“I never thought that one day my dream would become reality and I would be working on the same Creature Comforts series from which I was inspired”
If a talented individual has the passion and the will to work hard, there are no doors that will not open to him.
Well known Indian stop motion animation expert and Animation director Dhimant Vyas has in is his eleven years in the animation industry worked in various capacities with studios and organisations like Flickerpix Animations Ltd(UK), Tata Interactive Systems, Toonz Animation India, Flash Graphics, Ram Mohan Biographics,ISRO, NID, ZICA.
Recently he become the first Indian to be selected to join globally renowned stop motion animation studio Aardman Animations.
Animation ‘xpress Editor Anand Gurnani had a conversation with Dhimant about the latest developments….
Excerpts…
Tell us something about your being selected to join Aardman?
Though I work in all animation techniques, some how my love for stop motion dragged me towards those kind of projects by default. I remember watching Nick Park’s Creature Comforts as a student at NID and man was I impressed? Since then I have nurtured this ambition of working at Aardman,the world’s finest stop motion studio some day!
However I never thought that one day my dream would become reality and I would be working on the same Creature Comforts series from which I was inspired! It’s an amazing feeling and I am very excited to go there and work on it!!
I had sent my show reel to Aardman two years ago and I got a reply from ‘Richard Goleszowski ‘Golly’ that he liked my work. He told me that I’d be working with Aardman some day and since then I was in touch with him.
I visited Aardman this January while I was working with Joel Simon (Flickerpix) at Belfast and it was grand experience! Golly who’s director of the new Creature Comforts series’ shared some work from his new production ‘Shaun the Sheep’ and others. He spent the whole day with me showing all the process of production etc.
Just recently I got a mail from the studio offering me to work on ‘Creature Comforts’ Series and finally, it was a dream come true.
Today with opportunities in Indian animation increasing manifold, what makes you aspire to working at Aardman?
No doubt that today, there are umpteen opportunities in India too but more than the big money that would be offered to me here, I am interested in gaining perfection of my craft.
It was my long time dream to go to Aardman. I want to go there for personal development. I will get to learn new techniques and grow. There will be a lot of creative challenges too, Overall a refinement for me as an artist, a chance to evolve.
Tell us something about how you got into animation?
My love affair with animation began at a very early age, I was just a school boy then, it all started with an animated short that I saw. I just got fascinated by this beautiful medium. I did my fine arts at Vallabh Vidyanagar and , my faculty which was aware of my interest in animation, informed me about the animation course at NID Ahemdabad.
I was lucky out there to have senior faculty people like Nina and Binita as my guides and seniors.
My journey in the field of stop motion started when Proff. Joan Ashworth (Head of The Animation Department, Royal college of Arts UK) And Catherine Greenhalgh conducted a stop motion workshop at NID (1988). I got a chance to attend the workshop. This was the beginning of stop motion in India. And I got the right path, which I was in search of. Because of my love towards stop motion I get a chance to do projects in that medium wherever I work.
Please tell us about some of the projects that you have most liked working on?
Actually I have enjoyed all the projects I’ve worked on and have never thought of my work as a job. I think of work as a learning experience and am constantly trying to improve myself. Its lucky to get paid for something which one loves to do!
Projects with Rohit Watsa for MTV was the beginning when no one in the animation business knew what is claymation (1999) and we had to make a short sequence introducing what is claymation to get clay animation projects.
Several projects like ‘Cute Bunny’, ‘UNICEF Water Pump’ Feber Castell, Rag malhar, The Week TVCs and current stop motion TV series ‘On The Air’ are the memorable projects.
It was a great chance to use the acting, body language in animation in stop motion in the TV series ‘On The Air’ for BBC which is in progress at Flickerpix animation studio, Belfast UK. Joel Simon who has made Horn OK Please is directing it. It is based on BBC Radio Ulster’s Gerry Anderson show, animating the real life dialogue with humorous characters and re-interpreted settings. It was great learning experience to work at Flickerpix.
I was animating the main character ‘Gerry ‘ and enjoyed it. The great thing was we’d go to the studio where Gerry was hosting from and observe him while he performed the live radio show at BBC.
Your comments on the Indian animation scenario?
One thing I’d like to point out about a majority of Indian artists is that they look upon their work as a job, but one should look upon work as an opportunity to improve oneself, that attitude will help a lot in the long run.
Acting and Body language are of primal importnace to animation . Most animators here just give motion to the character. But what about character traits, personality, body language? These things are not explored much by the animators here. The acting part in animation is not being explored here.
Are you participating at Anifest India 06?
Yes. Plan at Anifest is to hold a workshop with Vaibhav. I will be demonstrating the shooting of stop motion and replacement animation along with Vaibhav.
Future Plans?
I plan to do a lots of hard work at Aardman and capitalise on the opportunity of working there. I am looking at working at Aardman long term and hope to get selected on to the feature film team. Also in the future I want to prove to the world that India has great talent. That could mean my opening a stop motion studio in India where the best of talent could work together.