If you’ve been to a movie lately, you likely have seen the brilliant work of the “Sheridan Mafia”. That’s the nickname given by Hollywood to several graduates of the animation program at Sheridan College, a school located in the sleepy suburban town of Oakville, Ontario, about a half hour west of Toronto.
Maybe you’ve marvelled at the T1000 “cyborg” in Terminator 2, were amazed by the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park, or were delighted by the effects in The Mask. Thank Sheridan graduate Steve Williams for that.
Perhaps you saw James Strauss’ dragon in Dragonheart, or other students’ work in such movies as Forrest Gump, Star Wars, Twister and Lord of the Rings.
Sheridan has become famous internationally as more than just an excellent school that produces talented students. It is an institution that has contributed to the animation profession, and has helped establish Canada as a leader in the animation industry. For that, thank Robin King.
After six months of research into what would be the next big thing, King suggested the creation of an eight-month graduate-level computer animation program in 1979. In those days, he was the director of new media development and academic director of the faculty of arts.
The idea was initially scoffed at. Many thought there were no qualified instructors, no students that needed the program, and no industry to fill with graduates.
King couldn’t allay those doubts. All he asked for was $200,000 and some faith. That year, the program was established and it became the first of its kind in Canada.
Today, you can find Sheridan graduates working in senior positions in every major animation studio around the world. Every year, Sheridan holds an open house so students can show their work to studio headhunters.
Some have even been offered jobs before graduating. Even more get wooed away before graduation. Starting salaries for animators are usually in the high five figures, and some can hit six figures.
Mike Shiell, a 1997 Sheridan graduate, was plucked out of school to work for Universal Studios in San Jose, California. Today, he is the 3D animation director at Nelvana, a Toronto animation studio. As he remembers it, the program was tough. “It was a lot of work, but a lot of fun, and you knew it was only eight months that you had to work like that,” he said.
About 150 to 250 students apply every year for about 30 coveted spots in the one-year graduate-level computer animation program. Annual tuition is $11,800.
“The hardest thing was just getting in. They really stress that you need an artistic background rather than computer skills,” Shiell said.
Another 15 students are accepted for the programs in the second year, and another 25 for those interested in more technical applications of motion analysis and special effects. Through an agreement with the University of Toronto, a few bio-medical masters-level students also get accepted to the program.
Since 1967, Sheridan has had a classical animation program which was developed by several famous animators, including Bill Mathews, a renowned animation pioneer at Disney. King, who is now a professor and a senior research associate at Sheridan, feels that the school is a success because students study both classical and computer animation. “The quality comes from the content and not the technology,” he said.
“Some schools get caught up in the tools, and even though the technology is important, there has to be a story, there has to be movement and it has to be exceptional.”
The goal is to focus on three things: story, character design and motion, and animation dynamics. If you have all that, then you have a great animator.
King believes animators are more than just artists. “They breathe magic into characters because when someone supplies the voice, the animator has to make the character come alive,” he said.
One of the main reasons Sheridan has done so well is it has been at it for a long time. It was one of the first and biggest computer animation schools in North America. As for competition, other colleges in the Greater Toronto Area are now offering computer animation courses. However, Sheridan’s primary competition historically has been American institutions, such as the California Institute for the Arts and the School of Communication Arts in Raleigh, North Carolina.
When the animation industry was new, Sheridan students were already winning awards and becoming famous around the world. It certainly helped that King was constantly out there, publishing papers, preaching the Sheridan way all over the world, including at SIGGRAPH, a well-known conference in animation circles.
The result of Sheridan’s fame was the creation of the college’s $24-million Centre for Animation, Design and Emerging Technologies which opened in 2000 after being financed by a mix of government funding, the private sector and other partnerships.
Remarkably, the demand for students from the program is still as high as it has always been, despite the troubled economy.
Programs have been expanded to address a demand for classical and computer animation services. New applications for animation technologies and skills are opening up as the cost of technology decreases.
Benefiting from this are many non-entertainment disciplines. “Animation is not going to be just about entertainment,” King said. “There are incredible things that can be done with 3D technology in preventative medicine, sports and many cross-cultural applications. Animation is not just about Mickey Mouse. It can actually make the world a better place.”
