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How did you choose your major?
Choosing my major was really difficult because I kind of wanted to do a little bit of everything. I chose illustration at first, and then ended up switching to animation. The staff here were very nice in helping me get situated, and changing majors, and making sure animation was the right place for me to be.

How has the CIA faculty helped you?
The faculty we have here at CIA are some of the most dedicated faculty I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with. For example, Hal Lewis will sit down with you for an hour if you need help working on your 3-D model. Hal was a 3-D modeler at Disney Feature Animation.

How valuable is it to have professors who are working professionals?
It’s very valuable to us because we get the most up-to-date knowledge of what is currently going on out in the field. So we are constantly learning new techniques or new ways to tell a story that professionals in California or Florida are doing now.

What does it mean to have your own studio space?
The studio space is what I like to call my home away from home. It’s a place to come and relax if you need to, or if you are stuck on a project, you can come here and think about it for a while and sketch out some ideas. We do have computer labs downstairs for animation, but the studio space up here is a place to work on our tactile work, or just brainstorm ideas if we need to.

What do you think of the campus environment?
I really love where the campus is situated in terms of University Circle, because you have the various museums, like the Natural History Museum and the Cleveland Museum of Art. You also have the Case Western Reserve University campus. Case offers a lot of opportunities for CIA students. And then we have the Cleveland Institute of Music. It is really nice for animators to have composers nearby so we can get custom music for our work.

Tell is about your internship?
I currently have an internship with Case’s School of Nursing, working with their biomedical team. I work on a patient simulator. It helps guide patients through the whole hospital process. It walks them through checking in, learning what to say, and what to ask their doctors. I’m doing 3-D modeling, environments, textures, and character animation.