Center for Animation

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Overview

Officially established in 2010, Brigham Young University's Center for Animation is highly recommended and is one of the top animation programs in the nation. Students from this program continue to achieve excellence and produce award-winning films, turning the heads of entertainment executives from California to Cannes. The BYU animation program holds faculty members from companies including Disney, Pixar, DreamWorks, and Warner Bros. These professors continue to obtain training on the best and most current technology for animation from motion picture studios and other companies such as DreamWorks, Pixar, Disney, Sony, Microsoft, Chair and General Motors.

History

The movement towards the Center for Animation was first started by Brent Adams, a Salt Lake City architectural designer who started commuting to Provo to teach evening classes. Shortly after he started teaching at BYU, a company in Alabama donated a significant amount of computer hardware to the university and Ira A. Fulton, a home-builder from Phoenix, Arizona purchased a supercomputer for BYU. With this new computer technology BYU started a computer animation program.

In the program's first year, well before the actual creation of the Center for Animation, the animation program won both a Student Emmy from the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences and a Student Academy Award from the same group that hosts the Oscars. The students from the Center continue to dominate these two competitions, and in addition, they’ve won Nickelodeon’s Producers’ Choice Award, Viewers’ Choice Award and have been invited to show at festivals such as Sundance, Cannes, and Annecy.

In 2008 Ed Catmull, the President of Pixar and Walt Disney Animation Studios, came to speak at the announcement of the Center for Animation. He acknowledged the success and progress of BYU's animation program, declaring that "we found that BYU has risen to the top. BYU has an extraordinary program here.They pay a lot of attention to what is going on in the areas of the entertainment industry, listen carefully, smart about what they do, and the students are really good that are coming out of here." The program was officially established in 2010.

The Center operates under the direction of three colleges: the Ira A. Fulton College of Engineering and Technology, the College of Fine Arts and Communications, and the College of Physical and Mathematical Sciences. In 2012 the Center's facilities were moved from the Ira A. Fulton College of Engineering and Technology to the College of Physical and Mathematical Sciences.

Awards

The Estefan team (from left to right): Quay Mims, Joey Majdali, Carson Crawford, Lauren Taylor, Lauren Oppenlander, and Aaron Ludwig

Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Foundation, College Television Awards

(These are universally called the "Student Emmys." Emmys are a trademarked name for the regular Emmys and are not to be used for this award. The voting is by the same academy members as Emmys, same organization, etc. The award is just non-officially referred to as a Student Emmy.)

  • Estefan (2013)
  • Dreamgiver (2012)
  • Xing
  • Kites
  • Pajama Gadiator
  • Las Pinatas
  • Der Ostwind
  • Petshop (2005, Non-Traditional; Computer Generated)
  • Faux Paw (2005, Traditional)
  • Lemmings (2004, Best Animation: Non-Traditional; Computer Generated)
  • The Lion and the Mouse

Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences; Student Academy Awards

  • Lemmings (2004, Bronze Award)

External Links

News Links

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