Students from COD's Animation Portfolio capstone class will screen their final projects during the 15th annual event held at the MAC.
COD Newsroom, Community Contributor
Students from College of DuPage’s Animation Portfolio capstone class will screen their final projects during the 15th annual Animation Night at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, May 21.
Animation night is a celebration of students’ hard work throughout the semester, including various work from other animation classes and displays of their artwork, which can be viewed on the stage by guests at the end of the night with refreshments.
“You start to develop some really good support groups in the class,” said Venezia. “They have their methods of motivating themselves. I like to see people being passionate about their work and really trying to do something they think they can’t do and prove to themselves that they can do way more than they thought.”
Ryan Jolly, a 2018 COD graduate and program tutor, notes that students in the animation classes are consistently passionate and willing to learn, despite approaching a challenging industry.
“I think that’s due to the competition and how we run the class, with checking in and seeing how everyone’s doing,” he said. “It’s the final class that you take at COD to make your film, and then you either go to another school or you go to the workforce, hopefully.
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Animation student Nicole Dakas’ project features Xia, a cat woman, wandering towards a grove of trees through an open plain with “something” following her.
“I’m inspired by a lot of animated stuff, like, ‘How to Train Your Dragon,’” she said. “One thing that’s been inspiring me lately is a video game I play called ‘Nine Sols’ that inspired my animation and kind of brought me down the animation track here.”
Student Toby Welch’s project stars a human girl who is abducted by aliens, who mistake her for the brother of an alien girl on the ship, while the alien girl’s real brother is found by the human girl’s friends who believe it is her and try to change her back into a human.
“It’s a little confusing to explain, but it’s supposed to be more comedic,” he said. “When we present, everyone is so happy to talk about these stories that they’ve been working on forever and things they want to share so, I’m really excited to see everyone’s work and see all the stuff that comes out of it.”
The Animation/Motion Graphics program at COD allows for students to learn cartoon drawing, character design, modeling, stop-motion, storyboard development and motion graphics. The College’s Animation certificate is a cross-disciplinary endeavor designed to prepare students to work in gaming, film or television.
For more information, call (630) 942-2020, email [email protected] or visit www.cod.edu/mptv.