TASK, as promised earlier, organised a day long workshop named TASK-Master for the teachers and trainers of animation on the 2nd of December 2008 at the Academy of Fine Arts where two animation stalwarts Sekhar Mukherjee & Vaibhav Kumaresh interacted with about sixty trainers of animation from various institutes in Kolkata.
Sekharda explained to the audience the art of animation and dwelled on the critical aspects of film making. He urged the trainers to extricate themselves from the mistake of making Disney type animation the benchmark for all their works and encouraged them to explore other media and styles of animation film making. Sekharda illustrated this through various films which he showed to the audience including those by NID students and those that were made using different media like sand, stop motion and mixed media.
The trainers should also create animation and not lose sight of their primary responsibility towards making of a good student concluded Sekharda.
Vaibhav Sir also continued in the same trajectory and showed the audience films made using different media including flash, clay, stop motion and even foam puppets. He emphasised that the use of the media would depend on the story and script requirements and a judicious choice of media was important for the final outcome.
He went on the show the spellbound audience the case studies of two of his creations, the Buladi series and the Taare Zameen Par sequence. He explained to them the process of character development, background selection, lighting elements, storyboarding, animatics, X-sheets, set construction and trial animation.
He emphasised the importance of pre-production for animation and asked the trainers to follow the entire process of animation development.
“I congratulate TASK for initiating an animation session specifically for the animation teachers. The prime asset of an education institute has got to be teachers and sensitizing them more and more to the beautiful art form of animation will always be a step in the right direction. I would be most happy if this event plays a role in revamping the curriculum of training institutes across India. We need to focus more on exposing our students to all forms of animation, storytelling and film making rather than trying to fit them into our existing industry. I am grateful to TASK for having given me this opportunity to share my views with the gurus and wish them success for all their future endeavours”, concluded Vaibhav Sir.
The sessions were followed by a small workshop where in groups of five were asked to present a story idea by drawing 5 frames after which Sekharda gave the teachers a crash assignment to come up with a short animated film based on these ideas. The workshop concluded with Sekharda making the participants promise a few short animation film entries of their own for the upcoming Kol.Katha competition.
Speaking on the occasion, Sekharda said “TASKmaster definitely is a welcoming initiative by TASK after the grand launch session in November. The entire team of TASK has shown very positive and liberal approach towards promoting the awareness of the medium of animation in 360 degrees aspects. The advisory board of TASK is a unique combination of persona of varied background and expertise with a common interest in promoting animation in this region”.
Ramesh Ruia, the president of TASK explained that they targeted the trainers since they were the first and primary contact point who would help in translate the importance of good animation film making technique down the line to the students.
