Michelle Higa Fox Interview
In this conversation, Mack Garrison interviews Michelle Higa-Fox, an Emmy award-winning artist and filmmaker, about her journey in the motion graphics and animation industry. They discuss the importance of community, early influences, navigating new technologies, innovative projects at BUCK, and the future of technology in creative spaces. Michelle shares insights on how to foster creativity and collaboration, the significance of learning through experimentation, and the skills that will remain relevant despite changing technologies.
Takeaways
Michelle Higa Fox is an Emmy award-winning artist and filmmaker.
Community plays a crucial role in the motion design space.
Early exposure to technology and creativity shaped Michelle's career.
Web design was a friendly entry point into the arts for Michelle.
Engaging with others accelerates the learning process.
Innovation thrives in collaborative environments.
Smaller experiments can lead to significant learning opportunities.
Character development is essential in storytelling across mediums.
Skills in user experience translate across different technologies.
Understanding one's learning style is key to personal growth.
Chapters
00:00Introduction to Michelle Higa-Fox
02:11The Importance of Community in Motion Design
05:17Early Influences and Family Background
07:08Navigating New Technologies and Learning
10:09Innovative Projects at Buck
15:34Creating Systems for Innovation
19:23The Future of Technology in Creative Spaces
Transcript:
Mack Garrison (00:00)
Hey, what's up y'all? Mack Garrison here, co-founder and director of content over at Dash Studio, and I am so excited to introduce y'all to Michelle Higa Fox, an Emmy award-winning artist and filmmaker who combines code-based visuals with handmade animation. With over 15 years of experience in motion graphics, animation, and experience design, her work has earned a Peabody Award, Art Directors Club Young Guns Award, and Best Music Video Award at South by Southwest. I'm impressed already, Michelle.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (00:28)
You
Mack Garrison (00:29)
In 2012, she founded Slanted Studios to develop commercial projects, music videos, and interactive art installations at the intersection of animation and emerging technology with clients including Netflix, Facebook, Twitter, Adult Swim, Coach, Nike, Samsung, Viacom, all the groups you want to work with and is now the current group creative director at BUCK. Michelle, thanks so much for hanging out with us and glad to introduce one of our Dash Bash speakers to our growing audience.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (00:45)
you
Thank you so much, Mack. It's a bit overwhelming to hear altogether. But I'm so excited to join y'all at Dash Bash. I can't tell you the number of people who have had the best time. I would say even a life-changing time, and that it really reminds them how going to Dash Bash captures a lot of the early feelings of motion graphics for all of us who were there in the late 90s, early 2000s. Great energy.
Mack Garrison (01:20)
Ugh, I'm gonna play that
on repeat. That's why I'm gonna fall asleep to it at night. Thank you so much. Yeah, I think, and I know you would agree just based on that comment, just the importance of getting together. The Motion Design Space is such an eclectic group of people with different backgrounds, different specialties who have found their way into this soup of an industry that's just got so much cool creative in it. And it's easy to forget, I think, sometimes with our day-to-day and client work.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (01:31)
Yes.
Mack Garrison (01:47)
just how great each of us are and sharing those stories and connecting. And so the bash was really born in a way to facilitate that. My business partner and I, we went to conferences over the years, always got so much out of it. And so it was a way for us to kind of bring it back to the community and also recognize that the industry has changed, that you don't necessarily have to be in one of these big markets, you can be in a smaller spot. So yeah, it's gonna be super fun and maybe a good place.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (02:05)
Hmm
Mack Garrison (02:11)
for us to start, Michelle, would just be talking a little bit about yourself. was on your website. I love this picture that you have up there. I think it's like you're described as your parents' living room with all the computers as a little kid. Could you describe that picture maybe to the audience and kind of what I'm seeing and why you chose, is that like a leading photo on your website?
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (02:32)
absolutely. Hopefully it'll be inset in the video. Maybe we can refer to it. but, this is a kind of famous internal family photo. So, my family's Japanese Peruvian.
Mack Garrison (02:35)
Yeah, there we go. That's right.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (02:46)
And legendarily, the only photo for a long time that my father sent back to our family in Peru was this photo. Which was really more about the fact for anyone that hasn't seen the photo is that there are three large, very large floppy disk driven computers, two dot matrix printers. I think there's also an oscilloscope and then me as a little two year old in a bonnet in the foreground. Which I think conveyed.
Mack Garrison (02:53)
Nice.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (03:12)
how proud my family was of the life they were building in America. But yeah, I was only two years old, but my family was very, very into the entire computer industry as an early age. And I will also make a note in the background of the photo, there is a handmade macrame.
Mack Garrison (03:16)
I love it so much.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (03:32)
table hanging sort of object, which I believe my mom made by hand. So I think that's also a characteristic of the family.
Mack Garrison (03:33)
yes.
How cool.
I love that. And your
parents were both kind of engineer focused, right? Was it your mom was computer programmer and dad was a field engineer? that right?
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (03:50)
Yes, so my mother...
learned computer programming in the 70s and Lima Parushi actually learned on punch cards, so by hand computer programming early days. And my father was in the early fiber optics days, so he was part of the cohort of engineers who first established all the fiber optic networks. But they were both incredibly creative. I mean, to do that type of problem solving, you also have to be creative, but they had a lot of craft outlets. So my father was also a carpenter. He always played
Mack Garrison (04:06)
Wow.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (04:23)
music, guitar, piano, and my mother. I have these memories of going with my mother to Michael's, the craft store. It's great, it's great. And she...
Mack Garrison (04:31)
Yeah, my god, I think I was literally just there last week. I still go to Michael's. It's great.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (04:37)
I feel like as a child she just went aisle by aisle and was like, I'm going to learn flower arranging. Now I'm going to learn cake decorating. And I have memories of like helping her cut out felt and puffy paint to make like the soccer banners for my brother's soccer team. So they were both pretty invested in those sort of things.
Mack Garrison (04:52)
How fun.
So I guess it was kind of a natural tendency for you growing up to kind of be around this engineer mind, this technical mind, but also it sounds like the arts were a really important part of the family as well. Was that kind of what started to push you and move you towards this kind of new technology creative space that you really operate in today?
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (05:17)
I so. the web, email on the web came around mid 90s.
around the time I was in high school. So I remember as a hobby kind of teaching myself web design, but I had never thought I would go into the arts. So I think that's something that's lovely about motion graphics is it attracts people who are into mixed media. So there's a lot of different ways in, you get filmmakers, you get art illustrators who can draw, you get photographers. And so I...
I am still surprised and delighted that I get to touch animation every day because I actually didn't take any art classes in high school. didn't think... Yeah, all self-taught, but web design seemed like a friendly way in. But in retrospect, I look back and I remember there's another family legend.
Mack Garrison (06:00)
wow, kind of all self-taught a little bit.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (06:11)
where my parents wrote a program where if you type train into the keyboard, a little like ASCII text-based train would go across as a thing to delight me. And one day my mom came into the office and she found baby me on the chair just typing train over and over again, even though I didn't know how to read. I just knew the buttons to press to make the thing. So I think.
Mack Garrison (06:19)
that's fun.
That's amazing.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (06:38)
I think web design was a natural way in and also the start of really enjoying spaces that felt new. So while I know sometimes things that are new absolutely can feel intimidating, the flip side of that is that...
there is not necessarily a structured or right way to do it yet. So it actually invites experimentation and it evens, in my mind, it evens the playing field and it encourages play.
Mack Garrison (06:59)
Mm.
I love that. And I think, you know, it's interesting as someone who's always had a fascination with the intersection of technology and design. It really does feel like it's on the forefront of like what's next because to what you just said, there's not really that clear path. I think it also makes it intimidating to get into like, you know, anything, anything new, you don't know, you're never good at it right away. And as designers,
and creators, think we have a certain bit of perfectionism already. It's like, I know how to use this tool. I can make it look good here, but to try something else, it's just in a space I don't know. Do have any advice for folks listening who might be considering, like, I want to try something? Like, where do you begin?
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (07:49)
Mmm. Yes, especially in new areas. Where do you begin? I think whenever I'm thinking about almost even trying a new hobby
or a new medium or something, I actually usually start by trying to see if there's a community there. especially now how learning has changed so much in the last couple decades. Like, are there resources? Are there videos I can watch? But even more so, are there local meetup groups? Is there a discord or a slack? Because for me, when I'm thinking about a new technology or something I'm interested in, like I go where the people are because
I find I learn so much faster instead of trying to, because sometimes I don't even have the language for knowing what I want. so, yeah, so it's like, if I'm, you know, learning compositing, but I don't even have the language to describe like what it is about the lighting that doesn't look right. I can't look it up. But if I'm talking to another person,
Mack Garrison (08:38)
Right what you're referring to or what you're trying to achieve. It's like I want this thing, you know
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (09:00)
It both makes it easier for me to use my own language in where I'm at and what I'm excited about, but then also whenever you're talking to another person, inevitably if they're passionate about it, then they're gonna tell you what they're excited about, which then excites you even more. So I just tend to go where the people are.
Mack Garrison (09:17)
Wow, I love that. Well, and it's
a good reminder that I think it's especially in this post-COVID world of being decentralized, working in different places, it's kind of easy to get caught up in your own little silo. You're doing the same thing day in and day out, and sure, you may be good at it, but it's a reminder like, dang, I should reconnect with other people because that's how we're learning from one another. And I imagine that's probably what's so exciting about working at a company like BUCK that is this, you know,
global powerhouse when it comes to creative and tech. With that job and all these people that you work around constantly, I'm curious, there's so many projects that I'm sure you've worked on that you're proud of. Is there one that maybe sticks out recently or rises above all the rest that was just like either particularly challenging or particularly rewarding that's just like, I loved how this turned out?
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (10:09)
I so part of the reason I was so so so excited to come to BUCK was obviously the level of design and animation is very high and you're working with just
these artists with these amazing minds, they're creating visuals you couldn't have imagined. But I was really excited for some of these artists to get to work in a way they haven't before. So it's like, what happens if we take your art and all of a sudden it's interactive and you can talk to it or you can actually play with it and it pushes back? And so a lot of the juice for me at BUCK has been trying to create the safe space where people can see their work in a new way.
think some of the most satisfying work has been doing augmented reality work, virtual reality work, AI adjacent work.
but specifically with teams who have never gotten to do this before. And simultaneously, we've brought in a lot of amazing talent who is experienced first, but maybe they haven't gotten to work with illustrators or stop motion animators or sell artists before. So then they're actually getting to realize what they know in a different way that they haven't. And I think maybe a culmination of this was we...
have an Asian Pacific employee resource group at BUCK and I think one of the really
gratifying collaborations I've gotten to do is for the Lunar New Year a couple years ago, we did AR filters and it was all with artists who had never done an AR face filter before and it was a really great entry for them to try that out for the first time. And then that kind of morphed into a group art show that we curated and collaborated last year, which was really gratifying. Again, to have something in real life, everyone gets to have physical art hanging on the wall that just people
in Brooklyn get to see who might not know anything about BUCK, but then the art that was there was flown in from all over the world because there were LA artists, there were Sydney artists, everyone getting to contribute. And the mediums were also really far-ranging. So there was Needlepoint, there were digital painting posters, there were films, there was like resograph animation. And so just collaboration, I would say.
Mack Garrison (12:32)
cool.
Well, it's so interesting to me
about that and elementally I've experienced it on a smaller level where like in simplest form, you know, if you're an animator and you're designing something for animation, you're making it easier for yourself, right? You're like, I'm gonna design it this way because I wanna animate it this way. So that'll be easier. But if you're an illustrator designed for an animator, sometimes you might create something that's wild or intricate and the animator would be like, dang, I have no idea how I'm gonna animate this. And it challenges them, right? To figure it out.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (12:47)
Right.
Yeah.
Mack Garrison (13:01)
And I imagine the tech is the same way. Someone who's in the AR space, like, don't know what I'm supposed to do here. I like this, so let me try that out. It kind of pushes the tech maybe in a place that it hasn't typically gone. Would you say that's pretty accurate?
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (13:14)
Yes, definitely. think that's one thing that I've learned over the years is the work always ends up being the best if instead of saying like, you can't do this, you can't do this, you can't do this. It's more focusing on opportunities like what can you do or relaying to the artist or the team member to be like, hey, you're here for a reason. I think that's another thing is when people are doing something new, a lot of times
they're like, why am I here? Or like, I'm kind of excited to be here, but I'm kind of scared this might be kicking in my imposter syndrome. And so I think what we try to do is make sure people understand, like, no, you're absolutely here for a reason, and it's actually super exciting that you're here. And like, this is what we want to bring to the table. Like, don't worry.
we're not going to let you walk out on a plank and not tell you. But then I think it's also creating an environment for collaboration then also. So it doesn't feel like things are getting known. It's more like they're always just getting steered towards a new thing that we probably wouldn't have made, anyone on the team would have made as an individual. We're creating something new that was only feasible because it was this team of people land.
Mack Garrison (14:10)
Sure.
Hmm.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (14:36)
in a certain spot. Yeah.
Mack Garrison (14:37)
It sounds like a conductor in a symphony, honestly. You know, as creative director or a director, it's like you have this focus of kind of generally where things need to be and what some core constraints are that are maybe inflexible. And as the, as the player, the musician and the creator, you're unsure of how to get there, but it's a conductor like, look, keep doing this, or I love what you're doing here. Let's, let's pair you up with these flutes or the brass or whatever it is. And you're kind of in concert together and
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (15:02)
Yeah.
Mack Garrison (15:05)
I just love that. Maybe this is a good question that stems off of it. Let's say, you know, let's say it's a smaller studio like Dash or someone else similar. We're trying to create some sort of system around innovation. You we hear about all this change. We want to get into innovation. want to try something. Have you found that there's like a good place to start or even broader thinking that helps kind of create systems around things that are a bit abstract and unknown?
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (15:34)
So I'm a big believer in sprints and making. I am a huge believer in actually taking something from concept through execution, through posting it on the internet. There are so many steps and parts of it that you don't realize that you learn actually by doing that are really important.
And so for me, I always like to identify a target like, hey, we've never done.
a postcard that we could send out that also has an augmented reality overlay. So we actually did this for the Adobe Max talk because Adobe now has a software package called Arrow that's part of the creative suite and they make it super easy to make a postcard that then you can like lift up and see a 3D model that you can actually like hold and twist. But that's a great example of something where you're like, I don't know how to make that. But you could probably, if you set aside
Mack Garrison (16:33)
Sure.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (16:37)
a week, I would say one to two weeks is a small studio because you're trying to balance this with work or if you're an individual maybe you devote a couple weekends but you identify something and you actually try it out. And kind of starting small I think part of it and this was something that was learned over time many many years I think when I was younger I always identified as my
innovation experiments, actually something that was like gigantic and it was only in retrospect that I realized I was like, I shouldn't have started with a 10 minute short film as my goal. I probably should have started with a 15 second looping gif as my goal. And so I think knowing that there's these smaller bite sized experiments to dip your toes in.
Mack Garrison (17:11)
yeah, right.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (17:23)
is really great. And sorry, I'm keeping going, but I think I first heard this on an old Grayscale Gorilla podcast, but he had mentioned this experiment where I think they divided a class in half and one half they asked them to make.
as many perfect pots as possible, like throw as many perfect clay pots as possible. And then the second one, they just asked them like throw as many as possible. It's just a volume game. And then after five hours, they went back and they found that the half of the class that had just been instructed to do as many as possible, even though there were more that were not quote unquote perfect.
they created more pots that were exactly like the model than the people who were instructed to do perfect, something perfect. So I resonate a lot with that story where you don't have to show everything you make publicly, but the most important thing is to learn to keep making and just keep making as a practice.
Mack Garrison (18:26)
I love that so much. It's
this idea of basically, know, perfection inhibits progress. Like you've got to just keep moving, keep kind of taking one step forward on it. I feel like I might've heard that study as well too, which is really interesting. Also shout out for anyone looking for TV, The Great Pottery Throwdown, if you like, The Great British Bake Off. I'm telling you, my wife and I have just been crushing that recently. It's the next one up from The Great British Bake Off, but it's really great. I love that.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (18:32)
Yeah.
Yeah
Mack Garrison (18:53)
You know, another question I think a lot of folks have is tech is just changing so quickly. So there's also this fear I think people have where you learn something new, you invest this time and energy into it only for it to move or transition or be somewhere else. And maybe it's not invoke like it used to be. Just from your perspective and the stuff that BUCK is focusing on, do you think there's a particular area or kind of new tech, VR, AR, some of this stuff in AI that feels like it might be
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (18:59)
Mm-hmm.
Mack Garrison (19:23)
a bit long lasting. Like is there a focus y'all have or like yeah we think that this area is probably going to be something in the future based on data or information we've gotten as a bigger company.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (19:35)
Yeah, I think always the underlying things to focus on are the skills that translate no matter what. So good character development, understanding how to convey a character quickly. It doesn't necessarily matter if the text shifts, like that storytelling.
holds through no matter what. And it's interesting because BUCK did a lot. We were actually foundational partners with the Spark AR platform, which is like those Instagram face filters. When those first popped off, that was BUCK. And Spark actually was sun, as a platform, was sunsetted earlier this month. So it's wild to me that there is this entire platform.
Mack Garrison (20:05)
yeah, that's right.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (20:18)
where all these creators were making their living in entire freelance culture and now they're having to pivot. But what's interesting is it also provided a way that a lot more people could learn user experience and could learn the principles of augmented reality. And like, how do we put design elements overlaid with physical space? Like, what are the rules? What makes for a good experience? That still translates into VR. And we've seen, know, Helena Dong
as
an amazing example, she's a senior ADF buck right now. She started in Spark but then was helping direct VR experiences and larger AR experiences. So I think the skills can still translate and I would say I don't know if VR as we know it now, who knows if it will continue or AR as we know it now where you're always holding up a device, but I think if you look longer
10, 15 years in the future, some sort of persistent digital layer is probably gonna hold. But there's also a world where it's like the tech that's going to allow us to experience that doesn't exist yet. So it's you're almost concepting about, hey, what are the skills and world building and pipeline understanding we're gonna need actually for the thing after the thing after the thing we have now?
Mack Garrison (21:22)
Mm-hmm.
I love that. It's also, it's building problem solving skills, right? At a foundational level, it's yes, this tech might change or evolve, but if you're figuring out how to navigate something new, getting comfortable in what we talked about before we even hopped on the podcast, like the deep end of the pool where you can't quite stand, but you're kind of navigating comfortability there, then you're basically setting yourself up for success in the future, because you can evolve as the tech evolves.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (21:49)
Mm-hmm.
Totally. I actually think one thing about learning to...
learning new technology is you learn yourself. Like how do I learn best? Right? When we onboard new artists at BUCK, a lot of the onboarding decks have this one slide at the end, which is almost like, what's your learning style? Do you like one-on-ones? Do you like materials you download at your own time? Do you like lecture series? Do you like references? Because people learn in different ways. So by constantly learning, you get to learn how you like to learn. And that is probably the most
important skill.
Mack Garrison (22:47)
100%. You gotta know where you're gonna be able to succeed, right? You can't try to force something down that's not the right fit. I love that so much.
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (22:49)
Yeah.
Yeah, and also like learning what helps you navigate uncertainty. I think that's something a lot of the artists in, we call it the experience group at BUCK, it's like our whole thing is like, Like uncertainty is table stakes here. And so we're just helping each other and helping our clients like understand how to navigate that uncertainty.
Mack Garrison (23:22)
I love it so much.
Michelle Higa Fox, she's the group creative director over a buck doing some really smart things and really creative stuff. If you want to come see Michelle and you want to come have a great experience at the Dash Bash, June 11th through 13th, 2025, we're hanging out in Raleigh, North Carolina this summer. Two days of great speaker series, of great hangouts to connect with some of the best in the industry. Hope you can make it. Hope you can join. If you haven't got your tickets, come grab them, come see Michelle and we can't wait to hang out with you. Thanks so much for the
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (23:25)
Hahaha
Hey.
Mack Garrison (23:51)
brief and quick intro. feel like I could pull this out way more, Michelle, but we're just going to tease them. everyone's going to have to come. Everyone's got to come see you at the bash. We're going to hang. Thanks so
Michelle HIga Fox [BUCK] (23:56)
Okay, excited. We're gonna hang. Everybody come hang.
Takeover Tuesday with Katie Trayte
An interview with Katie Trayte: an illustrator based in Washington, D.C as well as the Creative Director at Duke & Duck.
Q&A with Sarah Chokali.
Read time: 5min
Bella Alfonsi:
Hey, Katie! Thanks so much for being a part of Takeover Tuesday. For those who are unfamiliar with you or your work, please tell us about you and what you do!
Katie Trayte:
Thank you so much for inviting me to participate! I love your Takeover Tuesday series.
My name is Katie Trayte and I’m an illustrator based in Washington, D.C as well as the Creative Director at Duke & Duck.
Bella Alfonsi:
Do you have any formal training or are you completely self taught?
Katie Trayte:
I graduated from SCAD with an Illustration degree, but I am fairly self-taught when it comes to animation. I started out of school as an apparel graphic designer for Hollister. So if I made it here, you can too! I always felt a pull towards animation and storytelling, but never really saw where I could fit into the compartmentalized pipelines of feature and tv. When I found the world of motion design I was, in a word, obsessed. I was also what the French call, "Les incompetents". My love of the work made it easy to find motivation in closing my knowledge gap. It was an area where my illustration and graphic design passions could both thrive, and I was so drawn to the experimental styles and trend-setting approaches happening in the field.
Shot from Sony’s | Barbra Streisand project that Katie Art Directed.
Bella Alfonsi:
You have an impressive resume of clients, like Sony, Nestle, and Discovery Channel, just to name a few! What advice do you have for freelancers first starting out who dream of working with clients like these?
Katie Trayte:
I have spent most of my career in-house. From that experience, I would say there’s a huge benefit to being part of a company or studio to get access to those partnerships. Especially if you’re still finding your style and the idea of exploring a lot of different visual directions appeals to you. In-house is also a great place to get a master class on business and sales. Confidence in these skills can help you to feel more empowered to establish and foster relationships with your dream clients as a freelancer.
Bella Alfonsi:
What steps did you take to go from illustrator/designer to Art Director? Do you prefer doing one more than the other?
Katie Trayte:
I jumped from graphic designer in ‘the outside world’ to an AD at Demo Duck. Not having much motion design experience behind me at that moment was… different, but a lot of the skills that had led me to advance in design roles were still very applicable despite the shift between industries. Effective communication, articulation of ideas, and management skills all help take you from making great art to leading great art. I have such a strategy brain that I’d say art director is the role for me. I love being client-facing and problem-solving along the way during a project. I still get to do a fair amount of hands-on work in an AD role, so it’s a win-win!
Style Frame from Duke & Duck’s project for Nestlé that Katie designed and Art Directed.
Bella Alfonsi:
Do you have any advice for someone trying to become a director themselves?
Katie Trayte:
Start by demanding excellence from yourself in your area of production. If you’re producing high-quality work in your role, you’ll be trusted to own more and more of the pipeline. Hone your voice, always concept from a unique angle, and keep learning about areas of production that may be outside your expertise. Most importantly- develop your people skills! Effective negotiation, collaboration, and communication help to win the respect of your client and your team. At the director level, more often than not, your people skills are going to be what makes or breaks the success of a project.
Bella Alfonsi:
Tell us a bit about the piece, Be Aware. What was it like working with Barbra Streisand? How did the unique painterly approach come to be?
Katie Trayte:
Be Aware was such a dream to work on. Barbra Streisand was much more involved in the review and development of the project than I was expecting, which was a really fun surprise. I even have a first pass of my storyboards that came back to us with her handwritten notes on them! Treasure. She and Sony were both great clients.
Since moving to DC I’ve become friends with Elyse Kelly, who is an independent director and founder of Neon Zoo. I admire her work so much, and when she asked me to join the project I was excited about the opportunity to shadow her directorial expertise. The painterly approach came out of a lot of style development with Elyse. We wanted a look that matched the song- sweeping, emotive, and sensitive to the subject matter. I did initial sketch boards in a gestural, loose hand and that treatment felt like a natural marriage to the song lyrics. Elyse’s body of work is very painterly, so her talented animation team was very equipped to bring the look to life.
I love to paint, but most of my work up to Be Aware has had to be very graphic-driven. It felt like I got to really be myself with this style and say, “Don’t bring around a cloud to rain on my parade!”
Bella Alfonsi:
When you find yourself in a creative rut, how do you get out of it?
Katie Trayte:
Working remotely, (like I do now), or working freelance can make a creative rut feel like a creative canyon. An impossible abyss of creative failure from which you will never escape! On my own, I have never had a great solution for these difficult patches other than to take it easy on myself and let time pass, knowing that I’ll move beyond it. As a team, we’ve started a lot of open dialogue about overcoming ruts and are committing to more open avenues of collaboration this year. We’re working to let go of any self-inflicted shame associated with being stuck by reaching out to each other to talk through blocks, hurdles, or low points before they get too far. We’re having a lot of success. Working remotely, you're much more prone to anxiety and self-doubt that can make you retreat inwards. We’re all being intentional about training ourselves out of this habit through communication and feeling safe to be vulnerable with each other.
Shot from Duke & Duck’s “Plos” brand video Katie designed and directed.
Bella Alfonsi:
What or who inspires you?
Katie Trayte:
Both in my personal time and inside Duke & Duck we’re making more of a commitment to developing children’s IP. We’re even starting a sister brand for kid’s content called Double Scoop Studio! About a year ago, we discovered how much talent there was on our team for telling character-driven episodic content and have wanted to give that talent an outlet. That’s been a big inspiration to me- having this group of people come together that are committed to starting this new ambitious journey. I love working with my team to help find the special stories we have within us. Working together to grow these ideas, with a lot of laughter and joy along the way, feels like magic.
Currently, I’m really inspired by any kids media that takes more of a motion design direction to its animation approach or offers a new style in the space. Hey Duggee, Wide Load Vacay, City Island, StoryBots, and City of Ghosts are all great examples.
Bella Alfonsi:
Any final takeaways?
Katie Trayte:
I think I’ve said it all. Thank you so much, Dash team, for hosting these interviews and for always finding great ways to bring our community together!
Interview with Dash Bash Speaker, Sekani Solomon
We sat down with Dash Bash speaker, Sekani Solomon to speak on the pressures of being an international student, the importance of scoring internship opportunities, and the difficulties of securing a visa in the U.S.
Sekani is an award-winning Motion Design Lead and Creative Director at Cash App.
Q&A with Sekani Solomon
Read time: 20 min
Sekani Solomon:
Let’s do it.
Mack Garrison:
Let's do it!
All right. I'm joined now by Sekani Solomon. Sekani's an award-winning Motion Design Lead and Creative Director based in New York City, hailing from the twin-island Republic of Trinidad and Tobago. Sekani's diverse skill set in design, animation, and compositing allow him to work at any stage of the production pipeline with a high level of proficiency. He currently leads motion design at Cash App. Welcome to the conversation, Sekani. It's so great to meet you finally.
Sekani Solomon:
Thanks for having me, Mack!
Mack Garrison:
I would be lying if I said I wasn't thrilled and excited to be having you part of the Dash Bash this September. We have such a great lineup, and I'm looking forward to it, particularly after a year of so much isolation. To be able to get the motion crew back together to all hang out again, it's going to be a blast.
Sekani Solomon:
Oh my God. I know. Just seeing people in person in the same building is going to be wild, much less a bunch of motion designers, so I'm pretty excited.
Mack Garrison:
Exactly, exactly.
To start, I'd love to know how you found your way into motion design initially. This is such a melting pot of people with different backgrounds. We have graphic designers, illustrators, coders, and all find their way into motion design. How did you find your way into this career path?
Sekani Solomon:
Like a lot of people, almost by accident. A process of discovery. When I was younger, I used to do a lot of creative things. I made toys using just cardboard and tape. I always wanted to make the stuff I saw on TV. When I was around 14ish, I discovered Photoshop. That was my first gateway to making things digitally because again, the aim was always to make stuff that I saw on TV. This was 2004, they had zero to little resources to create this stuff.
Sekani Solomon:
Eventually, I pivoted and wanted to become a software engineer. Throughout my entire time in high school, I didn't take any art classes.
I was just doing the sciences. In 2008, one of my teachers was working on the high school's website, and I was like, "Well, I did some Photoshop back in the day. Maybe I could help." When I got back online, the learning resources were more...you just had a lot more options. From there, it was a quick process of discovery. That's how I discovered the industry. Photoshop first, AfterEffects, then Cinema, finally going into 3D. It's like this sandbox. You can create anything. That opened my mind up to wanting to create.
Sekani Solomon:
From there, I didn't even know I was doing motion design. I just wanted to make cool stuff. When it was time for college applications, I was still going to apply to be a software engineer.
Mack Garrison:
Oh, wow.
Sekani Solomon:
Then it went quickly from software engineer to graphic designer, then fully graphic design because no one's saying, "Hey, you could have a career in the arts." I didn't know a single person that was doing it professionally.
Mack Garrison:
Right. Everyone who I knew who was doing art professionally was into the fine arts. I didn't know there was a similar purpose to what we were doing, which was so interesting.
Sekani Solomon:
Exactly! Especially in Tobago. It's a small island of 50,000. Very few people do this type of stuff, but I knew I was super passionate about it. I figured, "Well if I'm doing this in my free time, I might as well pursue it and see where it goes."
“…the advantage of an internship, especially when you're in school, is it allows you to fail in a safe environment.”
Mack Garrison:
That's so great. I know you said there weren’t a ton of people doing it in Tobago, but was there any community? Were you able to find some other folks there who were dabbling in motion design?
Sekani Solomon:
Yeah, there were a lot of hobbyists and a few guys who were doing it professionally. I soaked in as much knowledge from them as I could, and they helped to steer me in the right direction. But I always wanted to keep pushing it, and pushing it, and pushing it, which led me to where I am today.
Mack Garrison:
I know you're up in New York City now. I imagine there was a decision made at some point, where you were like, "Wow, okay. If I want to push into motion design, I need to move on from Tobago and maybe go to the States or something like that." When was that moment? Maybe after school?
Sekani Solomon:
It happened when I was around 19. Because we're in the British school system, you can either do five years in high school or seven years within advanced courses. I did seven years in high school, so when I graduated, I was 19 and was trying to figure out my life.
Mack Garrison:
Like every 19-year-old, right?
Sekani Solomon:
Yeah! There's no prescribed course you need to take. Once I settled on wanting to pursue art, it was just a matter of finding the school. Also, trying to figure out a way to get to the U.S., because I knew that ultimately that was the place I needed to be. Fortunately, I had applied to SCAD and I got a scholarship there. I also got a scholarship from Tobago, and my parents paid the rest of the money. I was very lucky to be able to go to school at the Savannah College of Art and Design.
Sekani Solomon:
Coming from the Caribbean to the U.S., I thought everyone was going to be a beast. However, when I got there, I found out that a lot of people were just 19 or 18 trying to figure out what they wanted to do and hadn’t opened the software yet. So I was a little more advanced than a lot of my classmates. I was also older when I started. In my freshman year, I was 20 whereas most people are 18. Even so, the mission was always to get a job before graduating, because coming to the States is one thing, and staying in the States...
Mack Garrison:
...Staying in the States is another, right. Got to get that visa.
“…if you don't land that job in the first year, you're going home.”
Sekani Solomon:
Exactly. I did four internships while I was at SCAD. I worked at Loyalkaspar, which is a broadcast studio based in New York, Gentleman Scholar, The Mill, and Imaginary Forces, where I ended up taking a staff position there.
Mack Garrison:
Awesome. That's so great. I think there's something to be said when you're coming into an education system with a little bit of an older perspective. I was the same way. I didn't get into design until I was about 20 years old as well, maybe even 21 at the time honestly. So when I did get in, I ended up at the College of Design at NC State University. It was the same deal.
While there were a lot of students around me who were still figuring their stuff out, maybe going out and partying, my focus was definitely on school. I was like, "I got all the ‘figuring things out’ done earlier. This is what I want to do." I think that gives you an edge as far as staying driven and capturing some of the available internships.
Sekani Solomon:
A lot of the money for college is put into the opportunities. They bridge that gap between you and the studios. You’ll have these studios coming directly to the school for career day and all of that. All you have to do is present the best work to get the internships, so it was really up to me from that perspective. I just needed to perform well. I wanted to maximize that opportunity and get as much experience as I could because the advantage of an internship, especially when you're in school, is it allows you to fail in a safe environment. Even if you're a junior designer, once you've stepped into that professional realm, there are more stakes versus as an intern. Getting to learn in that environment was a good experience.
Mack Garrison:
I think you also had a certain level of pressure sitting on you. You may have a lot of these American kids who, if it doesn't work out, will figure something else out. But for you, you were looking at this as your sole path and career. You knew you wanted to be here, and you needed to get connected with jobs to get a visa. So there was this extra pressure to make sure that you were on top of your game at every point of the way. Always sticking out, securing that next job, things like that. That had to be stressful, I would imagine, and all while you're in school.
Sekani Solomon:
Yeah, I mean it's like if you don't land that job in that first year, you're going home.
Mack Garrison:
Oh, man. That's so crazy.
Sekani Solomon:
This is how wild it is. Not only do you have to get a job, but you also have to get a job that's willing to sponsor your visa. The usual visa most people get is an H-1B. Because so many people apply for that visa, it's a lottery. Even if you do everything right, the best chance you have is a one in four chance of getting picked in that lottery.
I think I applied for that particular visa twice and didn't get it. What I ended up having to do was get another visa called an O-1 visa, which is a more merit-based visa. They make a case for you to show that you're extraordinary in visual. It's a whole process that’s tricky to navigate. Even if you're doing everything you're supposed to, you could still be unlucky and go home.
Mack Garrison:
How much of that process did the companies you were working for help you with? Or did you have to advocate for yourself and educate on the different ways you could stay?
Sekani Solomon:
For the H-1Bs, I got full support from Imaginary Forces. They took care of everything in terms of the application. For the O-1 visa, I decided to take that cost on myself. Just in case I wanted to leave, I didn't want any strings attached, you know what I mean?
It was fine. They were super supportive in terms of providing the information and all that stuff. You have to get...I think it was seven to ten recommendations from other people in the industry. That's why all of those internships were important. I met a lot of people that could vouch for me. If you're not thinking ahead and planning, it could be difficult.
Mack Garrison:
Interesting. Well, it's a great conversation point because I think the perfect example is me as a studio owner at dash. We're a small crew. We only have like 12 people, compared to Imaginary Forces who have a crew of folks up there. As a result, it's not that we couldn't offer an H-B1 visa, but there's more legwork that goes into it when you're a smaller shop.
Mack Garrison:
You bring up a good point that when you're an international student studying in the States, it almost has to be a prerequisite for every place that you're talking to. To be like, "Could you sponsor an H-B1 visa? Are you open to that? Are you prepared to do that?" Because if that is critical, then you only have what...three or four years of internships before you need to land that full-time gig? So every opportunity you have becomes that more important. That seems like a lot of pressure.
Sekani Solomon:
100%. It's the pressure of making good work and progressing in your craft while staying in the States. Fortunately, it worked out.
Mack Garrison:
It did. It did.
Sekani Solomon:
And now, we're here.
Mack Garrison:
Well, I love the background on it because it's something that I think a lot of folks are familiar with, at least that visas are a thing, but the process of it and understanding the back end is really interesting to know as well.
So, you get in. You're with Imaginary Forces. What's the course of action from there to Cash App? You’re putting out some fantastic work with them. Were you going freelance in between those two? Did you go straight to Cash App? How'd you end up getting to where you are now?
Sekani Solomon:
I enjoyed my time at Imaginary Forces. Definitely learned a ton there and worked on a variety of different projects, from main titles to commercials to stuff on the big screen. There just comes a time when you have to look at the value of what you’re offering. You have to figure out how to extract more value for the time that you're spending because when you're staff, sometimes you’ll see a freelancer come in, do less work, and get paid twice as much. Then you're like, "Uh..?"
Mack Garrison:
You're like, "Wait a minute."
Sekani Solomon:
Exactly. It was time to spread my wings. To work with a couple of other companies to see what's out there, but also to have more control over my salary and the value that I brought. I left Imaginary in 2016 and freelanced for a bit. Pretty much worked with all the studios: BUCK, Psyop, Method, Gentleman Scholar.
“there comes a time when you have to look at the value of what you’re offering. you have to figure out how to extract more value for the time that you're spending...”
Mack Garrison:
Making your rounds.
Sekani Solomon:
Yeah, and in 2018, I think this was shortly after I had released Hidden, I got an email from Apple and ended up doing a couple of months over there in the Bay Area. It was my first real taste of in-house tech, and a completely different universe.
Mack Garrison:
Oh, yeah. Totally new vibe.
Sekani Solomon:
For better or worse in some ways. It was like this ‘coming to light’ moment where you're like, "Oh, wow. There's this whole other line of work where people are working more reasonable hours. People come in from 10:00 to 5:00. They're getting paid more." The only tricky thing with Apple is that the work's a bit more restrained. They have their own established way of doing things. You don't always have the kind of flexibility you might have at some other shops. Then the question was, "There's this whole other way to work, but do I want to sacrifice the work I was doing?"
Mack Garrison:
It's almost like it was a shot at your creativity. You were having a nice work-life balance, I'm sure you were getting paid really well, but then there was this push, of course, that we all have as creative individuals. What can we do differently? Can we try something new? And you were probably getting pushed into some of the same directions over and over again.
Sekani Solomon:
Exactly. The way I was rationalizing it to myself was that I could make a bunch of personal projects because I had more time. Also, having come from New York, I was not a fan of the Bay Area. It was such a contrast, especially in Mountain View, Sunnyvale. It's really chill. That was an adjustment. So I went back to New York after that and ended up working on a job for a tech company through a studio.
Mack Garrison:
Oh, man. That's so funny. You can never get away from tech when you're in the animation industry.
Sekani Solomon:
Right? That project, in particular, was just terrible because the creative changed every day and you had to work long hours. I was also thinking, "Oh, wow. I was just working on the client-side, now I'm back on the vendor side." It was just leveraging where I wanted to be, and it wasn’t there. It had to feel like the right opportunity because it's not just about the money, you also want to make good work.
Luckily enough, I got a cold call on LinkedIn from a recruiter about a position at Cash App. I wasn't even really familiar with the company at that point. I think I responded a week and a half later. I went into the office, met with some people, and I thought it was pretty awesome what they were trying to build. I ended up starting freelance there in late 2018. When I got the position, they were just like, "Yeah, make it weirder. Make it wilder."
Mack Garrison:
You're like, "Whoa. This is a big company telling me to make it weirder and wilder." I love it.
Sekani Solomon:
Yeah, and the thing is because Cash App was a small startup company within a larger company (Square), it felt like a small studio. It was pretty unique. After being there for about a month and a half, I ended up taking a staff position because I was like, "Oh, yeah, this is-"
Mack Garrison:
This is amazing.
Sekani Solomon:
Yeah, this is pretty new. Since then, it’s been about continuously creating really, really good work. Now, we've been scaling quite a bit this year, so...
Mack Garrison:
It just seems like you're always putting out something new and incredibly unique with them. I know, from just another creative perspective, to be working for a company that embraces pushing the boundaries of what's possible...that's just the ideal client. I've talked to other studio owners and creators, and there's always a question: Who would be your dream client, or who is the group that you want to work with? Everyone resoundingly says that it's less about the subject and more about having a good partnership with the clients that you're working with.
I think if someone believes in what you can do and what you can bring to the table; if they trust you, your opinion, and knowledge within the industry, you're inevitably going to have some of the best work that's out there regardless of what industry it lives in. Also, it helps that animation is such a great conduit for explaining complex materials. I think about what Cash App does and some of the things they're trying to get around seem like a perfect match for you to push the boundaries and create cool stuff.
“it should always be rooted in an idea and concept that ties back to the brand. the visuals are just a mechanism you use to tell that story or to deliver that concept…the last thing you want to have are just pretty, arbitrary visuals.”
Sekani Solomon:
Absolutely! You see companies, like Microsoft especially, working closely with studios like Tendril and BUCK to create these insane videos to depict their software. I'm really glad to see the companies at this scale embrace these types of visuals because, as you were saying, it does help to communicate and bring excitement and anticipation to the products that they're making. And that can be wild.
Mack Garrison:
What do you think was the biggest factor in making that happen? Because you're right, I've seen it trending. You see Tendril coming out with it. You see other companies watching what they've done for Microsoft, and folks try to replicate that ambient 3D style. What do you think it was that made that big switch? Is it just companies at this point just trying to be as different from one another as possible and things feeling too similar to one another?
Sekani Solomon:
I think a lot of it has to do with social media and the way we ingest content. People are now used to seeing really artful, different things on their social feeds. If you have that cookie-cutter ad, is it going to appeal? I don't know. Also, you don't have to be as scared to try different things because I think people are more used to seeing visuals that feel different. I just think it required some boldness on the client’s part to approve that “something”.
Mack Garrison:
I think one thing you mentioned, which helps a lot, is that you have a foundation with a client who is open to different things. I'm just curious about your take on this. When you're pitching something that's really out there, even at Cash App, I'm sure there are some projects where you're like, "wow, this idea that I have is super strange," or, "super weird." What are some of the steps you take before you bring that idea to the table? Just for any other designers that might be reading this blog later on, what are some things they should consider before bringing something a little bit more out there to a client to try to win them over on it?
Sekani Solomon:
Well, the first thing for me is that it should always be rooted in an idea and a concept that ties back to the brand. The visuals are just a mechanism you use to tell that story or to deliver that concept. For me, that's the fundamental thing. If the idea isn't clear, then that's when it gets lost because the last thing you want to have are just pretty, arbitrary visuals.
I think here, in particular, I'm a bit lucky because that's part of the brand. If there's not a quirk to it, it might feel a little bit off-brand. The challenge is making something that feels strange while still communicating a message. That's a very fine line. It's easy to go weird, and no one gets it or it’s too literal and it’s kind of meh. It's about trying to find the right balance.
Sekani Solomon:
Also, creating things that still feel fresh and new, especially because we're exposed to way more 3D than I think we have been over the years. People have seen stuff. Things are beginning to feel familiar, so how do you keep projects feeling fresh? How do you explore different aesthetics while still meeting the business goals?
Mack Garrison:
Right. It's like this rubber band. You push creative, but then it's got to come back a little bit because it's too far out there. Then, a business tries to pull it back, and it's constantly slowly pulling on each other's sides and moving the process along. It's good to think about.
You mentioned something a second ago at the end of that, which I thought was interesting too. How do you keep stuff fresh, right? How do you find new inspiration? Do you have avenues that you go down when you're just trying to brainstorm ideas? Is it moving away from video and looking at more print, illustrations, and things like that to bring those concepts in? When you have a new project and you're thinking about how you want to approach it, what are some paths that you do for finding inspiration?
Sekani Solomon:
I look a lot at sculptures, architecture, pottery, that type of stuff. I try to get a balance between looking at motion design references, but also real-world things for form, shape, and texture. Motion design inspiration is really good, of course, but if you’re only looking at motion design references, then you're going to keep creating similar things. It's very challenging to create something that feels fresh. Almost everything has been done already.
It's also about bringing your own voice into it. Your spin on whatever that thing is and trying to find a way to push it forward. To make it a little more unique, because even the stuff that you're referencing, someone did that before. You just took it and made it your own. That's fine too. Nothing needs to be the most original thing, but it needs to be...you could take an idea and tweak it 20%, and it feels entirely new because the context is different. That's one way I like to look at things. If the context and idea are different, then I think that does change it a lot.
Mack Garrison:
That's interesting. I love the idea of talking about looking at more traditional mediums, like sculpture, right? Particularly as we think about 3D, modeling, and creating something unique, you can almost look at some of the traditional principles. Ground something, but then because animation can do whatever you want it to, ask yourself how you can break some of the rules that come along with it. That's really cool.
Mack Garrison:
Let's pivot the conversation a little bit. One thing I wanted to ask you about, just because I know you've been really involved in the scene, is non-fungible tokens, NFTs. I felt like I could not get on Twitter, Instagram, or anything for the longest time without hearing something about NFTs. I know there was a huge spike in popularity. It seemed like everyone was participating. They’re still popular, but felt like there's a little more of a dip than there was a few months ago. What are your thoughts on the NFT industry? Do you think that's something that's going to stick around? Are people still trying to figure it out a little bit?
Sekani Solomon:
Yeah, I think NFTs are definitely here to stay, they’re just moderated from what they were a couple of months ago, which was just absolute lunacy. It was ridiculous.
Mack Garrison:
There was just a ludicrous amount of content being made.
Sekani Solomon:
Yeah. I mean I get it. If you're seeing people posting, "Oh, I made $10K. Oh, I made $20K. Oh, I made $50K," naturally it's going to generate a certain level of FOMO that no matter how confident or strong you are, you might fall prey to. Even for me, it was like, "Oh, someone could do a low-effort NFT and make 100 grand. Why don't I do that?"
Mack Garrison:
Yeah. What am I doing, right? You're like, "I'm pilling around making stuff anyway on a Saturday night. Might as well throw this up there and see what I can get."
Sekani Solomon:
Exactly. So, I think they’re here to stay. It's good because it's another avenue where people could generate value for their art, but, for me, it's tricky because it's hard to figure out how people value the work. In some ways, in fact in a lot of ways, it mirrors the actual art world. There's a lot of speculation. It's all about the actual artist. From that perspective, it's not necessarily new. What's new is that it's in the digital realm.
For us who are more commercial artists, having that experience of what more fine artists have to go through was super eye-opening. You have to remind yourself it's not necessarily just about the quality work you do, but also how people perceive it. Whether it's from a speculative standpoint or a, “oh, this is really cool” standpoint. You just have to go into it with low expectations, that's the mentally sound way. Even for me, I made some stuff, and I was like, "I have nothing to lose, so I'm just going to go high and see what happens." Then nothing was sold. I was like-
Mack Garrison:
Oh.
Sekani Solomon:
Very humbling.
Mack Garrison:
It's wild. It's such a hype business, right? If there's hype around something or people are excited about something, it builds it up. People feel like it's going to be rare, that this is a moment and they want to be a part of it. That, to me, is very similar to the art world. I even remember I had this internship early on at this art gallery called The Mahler in Downtown Raleigh. Seeing some of the artwork and how certain artists were valued more than others, and both of them would have the same quality, just with different styles. One artist had more hype that went around them, so when their pieces would get in there, people would come and buy them. It's kind of crazy because both pieces looked good. It's so subjective. To your point, it's now translating into the digital world. That's really interesting.
Mack Garrison:
I haven't done any of the NFT stuff, but what I am excited about is motion design being used outside of traditional deliverables, right? We always have these projects, where it's like, "let's make this video for the purpose of selling or advertising," or, "to live on Facebook.” For me, the thing that I get excited about with motion design is what the future can be. How do we start using it in nontraditional ways? What could we do to activate a space with motion design, or with NFTs? Now people are purchasing it as artwork. It creates a different avenue to utilize it.
That's what's really exciting because while motion design is very new, for the last decade or so the deliverables that we've been creating with it, at least on the commercial side, have been pretty consistent. To have this kind of influx of new energy coming in and a new deliverable...I think it's going to get people excited and also start to get people asking the question. It's like, "Well, okay, if NFTs are happening, what else can be out there? What else could we be doing with motion design?" Which I think is unique too.
Sekani Solomon:
Because now you're creating work solely just to create work. You can express who you are as an artist without the constraints of having to meet business needs or anything else that could be a constraint.
Mack Garrison:
Exactly. Well, that's a good segway to what you think the future of motion design looks like. What are your thoughts, Sekani? As we start to look ahead to where we're going and what we're doing, do you have any idea what might be popular here soon?
Sekani Solomon:
Yeah. Well, the good news is that motion design is everywhere because for the last, I want to say, 18 months, we've been adjusting to our new world. Doing that usually requires motion or some type of animation, so I think there are even more opportunities for people to enter the space. The problem is that people's attention spans are so short that now, especially from a commercial standpoint, when you're creating content, you need to design it in a way to capture people's attention depending on what platform you're putting it out on. It's not like the days where you could just drop something on Vimeo, and people will sit for five whole minutes straight.
Mack Garrison:
They'll leave after ten seconds if it's not exciting.
Sekani Solomon:
Exactly. Now, especially with advertising and designing for social media, it's like you’ve got to capture people within that first two to three seconds or you lose them, which is a challenge in itself. How do you make good content and have visual storytelling with those parameters? That's a good challenge, but there's still traditional media, like TV and YouTube which I think are helpful. You can work with longer durations, like ten to fifteen seconds.
Mack Garrison:
Well, it's interesting. It's almost like I've seen it becoming popular in two instances. You either have a demographic that wants something that's 30 seconds long, and you aim for 30 seconds. Or, conversely, it's really long. Something more like episodic content where you're talking about people watching tutorials or they're looking at brands like they've looked at Netflix and Hulu. Somewhere people will go to stream a TV show they watch. They're going to start doing the same thing with brands that they're interested in.
I know at least from a studio perspective, we've been getting a lot more work. People are trying to become subject matter experts in things or they’re putting out a series of videos that are a bit longer. To your point, you're either trying to do everything you can to condense a story down to be as short as possible or you're working with something that's minutes worth of content. I'm trying to figure out how I can animate something that long.
“I try to get a balance between looking at motion design references, but also real-world things for form, shape, and texture. motion design inspiration is good, but if you’re only looking at motion design references, you're going to keep creating similar things.”
Sekani Solomon:
Right, exactly. This is the thing. I was speaking more to the commercial space, but also, if you're a content creator, people are now looking for good content. If you always just want to make animated videos of longer durations, there are opportunities to do that as well. The bottom line is people are way more receptive to content than they think. Almost every company wants it in some form or fashion. It's just a great time to be involved, especially with the software becoming easier to pick up.
Mack Garrison:
Oh, yeah, and accessible. It's not as expensive anymore. I mean, Scene Cinema 4D dropped in prices. Even Adobe came down. I've never seen more motion designers coming into the space than ever before right now. Particularly with programs like School of Motion, MoGraph Mentor, and the education that's surrounding it now. It feels more achievable for anybody than it was when we were first coming up, which is cool.
Sekani Solomon:
For us, just from the hardware perspective, you can enter because you’re needed... A lot of renderers were CPU-based, so if you needed to scale the power, you needed to buy another machine versus buying another GPU. From that standpoint, it's a really good time. The cost of entry is dramatically reduced.
Mack Garrison:
It's probably why you're seeing more freelancers too. I didn't even think about that.
All right. Well, Sekani, I don't want to give away too much because you're going to be talking here in about a month and change or so. Any little tidbits or secrets you want to share on what you're thinking about talking towards at the Dash Bash this year?
Sekani Solomon:
Yeah, I think a lot of it is going to be about my journey and how I approach the work to make it unique and stand out. I want to talk a little bit about the process because it’s nice to show the fancy visuals, but it's also nice to show how we got there. I think just showing my journey is also important, especially as a Person of Color in a field that's not necessarily very diverse to showcase that you can make it. Obviously, it does require a lot of work, but there are so many opportunities that exist that people just aren't aware of. Yeah, I think it just would be good to elaborate on that a little bit.
Mack Garrison:
I think that's great. We want this festival to be inspiring, but also honest. I love our industry, but there's clearly a racial gap in creative leadership. As we look ahead to the future, motion design is changing. It's going to be changed. It only makes sense that we put people in the forefront who we know are creative leaders and we know are changing the game, and Sekani, I think that's you, bud. So we're excited to have you be a part of our festival!
Sekani Solomon:
I'm very excited. It's interesting. Even though motion design is more accessible, I think in some ways, it could be more difficult. Now you have so much access to the software and the tools, but people aren't learning the things that make motion design great; the storytelling, conceptualizing, design. Those are the fundamentals. You might be using Cinema 4D today, but if another tool were to come out 10 years, 15 years from now, we would have to switch into that.
It also serves as a means to get the idea out of your head, and that's where I always start every project. What's the idea? What are the concepts? And you kind of shape everything around that. That's also something I want to touch on in the presentation; ideas first, concepts, and learning that skill is important. Especially being in a leadership role, so much of the job you would know this, Mack, is just communication and articulating ideas.
Mack Garrison:
Oh, yeah. 100%. 100%.
One of our foundational points to get a job at dash, we have some core attributes, one of them is being gregarious. Not necessarily being outgoing or talkative, but particularly as it relates to design. You have to be able to explain why you did something, your reasoning behind it, why you believe that this is the answer to the problem at hand because, yes, we're making cool stuff. At a foundational level, people are paying us because they have a problem at hand and need us to solve it creatively, right? So, to have staff able to talk through the reasoning of why they're making certain choices and why those choices are solving a problem...that's how you move forward. That's how you get bigger and better projects. So I totally agree with that comment.
Sekani Solomon:
A good thing is, there are a lot more resources. I think it requires more diligence. Again, with School of Motion and all those different avenues, if you're interested you can learn all the things. It's so nuanced and based on that individual's perspective too because I think that's the thing that makes a motion designer unique is your ideas and the way that you approach the work.
Sekani Solomon:
That's why when approaching a project, I learned the process from conceptualization to the final product. That's how I started in motion design when I was younger. I made my own projects, which I think have helped me. Especially now, I could do a deck and I could be like, "Well, this is the concept," as a base for people to work from, but I could also jump in and create stuff. It's been helpful for me.
Mack Garrison:
Ah, that's great. Sekani, I'm so pumped for the conversations here in September. Really enjoyed this conversation. It was so nice to meet you in person. There are so many folks I’ve followed for a number of years, but I have no idea what they sound like or look like, so it's always great to have a quick chat. Particularly before you're coming down here and hanging out with us for a few days!
Sekani Solomon:
Yeah, it's going to be fun, Mack. I'm looking forward to it!