Since the summer of 2000, the Department of Visualization has collaborated with a leading animation studio to give students a condensed “real-world” production experience. This year students (under the direction of faculty member Ann McNamara and teaching-assistant Tim Swartz) taking the Summer Industry Course (VIZA 627) worked with artists and CG professionals from DreamWorks Animation to produce three animated shorts. Each team of students had to develop a storyline around a simple concept (involving a robot) and then produce a thirty-second short. Students covered every aspect of the CG production pipeline including pre-viz, rigging, animation, surfacing, effects, lighting and rendering.
