ABOVE PHOTO: PuppyChow Productions animation team (left to right) Kaylee Sevcik, Hannah Brown, Callie Kraemer, Lee Rupp and Gale Eidam.
A team of animation and digital media students at University of Wisconsin-Stout is collaborating with a local nonprofit to develop a public service announcement as part of the Animation Production junior capstone class.
Their 72-second 2D animated film, “Stray,” was created to help advocate for pet adoption at Dunn County Humane Society. The informative short features Bow, a stray orange tabby cat rescued during Wisconsin’s bitter winter.
Assistant Professor Jesse Woodward gives the student teams creative freedom in their narrative stories to choose to create 2D or 3D animations in many forms, including commercials, music videos, PSAs and more. “They find each other’s strengths, and each member plays an important role within the team. They also come up with studio names for their teams and design websites and social media accounts to promote their studios,” he said.
PuppyChow Productions, the DCHS team – they’re all animal lovers and cat people, by the way – all play a role in the animation, but also have focuses within the team:
- Hannah Brown, of Appleton, concept art, pre-production
- Callie Kraemer, of Sturgeon Bay, director and editor
- Kaylee Sevcik, of Sturgeon Bay, character lead for Bow
- Lee Rupp, of Nekoosa, human character animations
- Gale Eidam, of Minneapolis, human character animations
“Stray” will be posted on PuppyChow Productions’ YouTube channel and will be premiered at SOAD Senior Show, which showcases capstone projects by nearly 120 graduating School of Art and Design seniors, as well as juniors, from 6 to 9 p.m. on Friday, May 9.
Visit PuppyChow Productions’ website and follow on Instagram and TikTok.
Supporting a nonprofit through animation
Kraemer, who volunteered for a humane society as a Girl Scout, helped draw in her four classmates to join the Dunn County Humane Society project.
“‘Stray’ is a lighthearted, informative narrative to show how the rescue and adoption process at DCHS is meant to be stress-free for the animals,” she said.
The team brainstormed several narrative ideas on how to capture DCHS’s message through animation. One narrative followed a dog that broke off its leash while on a walk with its owner. However, when PuppyChow Productions presented its ideas to the animation class, the team learned that a cat was the favored pet of their classmates, and they began to develop Bow’s story.
After meeting with DCHS managers to learn about the rescue and adoption process, the team decided its PSA should include what someone should do if they find a stray cat, as well as how DCHS prepares pets for adoption with microchips, medical evaluations, cleanings and vaccines.
Brown designed the PuppyChow Productions logo, and Sevcik and Rupp designed the main characters. Sevcik’s animation of Bow had many iterations. “Bow’s final design is sensible to animate frame by frame. His animation is concise and leaves little room for error as each team member works on him throughout the process,” Sevcik said.
Bow is named in honor of DCHS’s tradition of placing a bow tie on the cats ready for adoption.
Rupp’s animations of the little girl and her grandma, who adopt Bow, were inspired by real people. The team named the girl “Jessie,” a twist on Woodward’s name. Jessie’s grandma is designed in the image of Rupp’s own grandma, who actually lost her golden retriever on a walk. It was found and returned – a happy ending to match Bow’s story.
The team used Toon Boom Harmony – an industry-standard 2D animation software – to create its animation. Eidam was a little familiar with the software, but for the rest of the team, Toon Boom was a new artistic realm. Learning the software’s tools and techniques proved to be the most challenging aspect of the project. They learned its functions by working with Woodward, watching YouTube tutorials and talking with senior animation students.
This project fulfilled the team’s field experience requirement of 80 hours, completed over the course of eight weeks. They are also volunteering at DCHS.
Design department Chair Shelley Pecha encourages collaborations with local organizations. She volunteered at DCHS last summer.
“They are a great organization full of extremely hardworking people. I wanted to find a way to help them with marketing and advertising to facilitate more adoptions, find more volunteers or gain more donations,” she said. “The design department is full of programs that can help community nonprofits in this way. It’s great for the students to learn from these organizations, see how they can help and maybe become lifelong volunteers. Hopefully, these nonprofits can use the student work in a way that benefits their organization.”
Animation Career Review rankings
Animation Career Review listed UW-Stout’s animation and digital media program among public colleges:
- No. 16 for top animation schools in the Midwest
- No. 35 for top public animation schools in the U.S.
More than 200 schools were surveyed.
UW-Stout’s game design and animation lab spaces include a state-of-the-art Vicon Motion Capture Studio, along with many other labs, studios and galleries. Woodward invites outside partners and on-campus collaborators to experience the Motion Capture Studio.
“We collaborate on live virtual performances; use virtual reality and augmented reality; detailed hand and finger animation; motion capture athletes, animals and more,” he said. “In the future, I hope to expand the system to do facial capture and camera tracking as well.”
