AnimSchoolBlog: AnimSchool Interview: Disney Recruiter Matt Roberts

AnimSchoolBlog: AnimSchool Interview: Disney Recruiter Matt Roberts

With our studio, the 3 most important recommendations I can give to animators are acting, acting, acting!!!!! A reel demonstrating a solid versatility in performance and entertainment value are the best way to get noticed. Don't give us any gimmicks, don't worry about putting music to your reel, just show us your full range as an actor. Give us a multitude of personalities on your reel that feel like genuinely different, thinking characters that even ideally, come off as done by different animators. Give us a variety of acting techniques:  broad, subtle, comedic, dramatic, dialogue, pantomime, cartoony, realistic, etc. Think in terms of subtext and making scenes with at least two characters interacting with each other so that they can play off each others personalities. A recommendation I often throw out there is that if you have access to a quality quadruped rig, do an acting test with that to show you can believably move a different set of anatomy yet do so with attitude and expression. Give us genuine emotion and specific nuance, not generic expressions. We're looking for actors, so treat your reel like an audition and wow us with your versatility.