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This issue of The Peg-Board is also available online in Adobe Acrobat format, as published in print. Click the icon at left for the Acrobat file. |
The latest feature of the Local 839 website is a bulletin board system, courtesy of Animation World Network. Now we can post our questions, comments, complaints, advertisements and miscellaneous observations online, and respond to the postings online.
Some of the bulletin board "forums" are available to the world at large, allowing anyone who logs in to directly contact the officers and members of our union. Other forums are for Local 839 members only; these require that you be set up on Local 839's membership e-mail list. To join Local 839's membership e-mail list and have accress to the members-only forums, send a message to Jeff Massie at jeffm@mpsc839.org with your name and home e-mail address.
With our new bulletin boards, now it's easier than ever for Local 839
members to communicate.
From the Business RepresentativeUnless you've been living without a cell phone on a remote beach on Kauai, you're aware of how the cartoon industry has been changing. And you're aware that retraining is not just useful, it's probably mandatory.
So it might be useful to know what Local 839 is doing and will be doing in the training department. How will it affect you? How will it help you? What, specifically, is available? And what are your options?
Training grants
For the past year and a half, the Screen Cartoonists has been a part of an H1-B training grant. Along with 24 other I.A. locals, we've tapped into $2.5 million that's been underwriting CGI classes at Gnomon, Studio Arts, Glendale Community College, Weynand, and Video Symphony training schools. I won't bore you with all the specifics, since they've been detailed in these pages and on the Screen Cartoonists web site (www.mpsc839.org), but to date several hundred of our members have taken advantage of these classes since they began in June 2001.
The Screen Cartoonists has been participating in an I.A. Training Committee (this is a conglomeration of most of the IATSE unions in Los Angeles), and we're now exploring new possibilities for grant money. As I write, the most likely new source is an ETP grant from California; we're also looking at CSATF training money in 2003 and 2004.
Partnering with studios
Another way we have been extending training opportunities is by working with signator studios to get CGI classes up and running. A year ago, a group of Disney animators contacted us and inquired if we would underwrite the salaries of trainers at Disney for classes in Maya. Initially, we thought we'd be subsidizing a couple of classes for animators and that would be it. But since that time, the demand for classes has expanded and expanded again. At present, the union's training arm -- The American Animation Institute -- is paying for instructors in Disney Features' training lab, and costs have ballooned as the number of classes has expanded.
Because of the number of classes, we've had to raise tuition fees as we've gone along. It simply isn't sustainable to run big deficits on each class offered, and so we've worked to narrow class deficits. But we'll continue offering as many classes as can be managed, to get training for as many individuals as possible.
At DreamWorks, we have sponsored compositing classes with RayZ software. Again, class fees have had to come up because the initial deficits were big. But again, we'll work to get people trained. (DreamWorks, unlike other studios, is paying for the training of their animators themselves. Bravo DreamWorks!)
Training where you can get it
Almost two years ago, Local 839 partnered with the Friedman 3-D Learning Center to provide a low-cost way for laid-off members to get into the digital world without spending an arm and a leg to do it. At that time, Friedman 3-D was a computer lab affiliated with the Los Angeles Unified School District that offered no lecture-type classes. Friedman provided digital software and self-tutorials; students came in, sat down at a computer station, and essentially taught themselves.
Some individuals were successful with this approach, but many weren't. So the Screen Cartoonists purchased equipment and set up lectures with two different instructors and commenced underwriting night-time lectures at Friedman 3-D. The lectures became overnight successes, and we urged members to attend them. Since that time, we have sponsored lectures in Maya and (most recently) in Photoshop, taught by 839 members Ernie Pava and Angela Diamos.
Current costs at Friedman are: $150 for the day classes, $50 for the evening classes, and $40 for the Saturday classes. Contact 323-223-0604 ext. 25, or the Friedman 3-D web site at www.friedman3d.com. The fees entitle students to whatever lectures are going on in the lab Monday through Thursday -- for evening classes -- and Monday through Friday for the day classes. Lectures are ongoing for Maya and Photoshop software.
But if you can't get into a studio class, grant class, or Friedman 3-D, you should know there's a wide range of schools and colleges that offer all sorts of computer graphics training at reasonable cost: Santa Monica College, Gnomon, Glendale Community College, Video Symphony, Weynand, Studio Arts, and Los Angeles Valley College to name but a few. You can find the links to many of these schools on the Screen Cartoonist's web-site.
Yeah, but ...
Now let me address one other hard, cold reality. There are lots of talented artists out there who simply don't take to the brave, new digital world. There are artists at the very top of their game who hate interacting with a computer and keyboard, who love traditional and are mournful that it seems to be on the downhill slope. What do they do? How will they stay in a business where pencil and paper don't seem to have the force and power they once did?
For people in this category, choices are narrower, but still out there. Storyboarding is not going to become strokes on a keyboard, although it's starting to become sketches created with a stylus on a phosphor screen, as digital boarding has started to take hold. The good news is, the artists who have made the switch tell me it takes only a few hours to learn the new technology. And you are still drawing, just not with a pencil. Also, traditional 2D design work of characters and props is still done the old-fashioned way, particularly in television animation.
If you are an artist who has spent the past several years doing cleanup, the American Animation Institute (here at the union office) has doubled the number of storyboarding classes. Both Tom Sito and Karl Gnass teach excellent boarding classes, and we invite you to take advantage of them. We also offer "The Art of Design" taught by Tao Nguyen, which covers character design, layout and perspective, figure drawing and overall project development.
There is still going to be a need for drawing skills, but as I walk through various departments at studios I see tech hardware sitting on almost everyone's desk. The business reality here in the twenty-first century is inescapable: most of us are going to have to know our way around computers and their accompanying software packages to be maximally employable.
Let's not kid ourselves. Upgrading our skills will not always be easy
or simple, but please know that part of this organization's mission will
be to help everyone get to where they need to be.
-- Steve Hulett
From the PresidentMany of us are facing a transition from traditional, hand-drawn animation to CGI animation. Being in feature animation, and being lucky enough to have received some serious CG training from my studio, I have conversations on this subject all the time. Sometimes I'm a little worried about what I hear. A traditional animator will shrug their shoulders and reluctantly accept that CGI animation is where the jobs are for now with the same enthusiasm of a gourmand going on a diet of boiled vegetables. They might stay alive but they won't be happy doing it.
That's not really the best analogy I can come up with. Going from traditional to CG is really like going to another country and another culture. Bear with me here while I try to put this in a context that hopefully will allow some of you to recognize yourselves.
I grew up an Army brat, and I instinctively loved traveling. Every new place was interesting for its skewed similarities and its profound differences. My traveling also made me really appreciate the good ol' US of A. So I'm always interested in hearing what people from other countries think of America.
At both Warner Bros. and DreamWorks I've worked with artists from all over the world, so it's been easy to get different perspectives. Somehow I usually expect to hear the worst, that they think Americans are unsophisticated, loud, unfriendly, too friendly, stupid, arrogant, whatever, and that Los Angeles is a cultural wasteland, with boring weather, crime, pollution, you name it. I've actually only heard that from a few people over the years, and they've all returned to wherever they came from not long after. Thanks for visiting, I'd think, and don't let the door hit you on the rear end on your way out.
Usually, instead, I hear how people's preconceptions tended to be wrong, or at least much too simple. These expatriates end up talking about the things they love about being here, and I end up being the one to point out what I prefer about their countries. Some of these folks end up wanting to become permanent citizens, some are just happy to be here for now, knowing they'll return home someday, but almost all of them flourish here because they embrace being here.
CGI animation has some of its roots in traditional animation, and it's a fairly young art form, but it is in many ways a separate and well-developed artistic culture. Unfortunately, I sometimes hear traditional animators who sound like loud, annoying tourists who don't "get" this new culture. I've asked a few friends if they realize how arrogant they sound when they imagine how much they have to teach their new CGI peers, or how easily they'll master the software and be producing mountains of digital footage.
I recently heard of an experienced traditional animator who complained that doing CG animation barely tapped into his skills. He didn't find it particularly difficult, just boring. His CG supervisor, though, had a very different assessment -- that he wasn't "getting it," and wasn't able to see what he needed to do to really improve.
So here's my advice on the subject, the payoff for this rambling analogy: Don't do it if you can't find the love for it. Would you move to a country you didn't respect and didn't really like, just for a job? If you do, you're not going to last.
I only have my toes in the CGI animation world right now, but I already know that the only way to begin to master it, the only way to succeed and enjoy it, is to completely embrace it. Go into it feeling like an exile, longing for your lost country of traditional animation, and you will be miserable, and more importantly you probably won't get or keep a job.
If traditional animation is where your real love is, then better to find a way to nurture that and leave the computers to people who want to be there.
-- Kevin
Koch
Executive Board member DAVE BRAIN weighs in with his advice on what to do while you're waiting for your next animation gig:
You are a professional artist with a full set of skills that make you valuable and employable in lots of art-related situations.
First, there's teaching. You simply have to be prepared to give others a solid, honest, but hopeful opinion of their skills and be willing to spend time with them talking and drawing to improve those skills. You can teach at universities, colleges and art schools. You can teach day or night, weekdays or weekends. four hours a week or thirty two. the thing is to start. Put yourself in a teaching situation, see what you can do. If you've been working in the "Hollywood studios," you do know how to draw, that's a valuable commodity.
BG artists and designers can teach painting and color theory applications. It keeps you "tuned up" while looking for a studio assignment. You probably know someone who teaches some aspect of animation. Call them or meet them for lunch and discuss your ideas.
Teaching is a job. You teach your subject and you manage your class. Curriculum should be prepared. You break your subject down into component skills. You decide on an order of instruction. Plan reasonable lessons, check and chart your students' progress. Once you have a track record in teaching drawing, painting, design, graphics, computer graphic skills, even history of animation, you have increased portability. If you choose, you can move out of the Southern California area.
Colleges and universities like their teachers to have masters or, at least, bachelors degrees. Letters of job accomplishment from the studios will also be necessary. Write up a sample of the kind of wording you need and see if your supervisor, at the time you worked there will compose, or at least sign , a letter of recommendation. Studio stationery adds to the readers impression.
Art schools, city recreation and remedial skill classes won't expect as high a profile set of credits but it's good, in all instances, to have some samples from the past shows you worked on ... and other old shows. They make good teaching tools and add to your validity in the minds of your students.
There are small animation jobs. Small by time length (1 to 9 seconds) like the closing of live action commercials, or, small by budget like industrial, teaching, sales or promotional films. The main thing is you don't have to be the producer. You just supply the artwork.
TV commercial production and editorial houses that shoot or cut live action commercials need animated graphics for their spots. Sometimes they even need small bits of character animation. Work "out of your hat," as they say. A designer/animator, a color finish artist (otherwise known as an inker/painter) and a camera finish person to film, tape, or digitally record can do it. One of you gets the job, you put your heads together to bid it. If you get the bid, you do the job. You work quickly. Most jobs must be finished in one or two weeks, lots of times the same week. But, they're simple. Letters assemble to form a word or a character winks from a pose.
If you get really busy, you can get an artists' representative to make your new sales contacts. The rep will want to see samples of the film spots you've done, and so might your first clients for that matter. There are post production houses that can build a nice short reel from almost any material you supply them. They can start with tiny pieces from shows you've worked on. They'll add graphic bridges and attention-getting lettering. Lots of post and editorial houses will do all the image recording. They just need good artwork.
Another form of the small film is the test animatic. Ad agencies need these all the time. Show them some nice color story boards, all the styles you can do. You'll start getting calls from agency art directors to supply finish boards based on their simple concept drawings. Lots of creative input there too.
New show design companies are less in number than ad agencies, but they're there and they need concept artwork for pitches all the time. It will be long hours for two or three days (meetings, drawings, more meetings and drawings) but the money should be good.
Look in the phone book. There will be studios that do sales and presentation films, slide shows, etc. Call and ask to see their art director. It may be the company owner. Show this person the breadth of your artwork. Offer a very low price for a small assignment to get started. Your studio credits will help sell you. You'll probably help write the script and design the concept in addition to supplying artwork. They can't match the artwork rates the studios offer, but there's a lot of room between fifty or sixty dollars an hour and the eight dollars an hour you'd get for clerking, sales or food preparation.
If you have a caricature style, try being a party artist. It's something you can do weekends and nights. Draw some caricatures of celebrities for samples, then advertise in large company in house newsletters. Disney has one, so does Warners. Lots of large corporations do and executives must entertain. Give your samples to local caterers and wedding planners. Cut them in as ten percenters. It should work.
$100 an hour sounds high but you'll work for it. At parties, they'll line up to get a drawing so no breaks for you. It's two to four hours straight through. Three to seven minutes per sitting is average, so, fifteen or twenty drawings per hour is about $7 per drawing. A fair enough price. You have driving time and material costs to cover too.
Don't go for less than $250 per occasion. It pays to design a "leave behind" one sheet, black-and-white, with your contact numbers on it. Business cards are a good idea too. Order some with the receipts of your first job.
Then there's the print art option. Here's a general suggestion -- Don't draw copyrighted characters for a person who doesn't own the copyright. But there's no law against drawing in the style of The Simpsons, Powerpuff Girls or Rugrats.
For print art assignments you can contact local printers. Again, a style sample sheet or booklet you can leave with them will let the printer show his clients what your artwork would bring to the job. Maybe do a little freebie for the printer to get on the good side of them. It's another sample.
You can design a puzzle game book. Leave room for the local merchants' ads. The merchants will pay for the book and give it to customers. Try restaurants, barbershops and salons, hardware stores and real estate agents. Try any store or service that caters to complete families and is an independent. The ad will be cheap for them and they disseminate them in each others place of business.
Art on T-shirts is good too, for local merchants. They'll sell them for half what they pay for them to get the advertising walking around town.
Any one of these ideas are a business. I've done most of them myself, in some form, and made money. You must be businesslike, show what you can do. That means selling yourself. Keep records -- costs and profit. You have to estimate, realistically, how much you need to do the job and make a profit. Be flexible ... but ... there is a price you can't drop below.
And have fun!
As we go to press, there are still some computer graphics classes for which the City of Glendale Verdugo Jobs Center and the Contract Services Administration Training Trust Fund are accepting grant applications from Local 839 members.
In less than a month, so many members applied for training grants that the CSATTF has stopped accepting new applications for classes at Gnomon School of Visual Arts in Hollywood, Studio Arts in Los Angeles and Weynand Training International in Encino. However, as of April 17 they are still accepting applications for classes at Glendale Community College and at Video Symphony in Burbank.
If you were accepted for a training grant that you have since found you cannot use, please get in touch with the grant providers so that the grant can go to the next person on the waiting list.
Contact the Local 839 office for the latest details on the classes for
which grants may still be available, and call the schools for details on
curricula and class schedules.
ABOVE: From Gordon and Dabni's loft on John
Street, the rubble hanging from the towers resembled a "ragdoll scarecrow".
Below right: The view from Brooklyn - - "No Twins". Below left:
The Flatiron Building.
Last month, Local 839 member GORDON BELLAMY told his story of survival in the shadow of Ground Zero in New York on September 11, 2001. This month, he reports on the stories of friends in the NYC animation community and how they weathered the events.
STEVE WILSON, an artist working
on Nick at Nite and on Spy Groove, says: "I was online, got
a call, went on the roof, helped some friends and then the word in Park
Slope, Brooklyn was to move away from the famous Brooklyn Bridge, it would
be next. Luckily we, the USA, had capped it, shut 'em down."
TIM WARBURTON. director of Sheep in the Big City, had just returned to New York from Japan, where he had just won first place in a competition, to have his pilot Kids Next Door shot as a series. He arrived in NYC on Monday, September 10 on the "red eye". So, on Tuesday morning, because of jetlag he was up very early answering his congratulatory emails when his wife Meg called on her cell phone while walking to work to say: "An enormous plane flying real low just went overhead, going south and I think it hit something downtown". Then the lines were cut.
Tom was trying to call her back on the cell phone when she called again, this time on the landline at her office in the Fashion District in Midtown. Meg works on the 42nd floor of her building, and during the aftermath of the attack, she and Tim stayed on the phone and watched and discussed the TV images together from their different locations. Meg had a view of the WTC from her work that Tom did not have from his home.
Later that day, Meg took a bunch of people from work who lived in New Jersey and could not get home, to their place in the East Village for billeting.
They walked. Pretty much all of Manhattan walked that day. All bridges were closed to vehicular traffic, and one unforgettable sight was of pedestrians walking home across them, like a city marathon of streaming people.
VINNIE CAFARELLI and CANDY KUGEL of BuzzCo had recently finished an animated short entitled Inbetweening America, using Shel Silverstein for style, and which has since been a winner in the New York Short Film Festival. Their studio is in the West Village, directly north of where all the people from the WTC had to pass heading away from the disaster zone, and they helped people going north that day by assisting with directions, offering drinks and simple things like that.
These local hero activities were typical of the kind of effort made by all New Yorkers that day and the following days, and is the true nature of people here. In fact every one of our visitors from across the nation and overseas tell us constantly that they are surprised by the friendliness of New Yorkers and different from what they are led to believe before coming here. We feel that the WTC attack has not made New Yorkers better, it has just helped the rest of the country to see our true light. A neighbor of theirs from Beirut advised them to put all their valuables in a knapsack, and be ready to go. I guess he would know following the terrorism that Lebanon experienced for years during their civil war.
ROGER
MEJIA, also of Sheep in the Big City and a School of Visual Arts
instructor, was just one of our animator friends who said he was almost
on his way to the city when the events of 9-11 started to unfold. He was
due at SVA that morning via the West Side 1 and 9 subway, which happens
to be the WTC train, when the TV reports began. That of course instantly
halted his day, as well as most of New York City's.
If he had not been stopped by the TV reports, he would have been on the train completely unaware that the huge buildings above the WTC station were about to collapse on it. The earth is now a place where cameras are everywhere. The whole world knew immediately and I think that perhaps that's a good thing, because we all went on alert.
CHRIS GILLES, of Little Bill and 2-D animation on a feature named Big Apple, told me of a little known fact about the WTC. When an office space or floor became vacant, from a lost lease or terminated rental, the WTC property management company would clear-out and clean-up the space, preparing the floor for a new tenant. And then the property management would loan out the floors or office spaces to artists until a new occupant was found.
NYC has a program that artists sign up to qualify for all kinds of assistance, and maybe the "Twin Towers" were part of this program. I don't know, and he didn't say, but if an artist could really luck out they would have the opportunity to create in what would be a view like from no other. I can see it now, in understated terms, "Artists space available to let - has a view".
A friend of Chris' named Michael, a sculptor of large pieces, was one of these artists. Michael was working on a large piece with the appropriate theme "Achievement of Lofty Goals". His sculpture was of vintage pilots working, with his piece showing a pilot riding a comet. Michael, and his work, were lost that day.
MIGUEL MARTINEZ, of Noodle Soup Studios, by chance was running late for work. Miguel lives in New Jersey and he rides the Path train to New York City. The Path goes under the Hudson River and Miguel exits at the WTC station where the train ride stops. His being late literally saved his life.
Miguel watched the Eleventh's events unfold from the New Jersey side, not from TV but in real life. From there the wind was coming from the north-west, blowing the billows of smoke and fumes to the south-east away from NJ, so that night his view of Manhattan was clear. He said that when power was out in lower Manhattan, it presented an eerie sight of the island with bright lights as usual everywhere, but DOMA was dark except for the glow from the WTC site at "Ground Zero".
At the sixty-day mark*, it is still, in some spots, 1000 degrees Fahrenheit. Miguel goes to work a different way these days, not because he is scared, but because the tunnel of the destroyed Path train is flooded under the Hudson River.
*Written in November 2001. Gordon stopped by our office just a week ago, and we're pleased to report that he and Dabni and their friends, and his dog Vincent Van Dogh, are recovering from the events that changed their lives and that of every American.
Text and illustrations © 2001 by Gordon Bellamy.
Local 839 offers three pension plans, two of which are entirely employer-funded. Those two plans are administered by the Motion Picture Industry Pension Plan (MPIPP). The MPIPP was started in 1953 by the IATSE and the various motion picture companies to provide pensions for IA members (and members of other unions like the Teamsters). The Plan now has over 40,000 participants and beneficiaries. There are two parts to the MPIPP pension. One is the DEFINED BENEFIT PLAN, which started when the plan did; the other is the INDIVIDUAL ACCOUNT PLAN, which was started in the late seventies.
In 1995, Local 839 started its 401(K) PENSION SAVINGS PLAN which offers a third level of pension participation to members of MPSC locals in Los Angeles and Orlando. The 401(k) plan now has over twelve hundred participants. Although our 401 (k) plan does not offer the employer match offered by some non-union 401(k)s, that is more than offset by the lucrative combination of employer- and employee-funded plans available to employees of union shops.
Here's a quick guide to the three pension plans offered to Local 839 members:
DEFINED BENEFIT PLAN |
INDIVIDUAL ACCOUNT PLAN (IAP) |
MPSC 401(k) PLAN | |
| What is it? | A pension plan that will pay you a set monthly check after retirement. | An account in which money is deposited, which builds up over time. | An optional savings plan allowing members to make tax-deferred savings contributions. |
| Who puts money into it? | The employer. | The employer. | You (participation is voluntary). |
| How much money goes into it? | 51.65¢ for every hour worked. |
|
|
| How much money does it have? | $1.748 billion. | $1.038 billion. | Over $50 million. |
| When will I be vested? | After five years (at least four hundred hours per year). Since all our plans are multi-employer, the time spent at any union shop counts towards your vesting. | After one year (at least four hundred hours). | Immediately. |
| What will I collect when I retire? | The "defined benefit" is based on the total number of qualified years and hours that you worked in the industry. The more years and hours you work, the higher your monthly check at the time you retire. | The IAP is paid as a single lump-sum payment or "roll-over" at the time of retirement. You get out what you put in, plus interest and a percentage of the "pot" (residuals, supplemental markets, etc.) | Participants enjoy substantial tax savings on a year-to-year basis. Payments are paid out at retirement, similar to the IAP (see left). |
| Who should I call for more information? | (818) 769-0007, (310) 769-0007 or toll-free (888) 369-2007. | (818) 769-0007, (310) 769-0007 or toll-free (888) 369-2007. | (818) 766-7151 (the union office); ask for Marta Strohl-Rowand. |
If you were employed by a union-shop animation studio in 2001 for which you are no longer working, you may be owed some unpaid vacation and holiday pay. Here's how to figure out what you are owed and how to collect it.
Q: How does vacation pay work?
A: If you worked for less than twelve months for the same employer, or if you worked over twelve months and did not take a paid vacation, you are owed vacation pay equal to 4% of your straight-time earnings.
If you are currently employed and have worked less than a year for the same employer, you will not be entitled to take a paid vacation until you have worked more than twelve months.
If you are currently employed and are entitled to vacation time, the employer has the right to require you to take the vacation in order to be paid for it. However, if the employer has not let you take a vacation he must pay you for it.
Q: How does holiday pay work?
A: If you worked less than the full year of 2001 for the same employer, you may be entitled to unpaid holiday pay. The amount you are owed is equal to the difference between 3.719% of your straight-time earnings and the amount you were paid on your weekly paycheck for holidays in which you did not work.
Q: How do I calculate my unpaid vacation and holiday pay?
A: Let's say you worked thirty-four weeks in 2001 for the same employer, from March 12 to November 2, at $1,800 per week. You were called in to work on Memorial Day. You did not work on three holidays (Good Friday, Independence Day and Labor Day), but you were paid for those holidays on your weekly check. Since your layoff you have not gone back to work for the same company.
Here's how you would calculate your unpaid vacation pay:
| Total straight-time earnings ($1,800 x 34 weeks) | $61,200.00 |
| Vacation pay owed (4% of above) | $2,448.00 |
And here's how you would calculate your unpaid holiday pay:
| 3.719% of straight-time earnings | $2,276.03 |
| Minus pay for holidays not worked* | $1,080.00 |
| Holiday pay owed | $1,196.03 |
*If this amount is the same or more than 3.719% of straight-time, you are not owed any 2001 holiday pay.
Q: What happens if I don't claim my unpaid vacation and holiday pay?
A: If vacation and holiday pay is not claimed within two years, it is deposited into your IAP pension account, and it cannot be claimed until you retire.
Q: How do I claim my unpaid vacation and holiday pay?
A: Before you go any further, check your pay stubs to make sure your employer did not already pay you your vacation and holiday pay when you were laid off.
Studios have varying policies for requesting and paying holiday and vacation pay. These procedures are to be followed only if you are no longer working for the same employer. Contact the payroll or human resources department of your former employer for further information.
If you are still employed at the same company, you should request vacations
through your department supervisor.
We will be cosponsoring with ASIFA-Hollywood and Women In Animation a
series of State of the Industry seminars that will help give us all a bead
on where our industry is going. The first will focus on feature animation,
digital and traditional, and is scheduled for Thursday, June 20, at 6:30
at the Burbank Realty Association Auditorium, 2006 W. Magnolia. The panel
is still being selected, and will include key industry figures from the
major studios involved in feature animation production. We plan to do these
events quarterly with upcoming events to focus on television production,
direct-to-video, commercials, and new media/games/interactive. Look for
more details in next month's Pegboard.
The entry deadline for our T-shirt design contest honoring Local 839's fiftieth anniversary has been extended to June 30. The winning designer will receive $500, with $250 for second place and $100 for third.
The contest is open to members in good standing (active or on honorable withdrawal). Submit your design to Jeff Massie at the Local 839 office. Do not put your name on the design, as all judging will be anonymous.
Contact Jeff Massie at (818) 766-7151 or jeffm@mpsc839.org if you
have any questions.
At the meeting on March 26, the Local 839 membership voted to hold our future meetings at the IATSE Local 44 meeting hall at 12021 Riverside Drive in North Hollywood (corner Agnes, just east of Laurel Canyon).
Local 44's meeting room is clean, spacious and well-lit, with plenty of parking ... and best of all, they'll let us go on serving pizza! We thank Local 44 for its hospitality and look forward to having our meetings at their site.
The next membership meeting will be on May 28 at 7:00 pm.
A sixtieth anniversary reunion of the Army Air Force First Motion Picture
Unit (FMPU) is in the offing. Contact Jules Levy at (310) 278-9820.
We have recently been informed of the death of CHRISTINE SERINO
on October 19, 2001. Since 1995 she had worked as a texture map painter
and artics and paint artist at DreamQuest, Warner Digital, SimeX, Digital
Fauxtography, Atomic Cow, Banned From The Ranch, Atomix and Disney/TSL.