Mike York - Character Animator

New Website !

2008-01-21T14:48:00.000-08:00

www.yorkanimates.com

I finally got my website up and running. There are still some minor issues but for
now you can check out my animation and portfolio. Feel free to email me if you
have any questions or comments.

New Website & Demo Reel Coming Soon

2007-11-02T09:37:00.000-07:00

I am almost finished with school now. WOW!! what a long journey it has been. I have learned soo much in the past 4 years its been amazing. I can't even fathom that I will be graduating soon with a bachelor degree in Media Arts & Animation. I am soo proud of myself, and I finally get to pursue a career that I love and have a great passion for.

I met some wonderful people over the last 4 years at The Art Institute of Colorado and all of them helped me grow as a artist and a person along the way.

I will have a website up pretty soon for my personal animation & demo reel and then its time for the job hunt.Im sooooo excited, I can't wait to work in the industry and share my passion with others around the world. Now a new chapter begins in my looney tune life and I look forward to seeing where it takes me. I want to travel to California because that is my home town where I was born and I have a lot of family there so hopefully I land a gig in Cali somewhere

Siggaraph 2007

2007-08-16T08:37:00.000-07:00

I just back from San Diego at Siggraph and I must say going on this trip was one of the most productive expeirences I have ever had. I went down to Siggraph with the intension of getting a job and nothing more. Boy did that change really fast as soon as I got into San Diego I realized how much I need to soak up this expierience and make the most of it. I made every day count by showing up at the exhibitions and job fairs as soon as they opened. This gave me the opportunity to get personal meet and greet seessions with Blue Sky,Lucas Arts,Walt Disney Animations, & 2 Alumni grads that used to go to my school.

I had a personal meet and greet critique session with Chad Sellers he has worked on many films such as Ice Age2 & Ant Bully one of my favorite animated movies this year. He was awesome and I really felt like we had known each other for years. Very easy to get along with and he gave me some awesome pointers on my reel and some really good critique. Out of all the professional animators and people I had meet and greets with over my trip Chad was the only one to critique my reel :-) But his critique was very good and I look forward to trying out some of his suggestions for my next reel cut. I got this really weird vibe that I might work with him very soon.

As far as parties go I missed the biggest one they had :-( The party on the battleship this year was amazing and I didnt get my wrist band because I didn't know we had to show up at the Marriot hotel first. That was a HUGE letdown but I made the best of it and me and few buddies from school the next night ending up going to a private Autodesk party on the 3rd level of "W" building in downtown San Diego, I was able to meet a Lead Animator and many other great artists from all over the world they had free drinks till 10pm and we were sifting our feet in Sand having the time of our lives at that point I idnt miss the battleship party at all. I met soo many new people on this trip I almost can't even count them. I was able to see my aunt and uncle and my cousin we went to the beach twice and I was able to do some body boarding right before I left to catch my plane. I couldn't leave Ca without going to the beach @ least one more time.

Overall my week in Siggraph was a very large eye opening expierience and I learned soo much from going I would never take that back. It was a very productive week for me and I got to meet a lot of very profound artists in the industry on a more personal level and I couldn't have asked for more. I really look forward to going back next year in La, California. I intend on moving back to California after I graduate its such a awesome state in soo many ways.

DEMO REEL JULY 2007

2007-06-11T14:08:00.000-07:00

http://www.4shared.com/file/17815764/ea629290/web_reel.html

The Art Institute Class Demo

2007-04-26T10:35:00.000-07:00

I was asked to teach a class on my workflow at my school The Art Institute of Colorado. I must say I was completely honored and I look forward to teaching again. The class demo got video recorded so I thaught I would share it with those who could not attend.

GDC 2007

2007-03-12T08:14:00.000-07:00

WOW!!

The Game Developers Conference in San Fransisco this year was AMAZING!! It was a very large learning expierience for me as a individual who is trying to break into the field. I met about 15 Art Director's from animation studios from all around the world. I applied at about 30 studios and companies total and I gave out about 11 Demo Reels and 30 Resumes. Now first off let me state that this one of my biggest learning expieriences of them all. I should have taken 50 Demo Reels and 100 Resumes. But next time I will be more prepared. That's what this is all about. SIGGRAPH is coming up so now I have a good idea of what to expect as far as caos and comotion.

On the bright side there were SOO many companies out there just waiting to show you the greatest up in-coming stuff from Blizzard and Midway etc. I was shocked to see how friendly and easy approaching everyone can be. It felt really natural to introduce myself and share my passion with them. I also got some REALLY!! good critique on my portfolio from the Art Director from Midway. They were some really eye opening comments that really made sense and needed to be said and heard by me. It was a like a Flanagan critique :-) It felt good to finally here that stuff again. I learned that I need to have a bunch of seperate demo reels when I go down to GDC next year that are tailored for each company.

For ex: Midway makes a lot of Wresteling games and fighting games now and so they wanted to see more characters colliding and showing impact. I plan on bringing a 20sec animation to Midway next year that shows PURE IMPACT!! :-)

I ended up going down with Desiree Ford a 3d Artist from school. We had a good time other than the fact that I was pretty sick to my stomach the whole trip :-(. But I tried to make the best of it and held my composure as much as I could. We took a cool little train that was held up on rusty ol' disks it was soo cool. We were chattin with this gangsta driver that had a ol school BEN DAVIS shirt on :-) and he was like " YO! man you a artist or WhAt?....... Man.... I couldn't even draw a crook-id line.. :-)

Character Animation Test Reel 2007

2007-01-30T14:50:00.000-08:00

I still have about 1 year left in school but I tried to throw together some kind of reel to see where I am at and also to send to a hopeful employer.

Please go to the link below to download the test reel.

http://www.4shared.com/file/9768493/a643d52c/York_Test_Reel.html

Mikey Monkey'in Around

2007-01-19T14:44:00.000-08:00

This is a new animation I am working on that is part of a test for rv3gen.com

Work in progress - Due at the end of this month :-)

Please visit the link below to download the animation

http://www.4shared.com/file/9151824/3e38b667/Mikey_Monkey_Around.html

Mikey Weight Test

2006-12-19T07:43:00.000-08:00

This is a weight test I did with the Mikey Ball Rig. I love working with this character he's soo fun to animate with. I plan on using him a lot more in the future.

Update: I added in some audio and I also worked on the animation some more.

Please go to the link below to download the animation. Thank You for your time
http://www.4shared.com/file/8545173/5d1e1b4b/weight_test_with_Audio.html

Best Game Ever Animation

2006-12-19T07:31:00.000-08:00

This is a new animation that is in progress and its about a conflict between a two friends about which video game they think is the best. I used a audio clip from the movie Billy Madison for my dialog.

Please go to the link below to download or watch the animation. Thank you for your time
http://www.4shared.com/file/7604746/3f340357/Schizophrenia_Test.html

Awarded Greatness Animation

2006-11-06T07:33:00.000-08:00

Ok so after a bunch of critiques from fellow animators I think I this animation is almost there.. It just needs a little bit more tweaking and arc adjustments.

Please go to the link below to download my animation. Thank you for your time

http://www.4shared.com/file/6057655/149fc1ac/Awarded_Render.html

My 1st Dialog Animation

2006-10-05T15:18:00.000-07:00

Work In Progress

Please visit the link below to download animation
http://www.4shared.com/file/4306132/b8b96e9e/low_max_dialog.html

Ritz Cracker Animation

2006-07-15T12:36:00.000-07:00

Work In Progress

Here is a Ritz cracker animation I am working on. I am trying to create a sense of military movements and poses. I intend to add sound effects and dialog for the general cracker and all the Ritz cracker recruits.