Guest Presentations and Field Trips
Guest presentations are a vital cornerstone of our animation program, offering an experience so rich in knowledge that attending them is almost like taking several additional courses. These sessions provide an invaluable opportunity to interface directly with active recruiters, working artists, and seasoned industry professionals who bring practical tips and authentic career advice straight to our students. To ensure a constant bridge between our studios and the professional world, we host these presentations practically once a week.
Here's a sample of our recent guests:
Wendell Dalit
A SJSU Animation and Illustration alum, Wendell Dalit is a visual development artist at Sony Pictures Animation, currently working on the highly-anticipated conclusion to the studio's groundbreaking Spider-Verse trilogy, Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse. Most recently, he served as art director on the studio's global breakout hit K-Pop Demon Hunters. Dalit previously served as a visual development artist on the Academy Award®-winner Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse and its sequel Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. He also served as the art director on Vivo, Sony Pictures Animation's first-ever animated musical, featuring all new songs from Lin-Manuel Miranda. In his role, he helped oversee the film’s design, look development, and surfacing.
Noah Klocek
Another SJSU alum, Noah Klocek is an art director and production designer at Pixar Animation Studios. Noah Klocek's career in animation started at Dreamworks, where he worked on Shrek 2 and Madagascar. He is currently at Pixar, where he has worked as a sketch artist, and more recently as a Production Designer, a role that guides the overall look of a given film. His many art dept. credits include Wall-E, Brave, Inside Out, Luca, Onward, and the series Win or Lose. He is the author and illustrator of several children's books, including Cloud Country.
Skydance Animation
Skydance is division of Paramount Pictures created to produce streaming films. The studio is based in California, with offices in East Hartford, Connecticut, and Madrid, Spain; the Madrid branch was originally Ilion Animation Studios. Skydance Animation's first film, Luck, was released on August 5, 2022, on Apple TV+. After Luck, they went on producing a slate of other films such as Swapped, released on May 1, 2026, on Netflix, followed by three other film projects: Ray Gunn (2026); Eddie and the Beanstalk, and an untitled Don Hall project (all for Netflix).
Allena Hail
SHM Alumnus Allena Hail talks about Technical Art! Allena is a Technical Artist with a flair for fun styles and story-rich environments. Her most notable title is the award-winning VR game "Luna" from indie studio Funomena. She has also developed games and experiences on the Magic Leap One, Oculus Quest, and Roblox. As Tech Artist, Allena embraces the "artist" title. She spends her time finding ways to make the process of creating art faster and easier for artists, while retaining and highlighting the spark that makes their work shine. Engines, software, programming, version control—these are all just tools she uses to help achieve the final look. The greatest reward in her work is seeing others experience the spaces which she’s created. Allena enjoys finding new ways to make art with computers.
Christian Roman
The legendary Christian Roman is a veteran animation professional with experience in all facets of the medium, including layout, timing, design, voice acting, scriptwriting, storyboarding, animating, directing, and executive producing. The core of his career was spent at Pixar Animation Studios, where he honed his skills as a storyboard artist and storyteller on nine features, shorts, and specials. He has also contributed to projects for studios including Film Roman (no relation), Disney Television Animation, Starz, 20th Century, WB Animation, Olive Jar, Aardman Animation, DreamWorks, and WildBrain His credits include Toy Story 3, Luca, Elemental, and directing and producing Disney’s American Dragon!
Colin Fix
The uber talented Colin Fix has been working in film, video games, and animation for nearly 20 years, at studios like 2K Games, ILM, Lucasfilm Animation, Lucasarts, EA, and Stormfront Studios. He has enjoyed working on exciting projects like "Game of Thrones", "Shadow in the Cloud", "Star Wars: The Force Awakens", "Bioshock 2", "Injustice 2", "Wish I Was Here", "Dark Phoenix", etc. Colin has a blast making art for a living and collaborating with so many talented, amazing people.
James Gurney
James Gurney, American artist and author known for his illustrated book series Dinotopia, celebrated the re-release of his The Artist's Guide to Sketching with us—the book he wrote and illustrated in 1982 with Thomas Kinkade (before he became the "Painter of Light."). James shared a presentation that quickly spanned the history of observational drawing, leading to his personal story with sketching, and how the field has evolved since 1982 with the development of Urban Sketching and Plein-Air Painting.
Keetsie Braz da Cunha
SJSU/SHM Alum, Keetsie Braz Da Cunha, in her presentation about VFX animation in video games. With over 11 years of industry experience, we are so grateful that she is coming back to SJSU to share her wisdom! Keetsie is a Senior VFX artist, specializing in stylized effects for games. She also has experience creating environments and hand painted textures to complement the visual style of projects.
Laika
The award-winning animation studio that brought you Coraline, Kubo, Paranorman, and more visited SJSU! We were so lucky to have Laika join us to talk about the pipeline and show us what goes on behind the scenes on their latest project. They also gave some great info about their internship program, and how to prepare a good application to get in.
Maike Sherff & Artists
Maikee Sherff is a first generation mixed Filipino Director! She is a specialist in Storyboards/Revisions, Character/Prop/FX Design, and Development. Studios where Maikee works (or has worked) include: A24, Disney TVA, Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon, DreamWorks TV, ShadowMachine / Apple TV+, Warner Bros., Titmouse, Hello Sunshine, Stoopid Buddy, PlayStation, and more!
Matt Zogaric
An industry professional and SJSU Masters Professor, Matt has several decades of experience in sound design (and film editing!), in several studios including Dolby Laboratories, Matt shared his broad knowledge of designing sound effects for all kinds of cool projects.
Eleanor Hideout (Senior Student)
We also have presentations by our very own awesome animation students! Our monthly SHMminars are cool events where our current students share their knowledge with their peers. They are student driven and cover a huge range of subjects: from mental health, to technical and artistic skills. They are low key presentations, but we love the spirit of it!
Field Trips
Expand your creative network beyond the classroom. Each year, our students can join curated trips to premier industry hubs—from the world-class Ottawa International Animation Festival to the epicenter of gaming at GDC in San Francisco. Beyond these flagship events, tailored field trips to cutting-edge studios and specialized facilities are deployed throughout the program to directly support and elevate your studio work.
Left: MDes students visit ILM (Industrial Light and Magic, where franchises like Star Wars are developed).
Right: Field trip to GDC - Game Developers Conference, in San Francisco.
Above: Students visiting Dolby Laboratories in San Francisco.
