Welcome!
Tony's intro to the first 2D Academy online course, 'Mastering 2D Animation:101' on Udemy.
My name is Tony White and I am passionate about traditional 2D animation!
With the advent of new technology and the demise of the once-great Disney studio the very existence of 2D animation - the finest art form there has ever been IMHO - is at real risk. The biggest challenge 2D faces today is that its great chain of learning – once passed down from master to pupil, from generation upon generation – is now broken.
Today the industry in the USA (ironically, once the proud founder and leader of the pack in terms of mainstream productions) no longer makes traditionally animated movies. Because of this, aspiring students of the medium can no longer learn while working with a master professional on genuine productions. Therefore, before mastery of this magnificent art form is entirely lost forever, I have decided to create the online 2D Academy in the hope that this void might be filled.
The 2D Academy is dedicated to preserving, teaching and evolving of the fine artform of traditional, hand-drawn 2D animation. Primarily it is a place where creative individuals, located anywhere around the world, can gain access to - and therefore learn from - the incredible knowledge that has been evolved and passed on for well over 100 years now. It is a place that is founded upon the irreplaceable wisdom of the past, adapted to a student’s needs in the present and with an eye to enabling them to create the great, animated classics of the future.
At the present time the 2D Academy has 3 ways of you doing this… through books, through online courses and hopefully in time, through paid apprenticeships on professional projects. More details of these can be found elsewhere on this site.
Finally let me wish you well in your studies. Traditional 2D animation is a path I have never regretted embarking on from day one of my career. Journeys from my animation lightbox have taken me around the world and to places of the imagination that I barely suspected existed - and I am fully committed to walking this path till the day when I am called back to that great drawing board in the sky!
I hope therefore you will accompany me for part of the way ahead – and beyond that, to journey on your own - to where your knowledge, your heart and your inexhaustible imagination will unquestionably take you!
Tony White.