Step One

So... I've been looking around for anyone who has a very detailed blog as to how they made it to the big leagues, and well, for me as a student, it's hard to know what right steps to take in order to increase my chances substantially to get to where I'm wanting to get to. Let me lay it down for you, I am not saying by any means the methods I am about to take are the same steps that anyone else should take, I mean, you do you buddy, but I just want to take you all through as much as my employers will allow in order for you to experience my ups and downs, acceptances and rejections, headway and disappointments, you know the whole deal. This is so you too see that achieving your dream is not a straight and easy path! I have gotten to a place where I can actually start living the dream I sought out as a child. It is exciting, nerve racking, joy inducing and down right scary, but I am going to accomplish my goals! It's just a matter of time. So with that being said, here we goooo!

Step one, internships. I'm arriving at the end of my first year at Trinity Western University studying Computer Science and theatre. It's been an awesome journey and lots of fun with lots of things learned. That being said, this summer I have taken a leap and I am applying to animation studios EVERYWHERE! Yes that means Disney, Blue Sky, and Pixar too. 

This is the reel I sent to these studios:

Ere Santos Spring 2016 Demo Reel from Ere Santos on Vimeo.

In addition to just applying to these studios, I have been STUUUUUUDYING! Getting edumacated on what a good reel is! Looking at past internship reels as well as looking at the reels they presumably applied with... Meaning that if they interned summer 2012, then I'd watch spring 2012 to see what their reel looked like... And for those who were so inclined to post often about their lives, I would study what they were doing in their with their lives before they got those internships. The reason I do this is to learn more about the people behind the amazing art. I would also reach out to those whose art genuinely inspired me and some of them even replied!

My advice for those reading in the present and future is (and I CAAAANNOT stress this enough) edumacate yourself on deadlines, program requirements, and anything else that would hinder you from getting ANY interview you're looking for. Know your employer and know what type of employees they are looking for. Next one is to realize that the devil is in the details. The more care to take with an application, the more the employer with see that you care about the job you are applying for. Don't ever think that, "oh they won't notice if I forget to put my address on my demo reel/resume" it may be obvious, but you'd be surprised. My next piece of advice is the most important. THIS REQUIRES A LOT OF HARD WORK PATIENCE AND DEDICATION. I'm not talking about a couple weeks of hard work or a couple months of dedication, it requires years and years of all this stuff to start getting anywhere. Don't you worry too much about making it to the big leagues so quickly darling that will all come with time! Concern yourself with this first stages, then the next, then the next, and so on so forth! Everything else will come with time. And most importantly, don't give up on your dream dear sister/brother, stay passionate! See y'all in the tomorrow!

Mr. Hardy, and Mr. Bardem

HAAAAAAAAAAAAPPY NEW YEAR!!! Y'all best be gittin' ready for a great year! Awesome things are happening!

I wanted to start off this year just pointing out some actors that really truly make you not want to blink while they are on screen! Javier Bardem and Tom Hardy, two method actors that really show what it means to create a convincing character. In every single role they portray is new and exciting. Why? Because they are just comfortable in the roles they are given, there is nothing forced and nothing feigned:

 

Here, one of my favourite pieces of cinema, Bardem is the Bond villain in Skyfall and what a performance. He enters the room and by the pacing of his walk and way he talks you have no question as to the fact that this man has no shadow of a doubt that he is confident in his abilities do accomplish his goals. You might also notice that a lot of the scene he stands with his fingers interlocked, which is often associated with putting up a guard or being nervous, but this time, he is just furthering his level of calculation that is he is apparently going through.

I also recently watch Legend... My gosh, what a movie. Hardy plays the legendary gangster Kray twins in this movie, but these twins have few to no similarities besides appearance. The way he differentiates the characters is by very slight differences but he sells them effectively. Yes, one of the twins wears glasses, but Hardy also chooses to jut his chin out and have a chronic case of RMF (Resting Mean Face) when playing that character. In every scene I was never confused as to which Hardy was which Kray and they helped me to stay within the story, one thing was consistent, they were gangsters through and through.

***MIND THE LANGUAGE***

All this being said, these characters are well thought out and very strongly portrayed. They showed character with indicating, by which I mean overplaying the character.

So...

1. Clarity:
• When animating, make sure to have traits that sell your idea for your character and who they are, no matter how short the shot, make sure that it sells your idea clearly.
2. Consistency:
• Ensure that the viewer is never confused as to who the character is at any given point in you shot/sequence/story.
3. Comfort:
• It's never interesting to watch an actor acting on stage/set, it's only interesting to watch character in their world. Let your character be in their worlds.

You might learn that I LoOoOve me some alliteration! I love to use it in obviously opportune occurrences! These are just a few things to remember when planning/animating your characters.

Who is HE to you?

So I was listening to a message, and I was kinda of half listening to it and there came a point where the speaker said these words, "Hear me please... There's somebody watching me right now and you're being asked to lay down something you could not imagine that to lay it down would not somehow deprive you of fulfilment in your future, and I want to tell you, you know that it's the Lord's doing... God will never violate what He started in you, by something that he brings to you now that looks to you like the end..." Why was this so poignant out of the 2 and a half hours of message material? Well, I just feel as though this is what the Lord has been asking me to do with animation but I haven't been listening. Interesting, Animation is my BABY the thing that I have been working towards for my whole life, and now more than ever! But you need to remember Abraham, and what God asked him to do with HIS baby!

There is so much happening for me, Animation Mentor is starting pretty soon, internships are around the corner, and I've never been more passionate about my craft, and He wants me to just hand it over to Him? But of course! Now more than ever! Because big things are happening for me! He's not asking me to give up animation. No, not at all, that is the calling over my life. He's just asking me to be in a place where it is not at the head of my life, put it in a place where He is choosing what I do with animation, not me. Only then am I truly following my deepest inspirations.

It doesn't matter what we're interested in, let God, draw, pilot, conduct, design, drive, edit, arrange, write, manage, lead, uncover, build, and animate your life.

So what is He to you?

Different Places

Here is a piece from Holes I finished about 2 weeks ago. My intention for this piece other than practice was to sort of time myself to see how fast I can animate to the best of my abilities. So um, basically it took me about 40 hrs to animate about 15 seconds of work.
Different Places Polish pass from Ere Santos on Vimeo.
There were a few specific things I was working on other than speed:

1. I really tried to push my polish.
2. This also pushed my eye and my understanding of subtle acting and secondary action.
3. I played a lot with staging and solid posing.
4. I made sure to animate the entire body, not just for the camera.

after I worked on these things, I truly felt that it plused a whole lot more in this piece.

Malcolm character courtesy of AnimSchool.com”

Life in progress

Wow... It's been a little while hasn't it! I have a story to tell so stick around! A lot has happened in 4 years (almost 5) and man am I excited to express everything that's going on! So the podcast is on hiatus but who knows what will happen in the future! I would love to continue interviewing artists that inspire me and receiving their story of their life in progress! As you all know, animation is a growing and evolving art form. You will constantly be having your life in progress. Anyway In summary, I am still head over head in love with animation. That hasn't and never will change! I moved from Scotland, no longer live there, but I now live in Vancouver Canada! I am 18 years old and attend Trinity Western University working towards a Bachelor of Science degree in Applied Mathematics with Computer Science... Super nerdy I know... But hey! Makes me sound smart :P. Anyway.. I am enjoying it, it's not bad but it really isn't what I want to do... it really isn't my passion and it really has me pacified... I just finished my first semester and it was a fun experience! But again, I could be in medical school, living someone's dream, the fact of the matter is that that is not my dream. If you are not being passionate about what is in front of you, you are hurting yourself. SO I am doing my best. I still get to animate on the side of my school work and man... There is no other paralleled feeling.

Awesome! So let's start:

2011 - Moved to Canada.
         - Animated.

2012 - Animated.

2013 - Moved to Calgary.
         - Animated.
         - Acted in professional theatre.

2014 - Animated.
         - Acted in professional theatre.

2015 - Moved to Vancouver.
         - Animated.
         - Started dating the most amazing woman.
         - Acted in professional theatre.
         - Got the opportunity to go to Pixar.
         - Met Animators that got me to animate.
         - Got inspired beyond my wildest dreams.

That is a breakdown of my past 4 years. Okay, goodbye!... What?... You want to hear about my year? Sure!
The year was 2015, high school was nearing an end and my life was approaching its beginning. As I have been doing for the past three years, I spent the beginning of my summer acting at the Canadian Badlands Passion Play as a villager, roman servant, and hill yeller (I actually had a line in the play!). It is always a WONDERFUL experience being at the site and getting to learn more about and refine my skill as an actor. But you are here for animation aren't yah? and for Pixar! Well I'm getting there! After the play I did a lot of sitting around animating at home, and during one of my breaks, I was on Facebook, as you do, then I saw a post by the Animation Collaborative saying that they were having a free Demo reel review at their campus in Emeryville in August. I thought... cool! That's awesome for student in the Bay Area... I passively like the post and went on with my day. This year (2015) my brother turned 21 and I turned 18! So my parents said, hey! If you could go anywhere this year, where would you go, and my eyes widened... I quietly said, "So like... even California?" And my parents said, "Yeah! of course!" And I said, "... cool" whilst on the inside I was starting to sweat and I really was quite excited! So we commenced a process of persuasion and such and we finally got the tickets to go to California! We decided to stay in Sacramento and for those of you unaware of the of the geography of California, Sacramento is an hour and a half away from San Francisco which is RIGHT next to Emeryville. AnYwHoS... We decided to take a field trip to San Fran the day of the portfolio review. We thought we could make a day out of the whole experience and so we did! Now here is where stuff gets interesting!

So the review is at 6:00 pm that Friday evening. And we left in the morning at around 9 and we thought, "Hey! We're going to hit Emeryville before San Fran so we might as well drop by the studio and pay it a photo visit!" As we approached the studio I started to shake, I couldn't believe that I was actually about to see the gates of the studio which made my childhood! We got out of the car and we walked up to the gates, "Just like the pictures!" I said and we went up to the guard at the gate and we decided to ask if we could go in! Obviously, we knew that we wouldn't be able to get in but we thought we'd ask nonetheless. So we went up and asked, and the man just said, "Oh! Do you have your card?" and we stared blankly at him and we shook our heads. He said, "Oh I'm sorry guys we don't actually do drop in visits and stuff!" He was so very nice about it and we completely understood! We said goodbye and were walking away. As I was walking away I felt something overwhelming my insides and I spun around walked back and told the guard, "Sir, I just wanted to tell you that I'm going to work here someday!"
"Buddy! That's great! You work towards that! I work here and let me tell you, it doesn't matter whether you're a janitor or a CEO, they treat you equally! I love working here!"
I walked away feeling so... Mixed! I felt so satisfied! Of course I wanted to go in but I ACTUALLY GOT TO TALK TO A PIXAR EMPLOYEE! That was enough for me!
So! The we left and did our touristy thing in San Fran looking at sights and driving that bridge thingy and we finally got to point where we decided to start heading back to Emeryville! We left at 4:00 pm thinking we would have PLENTY time! We started driving and we hit a TINY bit of traffic...
4:00-4:15-4:30 still in traffic! No problem! We thought, we still have an hour and a half.
4:45-5:00-5:30 STILL in traffic! I started to get nervous wondering if this was even going to be a possibility anymore!
5:45 and I'm feeling N-E-R-V-O-U-S!
6:10 and we finally arrive! We dash inside and I go to the front desk and the lady says, "Are you here for animation?"
"Yes ma'am!"
"Awesome!" So I write my name down on the sign up sheet and we start waiting for the reviews to happen. I walked around the Animation Collaborative campus and it was surreal! Seeing artwork on the walls and then having Michal Makarewicz walk past me saying, "Hey man!" was like... the greatest moment in my life! Then walking past a room seeing Royce Wesley, Tal Shwarzman, Aaron Hartline, Peter Kelly, Victor Navone... I almost passed out... I happened to be in the 3rd (out of three) group being critiqued and when our group was called, my throat closed up! We walked in and I sat down with the first fellow that critiqued me, introduced myself and told him a little bit and we plugged in my USB and got to the critiquing. He seemed really impressed especially with my age in comparison with my experience and it felt like 2 seconds before my time was up. I got up and he got up with me and he said, "Man, if you could stick around till the end of the night and try to show your work to one of these other guys, you really should try because you really have potential here and I think you should really get others to see your work!" That was the end of that!... Or so I thought! Later on, a lady made an announcement that since they finished a lot earlier than they expected to, everybody was going to be able to go for a second round of critiques! I got SOOOO Excited! There was a specific animator who I really truly admired and I was looking to beeline for his station when we were called! Our group was summoned and I stood at the front of the line of group 3 in order to get in first to have one of my heroes critique my presentation! I walked him and introduced myself and he asked me one question, "Why animation?" I chuckled and said, " Do you want the short answer or the long answer?"
"Um, let's for the whole thing!"
I went ahead to tell him why I loved animation and where I intended to go with it!
"Oh, okay, cool! Let's see your work!" We watched my demo reel and afterwards, he sat silent for a second, and took his headphones and said, "How old did you say you were again?" He told me that he was very impressed and that my work showed that I truly was in love with animation and then he did the unthinkable... He asked me if I'd ever been inside Pixar, like INSIDE! And I said no, and he said, "Okay... Okay... When are you going back to Canada?"
"Oh, um... On Monday"
"Okay... okay... I'm going to take you!"
My jaw dropped and I said, "E-e-excuse me sir?"
"Yeah I'm gonna take you!"
So after about 20 minutes, we left the AC and we went across the street to the studio and he made my childhood dream come true! Just setting foot in the studio was something that I had lived out in my dreams! I went home that night a happy, happy camper, and a very inspired young man!

Hey there,

So I want to blog about this new awesome reference footage for flying.

Check this hummingbird...

Studio Decision

So I decided I'll be working towards Pixar Animation Studios, it will be 5 years before I get the opportunity to work at any major studio so it might change, but I'm sure it will always come back to Pixar, because for the last 9 years I also have had this inextinguishable love for Disney/Pixar.
So I think I'll be trying put my all into trying to get to Pixar!