We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Casey Stallings. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Casey below.

Hi Casey, thanks for joining us today. It’s always helpful to hear about times when someone’s had to take a risk – how did they think through the decision, why did they take the risk, and what ended up happening. We’d love to hear about a risk you’ve taken.

I was born and raised in a small rural town in North Carolina. After graduating high school, I had plans of moving to Nashville, Tennessee to pursue my degree in Audio Engineering. College began and after 6 months of sitting in front of a computer compiling sound files, I realized it wasn’t something I truly enjoyed. Afraid to drop out of college, I had considered the animation courses at school. But I never felt I was good enough. I liked to draw and I knew I was creative, but growing up, my twin brother was always known as the “artist” of the family. I felt like I’d be settling in his shadow.

But I spoke with myself and realized I’m not my twin. I am my own creative individual! So I took a week off of school, spoke with my family, met with an advisor, and made the change. I was now an animation student. Almost instantly, there was relief as I sat in front of a computer and lightbox and started to draw. I felt like I had found where I was meant to be.

I still sometimes feel the pressure of being compared to my twin brother. We both are creative in our careers. He’s now a photographer based in Nashville, while I took the risk and made my way over to Los Angeles, California where I now work in animation. But looking back, I’m so thankful I chose something for myself and made that change. I could never imagine an uncreative life and career.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

First of all, my name is Casey. I’m 29 years old and I’ve always loved to create! I moved to LA in the beginning of 2017, and right out of the gate landed my first studio job as a revisionist for primetime television. It was a short job but I met some incredible people and learned so much more than I thought I would in that time.

Since then, I’ve been fortunate to work on many different and unique projects. I’ve done storyboards, designed backgrounds for animation, text for a feature film credit roll, and more recently begun work on the production side of animation as well as live action!

I’ve learned that I want to eventually be a showrunner for animation. And with that, I’d like to know what each role does day-to-day. I feel that understanding the workload and knowing exactly what each member of your team does helps create a strong leader.

My creative style is a weird blend of mystery, magic, and adventure. I’ve always loved shows that create unique characters and puts them in a situation that help them grow and become better versions of themselves. I personally love creating weird and quirky characters based on reptiles, foods, cryptids, and exaggerated versions of people from my real life.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

For myself personally, I think the validation you get as an artist is so rewarding. Its that little push you may need one day when your creative well has run dry. Every time I finish a commissioned piece or contract work, and I get the email that says “I love it!”, it literally makes my heart sing! Haha

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

In a previous statement, I mentioned wanting to become a showrunner for animation. As I child, I was inspired by someone’s creative idea, and I would love to be able to inspire someone else to create.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.cstallingsart.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cstallingsart/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cstallingsart/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/CStallingsArt
• Other: https://www.inprnt.com/gallery/cstallingsart/