| DreamWorks
CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg and fellow DreamWorkers are coming to the Texas
A&M College of Architecture to work,
play, discuss the future of CG animation and treat students,
faculty and staff to a movie.
The main event, “A Conversation with Jeffrey Katzenberg,” is
slated for 7:30 p.m. Monday, Oct. 30 in the Preston Geren Auditorium
at the Langford Architecture Center. Katzenberg will talk about
the future of computer graphic animation with DreamWorks computer
graphics supervisor and Viz former student Dave Walvoord in a
live question and answer session moderated by Dr. Dean Bresciani,
vice president of student affairs at Texas A&M University.
Tickets to Monday’s night’s event are available
on a first-come, first-served basis from the Viz Lab, located
on the in Langford C418. Students from VIZA, VIST, ENDS and CPSC,
in particular, are highly encouraged to attend this very special
happening. Please not that tickets will not be placed on hold
and e-mail queries and phone calls are strongly discouraged.
Also, no recording or photographic devices of any kind will be
allowed at this event. This includes cell phones with photographic
capabilities.
The following day, Nov. 1 at 7:30 p.m., DreamWorks is treating
ticket-holding College of Architecture students, faculty and
staff to a private screening of the new DreamWorks animated feature, "Flushed
Away," at Cinemark’s Hollywood Theater in College
Station.
“Flushed Away” tickets and posters are also available
on a first-come, first-served basis from the Viz Lab in Langford
C418. Again, tickets will not be placed on hold and e-mail queries
and phone calls are strongly discouraged.
Prior to the public festivities, as early as Friday, Oct. 27,
Katzenberg’s entourage will arrive in College Station to
meet Viz students and faculty, review student work and lead a
few highly nuanced animation workshops.
At 2 p.m. Friday, Oct. 27, DreamWorks special effects artist
Scott Cegielski will conduct a Visual Effects Workshop exclusively
for viz students in Langford C414 and C412. This visual effects
problem-solving workshop is limited to 12 students with a strong
interest in visual effects.
Earlier in the day, DreamWorks recruiter Kim Mackey will join
Cegielski interviewing Viz students and reviewing their work.
An “open presentation” by the Dreamworks staff is
set for 1:30 p.m. in Langford C414.
The day of the “Big Event,” Monday, Oct. 30, Dave
Walvoord, a Viz former student and computer graphics supervisor
for DreamWorks, will critique Viz student’s demo reels
in the morning, then lead a 3 – 5 p.m. lighting workshop
for Viz students in Langford C412 and Studio A.
Prior to his public 7:30 p.m. public presentation in the Geren
Auditorium, Katzenberg is meeting privately with Visualization
Science faculty and students to review research projects and
student work.
Jeffrey Katzenberg
Jeffrey Katzenberg is the Chief Executive Officer of DreamWorks
Animation SKG. DreamWorks Animation was a division of DreamWorks
SKG until October 2004, when it became a separate publicly traded
company. Katzenberg co-founded DreamWorks with Steven Spielberg
and David Geffen in October 1994.
Under Katzenberg’s leadership, DreamWorks Animation has
enjoyed a number of critical and commercial successes, including “Over
the Hedge,” “Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the
Were-Rabbit” (created by Aardman Animations), “Madagascar,” “Shark
Tale,” “Shrek,” and its sequel “Shrek
2,” the highest grossing animated feature of all time.
From its 1994 inception until it was acquired by Paramount in
2006, DreamWorks produced a number of celebrated films, including
three Best Picture Academy Award® winners – “American
Beauty,” “Gladiator,” and “A Beautiful
Mind.” The studio released its first animated films in
1998 – “Antz,” and “The Prince of Egypt.”
Prior to co-founding DreamWorks, Katzenberg served as Chairman
of The Walt Disney Studios. During his tenure, the studio produced
such box office hits as “Who Framed Roger Rabbit,” “The
Little Mermaid,” and “Beauty and the Beast,” the
first animated feature to be nominated for a Best Picture Oscar®.
Katzenberg previously served as President of Paramount Studios.
Katzenberg is currently the Chairman of the Board for the Motion
Picture & Television Fund Foundation, and serves on the boards
of AIDS Project Los Angeles, American Museum of the Moving Image,
California Institute of the Arts, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center,
Geffen Playhouse, Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s
Research, and The Simon Wiesenthal Center.
Dave Walvoord
Dave Walvoord recently completed work as a CG supervisor on
DreamWorks Animation’s hit summer comedy “Over the
Hedge.” He joined the studio in 2002 to help build the
digital animation feature film pipeline and in addition served
as a CG supervisor on the Academy Award®-nominated animated
comedy “Shark Tale.” Dave is currently serving as
a CG Supervisor on the upcoming action-adventure “Kung
Fu Panda,” slated for release May 23, 2008
Prior to joining DreamWorks Animation, Walvoord worked at Blue
Sky Studios as a supervising technical director on the animated
feature “Ice Age” and as a digital effects supervisor
on the Academy Award®-winning animated short “Bunny.” In
the live-action realm, he has worked on the features “Fight
Club” and “Star Trek: Insurrection.”
Walvoord received a Master of Science degree in Visualization
Science and a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science
from Texas A&M University.
John Tarnoff
Head of Show Development
John Tarnoff oversees three groups responsible for managing
key resources and practices in Dreamworks Animation’s early
production process for its animated feature films. These groups
are responsible for the initial artistic designs and storyboards
for films in development and pre-production, for the artistic
enrichment and training of the illustrators, designers, and storyboard
artists who create the look of these films, and for the studio’s
ongoing relationship with art schools and other institutions
that provide new ideas and talent that help shape the studio’s
future.
John has been in the motion picture business for 30 years, starting
in TV commercial production in New York and film distribution
in Los Angeles. He was a literary agent responsible for breaking
talented directors like John Landis, Michael Mann and Martha
Coolidge, and an independent producer and production executive
for studios including MGM, Orion, Columbia, Warner Bros, and
New Line. Some of the films he has been responsible for include
Diner, The Year of Living Dangerously, Pink Floyd: The Wall,
Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, and The Power of One.
A co-founder of Village Roadshow Pictures, he helped pioneer
U.S./Australian co-productions in the late 1980s. He began using
computers in film production as early as 1984, and branched into
multimedia development in 1993, producing CD-ROM games Big Brother
(based on Orwell’s 1984) and Wargames, (based on the hit
movie).
Prior to joining Dreamworks, John was the co-founder of Talkie,
Inc. an internet technology company that developed intelligent,
conversational animated characters for online marketing, brand
building, lead generation, customer service and training.
John holds a B.A. from Amherst College in Massachusetts. He
grew up in New York and Paris, and is a passionate still photographer.
Marilyn Friedman
Head of Outreach and Special Projects
As Head of Outreach and Special Projects for Dreamworks Animation
SKG, Marilyn Friedman spearheads the company’s school
outreach initiatives, assessing university academic programs
as they pertain
to the studio’s varied production needs. Prior to her current role, Marilyn led Dreamworks Animation’s
world-class team of recruiters in staffing all animation
studio production and technology groups. She was key in building
the
team for “Shrek 2”, the sequel to the Academy
Award?-winning animated feature, “Shrek”, and “Shark
Tale,” the
first computer-generated film to be produced at DreamWorks
Feature Animation in Glendale, CA.
Marilyn joined PDI 14
years ago, as one of two production managers for the pioneering
production facility. She then
moved into
a recruiting role with the studio in 1996 when Dreamworks
and PDI
entered into a co-production deal to create the hit computer-animated
feature film, “Antz.”
Marilyn kicked off her career
in the graphics industry with the creative services agency
Peterson and Dodge in San Francisco.
She later moved to San Francisco’s Frazier Design,
a high-end graphics design studio, where she held the role
of studio and
project manager for 6 years.
Marilyn is a graduate of the University of Colorado, Denver
with a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology. She has sat on advisory
boards
at various institutions of higher education and frequently
speaks at universities and industry conferences worldwide
on careers
in computer animation and visual effects.
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