In our recent webinar, Animation Mentor alumnus and Content Creator Sir Wade Neistadt took a break from his busy YouTube channel to sit down with us and chat about his animation journey. He talked about his favorite AM memory and his time at DreamWorks Animation, and shared his #1 tip for becoming a successful animator—it’s not what you think!

This was such a cool webinar and we learned a ton! Watch the replay to hear Sir Wade’s advice for yourself.

Some gems from the webinar:

“Do I still talk to my classmates? I get that a lot. Yes! Some of my best friends are from Animation Mentor.”

AM is probably the best career decision I could have made, because I wouldn’t be doing any of this stuff without it.

“People in the industry, especially ones who have been doing this for a long time, they all say that they love having new talent, new artists join the studio, because the new people are like, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m so excited to be here!’ And they were like that too, but after a while you get used to it and you’re like, ‘Yeah, this is still good,” but they’re not like *rah rah rah* every day, so hiring new people and bringing in people like you who are excited to be there is exciting for them and helps motivate them.”

“The best networking tip is to just work hard and be friendly.”

“I think YouTube’s particularly interesting and I think we’re going to start to see more and more artists joining these types of platforms. I mean there’s plenty of people on Instagram and there’s some of us on YouTube and I think it’s only going to grow, just because the freedom of it is cool. You can make anything and put it out there. It’s the most basic thing everyone can say, “You can make anything and put it on YouTube,” but that’s really cool!”

“If you’re 37 or if you’re 50 and you decide to change careers, no, you’re not too late.”

A huge thanks to Sir Wade for sharing his experience and advice—we’re so proud of our grad!

We have more webinars on the way, so stay tuned.

In the mean time, check out some related posts:
Is Your Demo Reel Ready for a Major Studio?
What Dos a Game Animator Do? Demo and Q&A with Skylar Surra
Q&A with Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse Animator Nick Kondo

Want to be mentored by professional animators?

Start your animation journey by learning from professional animators at studios like Pixar, DreamWorks, and Sony Imageworks! Get more information about Animation Mentor’s Character Animation Program.