John K on Animation Curriculums

Aaron Simpson of Cold Hard Flash interviews John Kricfalusi about a myriad of topics, one of which sticks out for me. John is asked what his ideal animation school curriculum would be:

Aarons asks: "Imagine that you were creating the curriculum for an animation college. What course titles would you start with?"

1ST YEAR

* Rubber hose animation
* Walks, runs, basic movement
* Basic lip synch
* Figure 8 motions
* Animating to beats
* ¾ walks with animating backgrounds
* How to read and write ex sheets
* Animating the impossible - using the medium to do what only animation can do
* History of cartoons, comics and animation from around 1920 till about 1965 - this would be every year and each year I would have the students study aspects of classic cartoons that relate to their exercises
* Life Drawing with an emphasis on slow careful drawings, structure, perspective and proportions
* Caricature
* Observation over style: Learning to use your eyes and senses to analyze, rather than copying trendy styles
* Music, Dance (every year)

2ND YEAR

* 40s principles of animation
* Using simple organic characters made of pears and spheres
* Basic acting, staging, timing
* Observation and application
* More Life Drawing
* Applying concepts from Life Drawing to your animation
* Caricature of bodies as well as heads

3RD YEAR

* Character animation
* Animating different types of designs
* Solving design/animation problems - animating cartoon designs from media other than animation-comic strips, magazine cartoons, etc.
* Advanced acting and dialogue animation - timing and pacing
* Animating caricatures
* Animating specific gestures and expressions that your fellow students make

4TH YEAR

* I'll have to think about this one... maybe make a film.


If there was a school like this, the graduates of the first 4 years of the program would revolutionize the medium and no one else could compete with them.

Make sure to check out the rest of the interview here.