Critiques come in all types and forms. Sometimes they are devastating, some times enlightening, sometimes they are both, but one thing they always are is stressful.

Interior - Laguna College of Art and Design - Day
Wide establishing shot: A cold wind is howling outside the doors at each end of the long rectangular room. There is a cluster of tables gathered at the center of the room to form a U shaped conference room table.

Two other tables filled with breakfast pastries, coffee, and orange juice are set against the right hand wall. The nearest of these tables partially blocks a large screen video/DVD unit that one of the students is trying to set up. She moves nerously around the room, clicking three different remote control units. She leaves the room and returns with a VHS tape and a computer connector cable.

Twelve students in their last year of the four-year animation program are gathered in room 12. The set up their stuff at the center tables. There are chairs set up along the wall with the doors and along the wall opposite it.

About 30 or 40 students and guests fill these seats. I am in that group at the invatation of Aubry Mintz, the chair of the Laguna animation department.

Sunday morning, I watch the drama unfold. I see their sweaty palms and signs of nerves. Their work hangs on the wall. It is just about show time.




Don, the student setting next to me, draws caricatures of the different people in the room.

Enter Eric Goldberg and Bert Klien. They set down in the far side of the U shaped group of tables. I help Eric fix his glasses. The right lens has fallen out. The girl that has been trying to get the flat screen unit set up is the first up to present. A hush falls over the room.

There follows 4 hours of in depth critique and training. Eric goes into the dangers of thinking on 2`s. He draws charts on the board. Both Eric and Bert talk about the techniques of animation. They discuss character design. They deal with the student`s stories and how to make them better.

It was a fun thing to watch. The students got a lot of valuable input. They all made a good showing. I was impressed with the Leguna animation program. Eric and Bert were great. They took the extra time to give the students a good honest critique with lots of helpful input. I enjoyed watching the whole process.


Charting out inbetweens and then showing how the inbetweening would be done from the chart
  ¶ 4:59 PM