Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Ananya Shenoy. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi Ananya, thanks for joining us today. Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

I took up animation during my undergraduate studies. At the time, I thought I would like to become a 2D animator. After the first year of university and after working on some short film projects, I realized that I liked illustration and 3D modeling more than animating. Looking back, I’m glad I had this realization early on in my college journey. However, even though I knew what I wanted to do, the journey to get where I am now was long and would not have been possible without the amazing teachers and mentors I had along the way.

Animation is a craft that is technical and artistic at the same time. No matter how much you learn, there’s always something new to do. In my initial years of university, I did a lot of self-learning. My undergraduate degree provided a broad introduction to animation and I knew that I had to go beyond what the university curriculum covered. My initial learning of 3D was through working on personal projects, running into issues and then watching Youtube videos to solve those issues. The work I did during this time really improved my problem-solving skills but something that I think would have sped up my process of learning was to get more feedback during this time. I think the times I made the most progress in my skills and learning was during classes and mentorships where I received feedback every week. Having more experienced eyes on my projects helped me to see my mistakes better and have more exponential improvement.

After the skill building during my undergraduate degree and additional classes, my goal during my Master’s degree was to work on as many collaborative projects as possible. Even though I was more confident with my skills when I started my Master’s degree, animation is collaborative field and I hadn’t worked on many 3D collaborative projects before then. Working on several 3D films during my Master’s helped me learn how to work in a variety of styles and also match the needs of different kinds of short film and game projects. It helped me bridge the gap in my skills and make my files more optimized for use by other people. I also learned a lot from the workflows of the people that I collaborated with.

The main advice I would give to people just starting out in animation is to build your problem-solving skills early on. No matter what discipline you choose, a surprisingly large part of the animation learning process is scouring through reddit threads and obscure posts on websites from the early 2000s to find the answers you need. Knowing how to troublshoot and pull from different sources to solve the issues you run into is really important. Also, never rely solely on classes when you’re in your learning phase. Classes are just a foundation to teach you essential skills. When it comes to art and animation, what will make you stand out is the work you do outside your classes that showcase your personal voice.

Ananya, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

My initial reason for getting into animation was because I liked writing. I had always wanted to be an author but also did not think it was a viable field for me. Going into animation, I thought it would be a great way to add visuals to my stories. Ironically, I now work more on the technical side of animation and haven’t written a story in years.

Apart from building my craft and collaborating with people when possible, I currently teach animation at the University of Central Florida. The thing that I am most proud of is the how I have built my teaching skills over the years. As someone who grew up an introvert, I never thought I’d get into a profession where I would be talking to so many people every day. Being in art schools for both my graduate and undergraduate degrees really helped me break out of my shell and my early years of troublshooting made me good at problem-solving for myself and other people. Teaching has also helped me learn so many new things from the work of my students and from solving the issues that they have.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.

I think non-creatives underestimate how much time doing creative work takes. People usually think that animation is a fun and laid-back profession and often don’t realize how much time it takes to truly master the craft. While animation is definitely a lot of fun and definitely rewarding, the main thing I find myself explaining to people is how long doing something in animation takes. Most animated feature films have hundreds of people working on them usually for the span of several years.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

I have always been someone who is decisive and know what I want to do. Something that I have had to learn is to let go of the things that I can’t control. I always try to put my best foot forward for whatever I do and something that I used to find difficult is navigating the reactions of other people and facing rejection. Over the years, I have learned to separate the end result from the process and have started focussing more on how I can work on things that I like without always worrying about how they will turn out. I think that everything you do becomes a learning opportunity even if the end result is not what you originally anticipated.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://ananyashenoy.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stuck_in_my_imagination/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ananya-shenoy/