Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Alex Geerken. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Alex, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.
Since I was little I have always loved drawing – my high school notebooks were mostly filled with drawings and random little characters. In 2016 I began teaching myself animation in Photoshop. I had no prior experience with animation aside from making Post-It flip books in grade school, but decided I wanted to overlay some effects on some video I had shot. At the time, I had no idea there was actual animation software out there, so I painstakingly would take screenshots frame-by-frame of the footage I had shot, and then import them as a stack in Photoshop, and draw individually on each frame, export and then compile them together as a video. That was my first taste of rotoscope animation. From there, I eventually learned more techniques and other features in Photoshop to have a much more efficient workflow, and I eventually began landing jobs creating fully rotoscoped athlete animations. Traditional 2D animation is an extremely time consuming process, and in watching footage of athletes frame-by-frame I have become more familiar with motion and the flow of natural movement. This has helped me in creating more original 2D animations of my very own, such as these 2 cat characters I am making an animated short called Soba & Shiro.
Today, there are so many incredible apps and tools for creatives to use, and I try to use as many as I can. I eventually want to get TVPaint but as always, the learning curve for new software can be steep so it’s just a matter of time, slowly implementing new tools to my workflow.
My history of sketching and drawing is what made me so curious to suddenly dive into animation, I wanted my doodles to come to life. There are zero limits and infinite possibilities as to what you can create with 2D animation – worlds, characters, stories…all you need is an imagination and a pen!
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
Although I am fully focused on pursuing 2D animation, I have never attended to art school – I am self-taught and went to college for Psychology, graduating with a BA from Willamette University in 2014.
All my life I have always shot video and photo for fun, and in 2015 I began posting my video art on Vine – short 6 second looping videos with audio I enjoyed and it began to gain some traction. I was featured several times, gaining millions of loops and views and gathered around 30K followers in a very short time, which blew my mind. I had always been hesitant to post on social media, but when I saw that my work was something that people resonated with, it gave me the drive and motivation to keep creating and pushing myself to create more. When Vine was shut down, I had no audience – it was super upsetting to lose a platform and a community that was so niche for my style of video so I asked myself ‘How do I stand out on other platforms?’
This was 2017, and I remember thinking that the way to stand out is to do something that very few people will be willing to do, something that takes a lot of time and effort…2D animation.
I had always loved drawing, and I decided to implement that skill into a new style for my video art. At the time, I lived and worked for Red Bull in Denver CO, and I decided to rotoscope a local skater named Devin Bagnoli – I drew and colored a full background, animated him landing a trick and posted online. It immediately got attention and positive feedback so I decided to create more!
I then animated Clive Dixon doing a nollie noseblunt down a prolific skate spot ‘El Toro.’ Birdhouse skateboards reposted my animation, which got me a couple thousand followers.
This was the turning point for me as an artist. I got some gigs with Red Bull, as well as Vans, and I created a full length animated music video for Sam Tabor, a YouTuber/skateboarder who came across my work through the online skate community.
I animated skater after skater, and would get shouted out for these videos by the athletes themselves, and eventually hit 10K followers on IG in 2019.
I was feeling on top of the world, and flew out to LA that summer for the day for a potential animation job. However, on my way to the airport that day I got in a bike accident and broke my collarbone/shoulder…my drawing arm. I was out for 2 months recovering, and it was the worst feeling being unable to draw. As soon as I recovered, I set myself a challenge for the month of October to make an 1 animation every day for 31 days, using the daily ‘Inktober’ prompts (Inktober is a month long art challenge created by artist Jake Parker that is focused on improving skill and developing positive drawing habits. Every day for the month of October anyone participating in the Inktober challenge creates an ink drawing and posts it online.)
I used a cat character that I had created in 2013 called ‘Shiro’ and used him as the subject for the daily prompts.
Creating my own original animations was a blast, making different characters and scenes for him to interact with, a little touch of humor here and there.
It brought me back to when I was little making comic books and reignited my inspiration to create again. However, that month was brutal, working my full time job at Red Bull and then coming home to create a fully animated/colored video for another 6-8 hours. My injured arm basically felt broken again by the end of it, but was totally worth it, resulting in a few minutes of my own little cartoon. The next couple years I was caught up in working for other brands and companies, and I had to put my own creative endeavors aside.
In 2022 I moved from Denver to live in LA, where I worked with my friend Danny Casale AKA @Coolman on Instagram, who I have known since 2014. I learned a ton from working with him, about social media and how to navigate the internet space, and felt inspired to get back into creating my own originals.
So October of 2023, I took part in the Inktober challenge once more – introducing a new cat character named Soba (these two characters are named and inspired after my actual cats, Soba and Shiro – they’re the greatest). This time however, I connected each prompt to create a ~4 minute long adventure for the two to embark on. I am still in the process of finishing the animation, dozens of background art images to paint, and finalize movements and animation, but the daily prompts are currently strung together in an ‘animatic’ on my Instagram that I will use to finalize the full video with sound and music. I have many small passion projects I have slowly been chipping away at, and am looking forward to sharing more of my art online – keep your eyes peeled!
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
In 2019, I flew out to LA on a day trip for a meeting related to a potential animation project. However, on the way back to the airport, I had a bike accident and ended up breaking my collarbone/shoulder. I called an Uber to take me to the emergency room, where I underwent X-rays. Despite the pain and discomfort, I managed to catch a flight back to Denver a couple hours later – undoubtedly the most challenging flight of my life.
The injury was particularly disheartening because it affected my drawing arm. After two months of recovery, including physical therapy, I finally felt comfortable enough to pick up my pen again. That’s when I decided to set myself a 31-day challenge – Inktober. Inktober, an online art challenge created by artist Jake Parker, encourages participants to create and share an ink drawing every day throughout October. I revisited a cat character I had originally created in 2013 – Shiro – and animated a new scenario each day, from start to finish.
Despite the toll it took on my arm and the exhaustion of posting before midnight every day, the experience was immensely rewarding. It tested my discipline and determination after a prolonged creative hiatus. Since then, I’ve come to appreciate both my ability to draw and the functionality of my arm. Here’s hoping I never encounter a similar accident again – maybe I need to invest in a protective arm case like the ‘hand model’ from Zoolander anytime I get on anything with wheels…
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
I think the most rewarding aspect of being an artist is when people directly reach out to say they enjoy your creations.
When I am shouted out by an athlete for creating an animation, or even another artist gives me a boost, I would be flooded with DM’s from people with nothing but praise and support.
Of course theres always a hater here and there, but seeing the overwhelming positivity is something that keeps me going and inspires me to push ourselves even more. Especially in 2D animation, with my cartoons it is extremely rewarding to have absolute creative freedom – there are zero limits as to what I can create on a blank piece of paper and a pen – and also overwhelming because of the fact theres infinite possibilities, it can sometimes be difficult to even know where to start. But at the end of the day, the absolute creative freedom is what I love most.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.alexgeerken.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alexgeerken/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/alex.geerken
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexgeerken
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/alexgeerken
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/AlexGeerken