Movie Animator

Growing up in São Paulo, Brazil, Renato dos Anjos (reh-NAH-toh dohss AN-yohss) loved to draw. “I had a comic strip that I made with one of my neighbors,” he says. Dos Anjos learned the basics of animation as a teenager when he worked with a family friend at a Brazilian animation studio.

Today, Dos Anjos leads a team of more than a hundred people at Walt Disney Animation Studios. They use technology to bring expression, movement, and personality to movie characters. Dos Anjos has worked on 17 films, including Zootopia and Encanto. He recently spoke with SuperScience about his work.

Renato dos Anjos (reh-NAH-toh dohss AN-yohss) grew up in São Paulo, Brazil. He loved to draw as a kid. “I had a comic strip that I made with one of my neighbors,” he says. Dos Anjos learned the basics of animation as a teen. He worked with a family friend at a Brazilian animation studio.

Today, Dos Anjos works at Walt Disney Animation Studios. There, he leads a team of more than a hundred people. They use technology to animate movie characters. That means they create the characters’ movements. Dos Anjos has worked on 17 films. They include Zootopia and Encanto. He recently spoke with SuperScience about his work.

Everything starts with the story. The director has an idea about what this movie should be. Writers create a script, which is a written version of the story and its characters. Then a group of artists draw comic book-like versions of the script’s visuals, called storyboards.

That’s when my department, called character animation, jumps in. Animators take storyboard scenes and make them move, following the director’s instructions. One group works on wind, fire, water, and landscapes. Another makes the clothes, fabrics, and hair move realistically. For Encanto, my team had about 105 animators.

Everything starts with the story. Writers create a script. It describes the story’s plot and characters. Then a group of artists draws storyboards. They’re like comic books. They show the script’s scenes.

Next, my team jumps in. My department is called character animation. We take storyboard scenes and make them move. We follow the director’s instructions to do this. Another group works on wind, fire, water, and landscapes. And another makes the clothes, fabrics, and hair move realistically. For Encanto, my team had about 105 animators.

It’s kind of like manipulating a puppet. On the computer, you’ve got a threedimensional character in a scene without any expression. Using a computer program, I can move the character’s shoulder and start to move her feet. Slowly, I build the movement of the scene.

We have more than 2,000 controls-points we use to move the body. Every knuckle, wrist, and elbow has many possible rotations. There are hundreds of controls to move the muscles in the face.

I do a first pass, then I show the director. The director will say, “That’s exactly what I’m looking for.” Or the director tells me what needs updating. This process is repeated many times for each scene.

It’s kind of like moving a puppet. But we move a 3-D character on a computer screen. A computer program allows me to move parts of the character’s body. I might shift her shoulder. Or I may move her feet. Slowly, I build the movement of the scene.

We can move more than 2,000 points on the body. Every knuckle, wrist, and elbow has many possible positions. Hundreds of controls move the muscles in the face alone. That allows us to create many different expressions.

I do a first pass animating the character. Then I show the director. The director will say, “That’s exactly what I’m looking for.” Or the director tells me what needs to change. This process is done many times for each scene.