The
Animation Educators’ Forum (AEF), a non-profit association of teachers and scholars whose focus is the art of animated film, announce this year’s inductees into their Hall of Fame. This virtual hall is dedicated to the artists and scholars whose teaching influenced the history of animation. Each January the Forum announces a new group of names added to the hall. It you wish to suggest a worthy candidate, please visit:
animationeducatorsforum.orgNancy Beiman
Nancy Beiman, a graduate of the first class of CalArts’ Character Animation Program in 1979, was a supervising animator on such films as Amblin’s
An American Tail: Fievel Goes West (1991) and Disney’s
Treasure Planet (2002). She also directed a TV special, two videogame cinematics, and three independent short films. Nancy became an educator after a 1999 auto accident and taught at the Savannah College of Art and Design and the Rochester Institute of Technology beginning in 2000. She then taught storyboarding at Sheridan College from 2008-2018. Nancy also wrote textbooks on storyboarding (
Prepare to Board!) and acting for animators (
Animated Performance). More about Nancy Beiman:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nancy_Beiman
Doug Crane
Animator Doug Crane (1935-2020) began his career at Terrytoons and animated at a variety of other studios, including Hanna-Barbera East and Filmation. His credits include such TV series as
Deputy Dawg and
Spider-Man, specials like
Really Rosie (1975) and such features as
The Adventures of Raggedy Ann and Andy (1977) and
Heavy Metal (1981). He taught classical animation for many years at the School of Visual Arts. More about Doug Crane:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doug_Crane
Harry Love
Harry Love (1911–1997) was an animator, director, producer, writer with a 62-year career in studios from Charles Mintz to Warner Bros to Ralph Bakshi. In the 1970s to meet a manpower shortage at Hanna-Barbera, Harry organized their training program. He taught so many young writers and artists to do studio work that his program was referred to euphemistically as Hanna-Barbera University. More about Harry Love:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Love_(animator)
Elmer Plummer
Elmer Plummer (1910-1986) was a designer and watercolorist who started at Warner Bros, and later moved on to Disney where he worked on
Fantasia and
Dumbo. After World War II he worked at Disney part time, while he began teaching at Chouinard Art Institute, transitioning over to Cal Arts in 1971. There he taught many of the animators of the 1990s animation renaissance. More about Elmer Plummer:
https//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elmer Plummer
Harold Whitaker
Harold Whitaker (1920-2013) was a British animator, author, and teacher. He began his animation career with Anson Dyer before World War II. After the studio was taken over by Halas & Batchelor, he became a lead animator on
Animal Farm (1954). He also worked on
Heavy Metal (1981). In 1973, John Halas asked Harold to teach a crash course in animation to help build the next generation of artists. In 1981, he published the classic text,
Timing for Animation. More about Harold Whitaker:
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/jan/14/harold-whitaker
About ASIFA-Hollywood
ASIFA-Hollywood is the world’s foremost professional organization dedicated to promoting the Art of Animation and celebrating the people who create it. Today, ASIFA-Hollywood, the largest chapter of the international organization ASIFA, supports a wide range of animation activities and preservation efforts through its membership. Current initiatives include the Animation Archive, Animation Aid Foundation, Animation Educators’ Forum (AEF), film preservation, open-source support, special events, screenings and the annual Annie Awards.