helpful, as is a spark to creatively interpret the world around them. The Animation Mentor curriculum is based on the industry standard software program Maya, so a foundational knowledge of this program is helpful.

Do you help graduates obtain employment? And, who employs graduates?
There is currently a high demand for graduates. Animation Mentor works closely with top studios to identify and place students within their open positions. Graduates are currently working at over 200 studios including Pixar Animation Studios, Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), Sony Pictures Imageworks, Walt Disney Animation Studios, DreamWorks Animation Studios, Electronic Arts, Blue Sky Studios, and Tippett Studios.

What are some of the feature films that graduates have worked on?
To name a few, Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, Bee Movie, Transformers, The Golden Compass, Horton Hears a Who!, and Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs.

Do mentors undergo any training to help them prepare to deliver instruction of course materials?
Mentors undergo an orientation program and are given guidelines and criteria for how to provide effective critiques and Q&As. However, they are already experts in the field and are well-qualified to teach students so they don't need any "training" in the material. They act as the directors giving assignments and critiquing work just like they would on the job.

What kind of diploma or certificate do students receive upon graduating from Animation Mentor?
Graduates receive a certificate in Advanced Studies in Character Animation approved by the Bureau for Private Postsecondary Education.

What are your business goals?
Animation Mentor's goal is to be the best animation school on the planet!

"We strive to be the most innovative, creative, caring, and fun animation school in the world and are dedicated to inspiring and supporting our students to reach their dream of becoming a character animator. We accelerate their learning curve by delivering the pure essence of what they need to know to get where they want to go, in a nurturing and supportive environment." – Bobby Beck, CEO and cofounder

Founder Bios

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BOBBY BECK, CEO/president
When Bobby Beck cofounded the award-winning online animation school AnimationMentor.com in March 2005, there was nothing like it in post-secondary education. Students work with mentors from major studios in a production-style environment, and graduate with a professional demo reel. Since that time, he has continued to transform the school, refining and expanding its curriculum, and developing new technologies to provide students with the best possible preparation for studio employment.

As AnimationMentor.com's CEO and President, Beck works with partners and cofounders Shawn Kelly and Carlos Baena to define the school's overall direction. He oversees the implementation of their collectively developed vision, which includes spearheading the school's business relationships, culture and curriculum and supervising the development of its Web 2.0 strategy and next generation tools.

Beck attended the Art College of San Francisco until he landed a job at a game company based on character tests he taught himself. In 1997, he joined Tippet Studios in Berkeley, Calif., where he worked on the feature films My Favorite Martian and Virus. The following year, he moved to Los Angeles, where he animated on Dinosaur at Walt Disney Feature Animation.

In 1999, Beck was offered one of the most coveted positions in the industry as an animator at Pixar Animation Studios in Emeryville, Calif. At Pixar, he worked on Toy Story 2, The Incredibles, Cars, and the short film Boundin', before being promoted to senior animator/character developer on Monsters, Inc. and Finding Nemo. For Monsters, Inc., Beck codeveloped the little girl Boo. He also was the developer of the youthful fish Nemo in Finding Nemo. In both films, Beck determined the characters' appearance and how they expressed their essence through gesture and movement.

In September 2004, Beck made the difficult decision of leaving Pixar to devote himself full-time to running AnimationMentor.com. He embarked on a second wave of self-schooling -- studying business development, leadership, administration, and education -- and began working with a business coach. It is a process that continues through today as Beck and his Animation Mentor team strive to provide their students with the highest quality and most personal learning experience possible.

Animation Mentor, which is headquartered in Emeryville, currently has more than 900 students and 57 full-time mentors from all over the globe.

Beck lives in San Francisco, Calif. He spends his spare time kiteboarding, playing electronic music, drawing, and creating short films.

SHAWN KELLY, cofounder
Shawn Kelly realized his dream to animate films with the help of three mentors who took a personal interest in his career. Convinced that animation lovers everywhere should have the same opportunity, he cofounded AnimationMentor.com, an online animation school with student/mentor relationships at its core.

Kelly works with Bobby Beck, AnimationMentor.com's CEO and President, and cofounder Carlos Baena to help define and shape the school's overall direction. Kelly balances his Animation Mentor role with his work as a senior animator at Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) in San Francisco, Calif.

Born in Santa Rosa, Calif., and raised in Petaluma, Kelly set his sights on working at ILM at age five when the movie Star Wars hit the big screen. Under the tutelage of two family friends, Bill Hennes and John Root, he studied drawing and computer software throughout high school, attended community college, and Academy of Art University in San Francisco.

A summer internship at ILM introduced Kelly to another influential mentor, animation director Wayne Gilbert. It was through Gilbert that Kelly realized that he wasn't learning what he needed at school. Kelly left the academy in 1996 for a job as character animator at former video game and educational company Presage Software, but continued his studies with Gilbert twice a week.

In 1998, Kelly fulfilled his lifelong dream and landed a job at ILM. Since that time, he has worked on numerous films including Day After Tomorrow, where he was on the team that animated the wolves; War of the Worlds, for which he animated tripods and probes; and Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith, where he helped develop and animate the vulture droids and animated Yoda in a pivotal swordfight. Kelly worked as a lead animator on Transformers, and his additional credits include The Incredible Hulk, Star Wars: Episode 2 – Attack of the Clones, AI: Artificial Intelligence, and Indiana Jones 4. He just completed work as lead animator on Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen.

Kelly received the 2007 award for the 'Best Single Visual Effect of the Year' by the Visual Effects Society (VES), an organization dedicated to advancing the arts, sciences and the application of visual effects. Kelly's winning effect was for the desert highway sequence of Transformers, in which Bonecrusher skates through traffic, destroys a bus, and fights Optimus Prime.

Kelly has developed curriculum and taught at the Academy of Art University and was on the team that earned the 2000 CLIO award for Best Computer Animation for a Pepsi/Star Wars "Alien" campaign. Kelly currently lives in San Anselmo, Calif., where he reads a lot -- especially comics – and writes short films.

CARLOS BAENA, cofounder
Carlos Baena knew he wanted to be an animator after watching two films: Toy Story and The Nightmare Before Christmas. He was moved by the storytelling, the characters, and the animation. After Baena began studying animation, he experienced a deeper level of storytelling that he wanted to share with others. As a cofounder of the online school AnimationMentor.com, Baena is helping to bring animation education to students around the world, inspiring them to make films.

Baena works with fellow cofounders, Bobby Beck, AnimationMentor.com's CEO and President, and Shawn Kelly to define and shape the school's overall direction. Baena balances his cofounder responsibilities with his full-time animator job at Pixar Animation Studios in Emeryville, Calif.

Born on the Canary Islands and raised in Madrid, Baena came to the United States to attend the University of San Francisco and the Academy of Art University. Upon graduation in June 1998, he landed a job animating commercials at Will Vinton Studios in Portland, Ore. Four months later, he returned to San Francisco to work on spots and short films at Click 3X and WildBrain, Inc.

Baena continued to hone his craft, doing character animation tests and wearing out his VCR's slowmo toggle. The imagery he created helped him secure a position at Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) in March 2001. At ILM, Baena worked as an animator on Jurassic Park 3, Men in Black 2, and Star Wars: Episode 2-Attack of the Clones. Captivated by fantasy and comedy, Baena left ILM for Pixar in 2002 where he has worked on the films Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Cars, Ratatouille, the short film Boundin', and Andrew Stanton's WALL-E. In Cars, Baena animated several scenes with the two Italian cars Guido and Luigi (two of the characters that were the most fun for him to animate) and received a 2007 Annie Award nomination for Best Character Animation for his work. In Ratatouille, he worked mostly on the chief villain Skinner, finding creative and subtley funny ways to show the character's anger. Baena's current projects at Pixar include the upcoming release of Andrew Stanton's WALL-E and Toy Story 3, which is scheduled for release in 2010.

Baena currently lives in San Francisco, Calif., where he spends his leisure time studying and making short films, composing music, skateboarding, and perfecting his animation craft. For more information on Baena, check out his Web site: www.carlosbaena.com