Episode 462 - Jessica Schab, Studio animation, Guru, sceptic, leader
Jan 20, 2020
Today we have a special guest! Jessica Schab. Jessica works for Mainframe entertainment in Canada, one of THE premier digital animation companies! Before things like Pixar they were THE CGI animation people! Behind the Video for Dire Straights' Money for Nothing video back in the 80s, Transformers Beastwars, Octonaughts, Babrie, and my personal fave: Reboot!
Topics and Show Notes
Jessica is an interesting person. She's in charge of production design on an upcoming show for Dreamworks, which involves a particular kind of organisational based leadership which is quite uncommon in a lot of small scale creative projects like webcomics, but still extremely important nevertheless and a lot of projects fail because they don't take account of it.
Jessica is an even more interesting character than that though. She's been a spiritual guru who has lived all over the world. She then reversed course and became a sceptical activist! She's even had a documentary made about her! So she's quite good at building and maintaining a personal brand which is what every webcomicer should know how to do. You'll have to watch our Patron video to find out about that stuff though.
This week Gunwallace has given us the theme to Grey Sky Blue Moon. I’m tempted to write a bad early 80s rap for this, but I won’t torture people that way. This tune is remarkably 1980s in style: rap, dance style music, exactly like you’d get from a big budget movie from 1984 or ‘85. Think Beverly Hills Cop or Police Academy. It’s perfect! It’s a great match for the crazy light night hi-jinks that the girls of Grey Sky Blue Moon get up too!
Topics and shownotes
Links
Equal time for free thought: WBAI 99.5 FM - http://equaltimeforfreethought.org/
Reboot - https://reboot.fandom.com/wiki/Mainframe_Entertainment_Inc
Mainframe - https://www.mainframe.ca/
Jessica Schab - http://www.jessicaschab.com/
Featured comic:
The Red Moon - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2020/jan/14/featured-comic-the-red-moon/
Featured music:
Grey Sky Blue Moon - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Grey_Sky_Blue_Moon/, by xailenrath, rated M.
Special thanks to:
Gunwallace - http://www.virtuallycomics.com
Tantz Aerine - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Tantz_Aerine/
Ozoneocean - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/ozoneocean
Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Banes
kawaiidaigakusei - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/kawaiidaigakusei/
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Ozoneocean at 6:22PM, Jan. 23, 2020
Ya, it's fascinating to me :D I saw a discussion of the 3 types of leadership on the youtube channel "military history visualised", and ever since then I wanted to see real world examples of organisational leadership, rather than just the usual tactical and strategic on the low and high ends respectively.
Andreas_Helixfinger at 5:03AM, Jan. 22, 2020
Hey, I get what you're saying man(Y)
Ozoneocean at 7:05PM, Jan. 21, 2020
I like it too. But learning about the process for a pro running a animation studio is valuable. We always talk about direction, acting, writing etc, but the organisational level is what actually makes things happen. It's that essential bridge between coming up with an idea and working on it: HOW you you even start working on an idea? How do you make working on that feasible and sustainable? THIS is how.
Andreas_Helixfinger at 6:53AM, Jan. 21, 2020
This was a fascinating one(Y) Personally though I'm sticking to Newgrounds when it comes to animations. The content on that site is amateurish for the most part, yes, but there is plenty of talent and passion to go around, and there are quite a few little gems there you don't find anywhere else as well. It's the kind of diverse, self-indulgent, quirky kind of stuff that I keep coming back to watch over and over again^^