Dick Zondag Visits Vancouver Students

My good friend and college buddy Dick Zondag came by a few weeks ago to talk with our animation students.
I hosted a Q and A session with Dick as we talked about his past experiences working at various studios as a supervising animator and director.

We are very happy that he has agreed to jump on board to help instruct our character animation students part time. With all his feature experience, it's going to be a great opportunity for the students as he makes his rounds and helps them with their scenes. I'm sure there will be a few stories of the old days as well :-)


Below is a quick movie showing part of our discussion while he visited the school. He talks about being a supervising animator and the importance of working as a team with the director and animators to discover the best creative ideas for each scene. 
In this moment he discusses the process of acting for the character he supervised, the 'Bowler Hat Guy' while working together with the director Steve Anderson on Disney's feature 'Meet the Robinsons'.



DICK ZONDAG interview with Mark Pudleiner from Mark Pudleiner on Vimeo.



Dick Zondag has over 25 years experience in animation as a Director, Supervising Animator, Story Artist, Character Designer and Writer. He has worked on projects produced by George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, and studios such as Don Bluth and Walt Disney Animation Studios.  His industry credits include everything from The Care Bear Movie and Reboot to The Land Before Time, Chicken Little, An American Tail, Dinosaur, Meet the Robinsons, Bolt, and many more. Dick has now started his own studio, Movie Plus Canada, with partners Ralph Zondag and Chris Brough. Both Dick and Ralph are currently preparing to co-direct Heroes & Monsters and Monkey King as 3D movies.


Here is Dick's website :    www.dickzondag.com

Here is Dick's IMBD credits: Click here for his credits

 

The Land Before Time - John Pomeroy - sketches 5

Here is another one of John's drawings from the feature 'The Land Before Time' while we were at Don Bluth Studios in Burbank California during 1986. The time was just before we made the move to Dublin Ireland. This was one of John's earlier scenes when Littlefoot is first born as he hatches from his egg. I remember seeing it for the first time and thinking how cute the scene played out. As usual, John set the bar very high for the other animators to match the charm and appeal he was able to put into his performances. Beautiful work.

                                     Below is the clip showing how John's scene plays out.

                                         copyright: Universal Animation Studios
                                                     

50 years old today.

Yikes !

Half a century old today. I guess i should have my act together at this point :-)
For all the people that venture over to this blog every now and then - thank you for your support and i truly hope that you are able to enjoy the things i post about.

All the best for the future -  Old person { Mark }

Here's a quick sketch of my youngest as we wait for his flight at Vancouver International Airport.
Black Sharpie on paper.