Jocelyn Cofer presents her latest 2D Shortfilm, her school years are all about keyframes, cats and having lunch with Glen Keane.

What motivated you to do Cat Flap?
SCAD's curriculum requires their students to create a short film during their senior year at the college. After spending two quarters working on a film that turned out to be almost five minutes long, I realized there was no way I'd be able to finish it by the third quarter. Luckily, I got accepted into Disney's internship program over the summer, which steered me in a great direction for my project. I spoke with my mentor, peers and some of the master animators about my film. They all really liked the story, but agreed it was way too long for one person to pull off in my time frame. Everyone advised me to do a 30 second piece with one character. Glen Keane also suggested animating something that I know, but I'll get to that later. So, I took their advice and after much thought came up with Cat Flap. Originally the cat was stuck on a chair after using it as a scratching post since I've seen my cat do that plenty of times. My professor suggested having the cat get stuck on something funnier though. After much more deliberation, Cat Flap was born.

How long did it take you from start to finish?
It took me about 11 weeks to complete Cat Flap from start to finish. I spent two weeks on the animatic, rough layouts and really rough animation in Flipbook. My friend and fellow animator Victoria Alexander did the final layouts and all of the coloring during the following 10 weeks. While she worked on that, I printed out my rough animation and tied it down traditionally. Once the tie downs were finished I added all of the inbetweens and sent it off for Victoria to color. I'm sure it would have been easier to just do everything digitally, but I feel like I can draw much better with a pencil and paper than I can with a tablet.

Can you mention some of the challenges you went through?
Overall, the project went smoothly once the ten weeks of the quarter got started. The beginning was really tough though. I'm not very good at concept and character design, so it took me forever to come up with a look for the cat that I was happy with. The only other major problem I had was with the last scene where the cat goes up with the garage door. Initially, I moved the garage door up using a camera move in Flipbook. I had never done anything like that before in 2d and pretty much had to brute force things to get them to work. I printed out all of the frames of the door going up so I could use them as a guide for my inbetweens. Once the animation was finished, I discovered that the colored door didn't line up with the rough black and white door I had been using as a guide. I requested the linework for the final layout and reprinted the garage door frames. I started to redo the animation, only to discover my original work actually did line up with the new layout. After a lot of back and forth, I finally got everything working. Needless to say, it was a huge learning experience.

As part as your credits you have Glen Keane, Wow! Did you meet him?
Yes, I was fortunate to have lunch with Glen Keane on my second to last day at Disney. I've seen all of his Calarts lectures on Youtube and treasure every second spent with him. Glen told me about one of his first assignments when he came to Disney. He said like every animation student, he wanted to create an epic adventure and ran out of time. Glen ended up making a really simple 30 second piece and the nine old men loved it. Glen said one way he connects with his characters is looking for what he knows. We all have heard him talk about how he connects Tarzan's first meeting with Jane with the moment he met his daughter as a baby. Glen said looking for moments like that really helps you get into character and create sincere performances. He advised me to think of something I'm really familiar with and to use it as a subject for my film. I told Glen I knew a lot about cats since I've had one for 16 years. Glen told me to take that knowledge even further and do an intense study on cats. He wanted me to figure out what makes a cat a cat and to get their feline essence. Hopefully, my studies are evident in the film even though Priscilla doesn't behave like a truly naturalistic cat. Glen also gave me some amazing words of wisdom that I have placed on my wall above my desk. He said "it's not about how well you can draw, but how much you believe".

You have animated in 2D and 3D, which medium do you prefer the most?
Hmmm, that's a tough one. I love working in both mediums and after working in one for a long time, I end up missing the other. Earlier on I would say 2d is my favorite medium, but I really love the fine details and nuances that you can get with 3d. I'm sure they can be achieved in 2d as well, but I don't feel like I have the necessary drawing skills to pull them off. I do like the fact that you aren't limited by the rig and the lack of technical issues in traditional animation, but the wonderful "undo" button is sorely missed. Both mediums have their pros and cons, and I've learned that animation is animation. I love animating and either medium is just fine with me.

Is there anything else you would like to add?
Not really, but I do have a small piece of advice for my fellow students and that is to never give up on your dreams. During my college career I was told many, many times how unlikely it is for students to get into a major feature animation fresh out of school. People were constantly telling me to lower my standards and to look at smaller studios since they were more likely to hire me. I don't have a problem with smaller studios and game studios, but they weren't why I got into animation. I decided to become an animator because of the Disney films and was/still am determined to work at a feature animation studio. I don't have the coveted position yet, but getting the Disney internship was definitely a huge step towards my goal.

About the Artist: My name is Jocelyn Cofer. I'm currently 22 years old and will be graduating from the animation program at the Savannah College of Art and Design at the end of May. I also gradated from AnimationMentor in the summer of 2007. I loved animated Disney movies as a child and constantly drew characters from the films. In middle school I found out that people actually created them and I decided I wanted to be an animator right then and there. Ever since then I strove to learn how to animate so that I could some day work at the wonderful world of Disney. Last summer, my dream came true. I was an animation summer associate at the Walt Disney Feature Animation Studio, and it was the best time of my life. I loved every moment at Disney and was very sad to leave in August. I'm hoping to return there after graduation with a full time position or a spot in their talent development program. When I'm not animating, I am usually drawing, reading, or playing video games