Courses in Animation and Production cover the history, methods, and specialized topics pertaining to the world of animated films. From character rigging to cinematography, students both learn and practice how to tell compelling stories through the magic of moving images. Comprising former Walt Disney Animation Studio employees, as well as accomplished filmmakers and animators from a range of game and production studios, department faculty bring a deep well of knowledge and industry experience to the classroom.

Department Faculty

Dan Daly

Department Chair
Senior Lecturer

Dan Daly graduated from Whitman College in 1987 with a major in English and minor in political science. He went on to attend night school for three years at Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California, where he studied traditional figure drawing. He also he attended a figure drawing workshop with Burne Hogarth at the Scottsdale Artists’ School.

In 1990, Daly submitted his portfolio to Walt Disney Feature Animation, and was chosen for a 16-week intensive internship at Disney’s Florida studio. After successfully completing the program, he returned to California and spent a year working as both a special effects inbetweener and character inbetweener for Kroyer Studios on the feature film FernGully: The Last Rainforest, and as a character inbetweener for Don Bluth Studios on the feature film Thumbelina.

Daly was then hired permanently by Walt Disney Feature Animation Florida. He spent 12 years at Disney, working his way up to the position of Key Assistant Animator, where he was responsible for leading crews of three to ten artists, as well as mentoring entry-level artists. Daly’s credits at Disney include Trail Mix-Up, The Lion King, Pocahontas, Mulan, John Henry, Lilo & Stitch, and Brother Bear. While at Disney, Daly continued to attend figure drawing and painting sessions and workshops, as well as seminars on most aspects of filmmaking, including Bruce Block’s lectures on visual structure in filmmaking.

After Disney’s Florida studio closed, Daly began showing and selling some of his plein-air paintings at the Germanton Gallery in Germanton, North Carolina, and also completed several portrait commissions before moving to Wisconsin to become Supervising Animator at a small start-up studio. While animating during the day, he attended regular evening portrait painting sessions at the studio of Dan Gerhartz, a prominent oil painter. After two years in Wisconsin, Daly moved to Washington to begin his teaching career at DigiPen.

Daly is passionate about drawing and animation and enjoys sharing this passion with his students. His greatest pleasure in teaching is when he sees this passion take hold in a student.

Film Credits

  • Brother Bear (2003)
  • Lilo & Stitch (2002)
  • John Henry (2000)
  • Mulan (1998)
  • Pocahontas (1995)
  • The Lion King (1994)
  • Trail Mix-Up (1993)
  • FernGully: The Last Rainforest (1992)

Matt Brunner

Senior Lecturer

Matt Brunner started out as an artist with a BFA from the University of Colorado Boulder. He survived as a classic starving artist in Austin, Texas, for about 10 years showing in various galleries and museums until he finally gave in and got a job as an art director for an educational live-television production studio. This led him to graduate school to get a degree in computer animation and digital cinema (then a brand new field) at the Texas A&M Visualization Lab.

After getting his master’s degree, he went to a stop-motion animation studio in Portland, Oregon, called Will Vinton Studios (aka Laika) and founded the studio’s digital animation and VFX department. He directed and animated many high-profile commercial projects and short films, incorporating traditional animation media with digital and 3D characters and effects.

When video games began to emerge as a powerhouse animation and storytelling medium, Brunner decided leap to the next wave of innovation and work with a new, unreleased platform at Microsoft: the Xbox. He worked at Microsoft as an art director, cinematics director, and experience director on several projects, most notably on the game Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge. With the next wave of consoles, he left Microsoft and co-founded Airtight Games. He was the Chief Creative Officer at Airtight and Art/Animation/Cinematics Director on all their large console projects, including Dark Void and Murdered: Soul Suspect.

At DigiPen, Brunner has been teaching art direction, helping student artists learn how to make video games, coaching student teams, and advising BFA and MFA film and game projects. He also teaches Houdini as a game and film development tool.

He has been a featured speaker at many key conferences and industry shows, including SIGGRAPH, GDC, FMX, and the BAFTAs. He still stays actively engaged in all his art loves: painting, sculpture, animation, and film.

Selected Game Credits

  • DragonSoul (PerBlue)
  • Titan Empires (PerBlue)
  • Murdered: Soul Suspect (Airtight Games)
  • Dark Void (Airtight Games)
  • Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge (FASA Studio)

Antony A. de Fato

Senior Lecturer

Antony de Fato teaches ANI 101: Introduction to Animation – Theories and Techniques I, and ANI 151: Advanced Animation Theories and Techniques. He graduated from the University of Missouri with a Bachelor of Arts with an emphasis on drawing and a Bachelor of Science in Home Economics for housing design.

De Fato began his pursuit of an animation career in 1987 by moving to Los Angeles and landing his first job in the industry at Walt Disney Feature Animation. In 1994, he moved to Florida to work at Disney’s animation studio in Orlando. After that studio shut down in 2004, he worked on freelance animation projects, including Stitch’s Great Escape for one of the Disney theme parks. In 2005, he was hired by Cecropia, a Boston game company, and worked at their Orlando-based studio on The Act, a hand-drawn arcade game. After that studio also closed, de Fato moved to Flagstaff, Arizona, where his wife was a whitewater river guide in the Grand Canyon. He joined DigiPen near the end of 2008.

“I come from an industry rather than an academic background, and although I miss the excitement of the production atmosphere, I enjoy teaching a subject I am passionate about and sharing that passion with students,” de Fato says. “It is most gratifying to see students grasping new concepts and to watch their growth as artists and animators. Working in the animation field was always a dream of mine, and hopefully, in some small way, I can help the students to realize their dreams, too.”

Film and Game Credits

  • The Act (2006), Lead Animator
  • Brother Bear (2003), Assistant Animator
  • Lilo & Stitch (2002), Assistant Animator
  • The Emperor’s New Groove (2000), Assistant Animator
  • John Henry (2000), Assistant Animator
  • Tarzan (1999), Assistant Animator
  • Mulan (1998), Breakdown Artist
  • The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996), Breakdown Artist
  • Pocahontas (1995), Inbetweener

Learn More

From the “House of Mouse” to DigiPen: How a Group of Disney Animators Found a Home with the Dragons

Jazno Francoeur

Program Director (Bachelor of Fine Arts)
Senior Lecturer

Jazno Francoeur’s career began in 1990, when he interned at the Walt Disney Feature Animation studio in Orlando, Florida. Upon graduating from Kansas City Art Institute in 1992, he began working at the Disney studios in Los Angeles, California. During that time, Francoeur worked on a number of films, including Lilo & Stitch, Tarzan, Mulan, Pocahontas, The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast, The Emperor’s New Groove, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Brother Bear, John Henry, and Roger Rabbit’s Trail Mix-Up, as well as the Aladdin video game for Sega Genesis and numerous other shorts, park projects, and commercials.

In 2004, Francoeur became an animation instructor at DigiPen Institute of Technology in Redmond, Washington. After transferring to DigiPen’s branch campus in Singapore in 2008, he was invited to a seven-month effects course at Lucasfilm Animation.

In addition to his career as an animator and educator, Francoeur is a performing musician (with his ensemble Mercymachine), a published poet, and an exhibiting photographer.

Film and Game Credits

  • Brother Bear (2003)
  • Lilo & Stitch (2002)
  • John Henry (2000)
  • The Emperor’s New Groove (2000)
  • Tarzan (1999)
  • Mulan (1998)
  • The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)
  • Pocahontas (1995)
  • The Lion King (1994)
  • Trail Mix-Up (1993)
  • Disney’s Aladdin for Sega Genesis (1993)
  • Beauty and the Beast (1991)

Learn More

From the “House of Mouse” to DigiPen: How a Group of Disney Animators Found a Home with the Dragons

Mark Henne

Program Director (MFA in Digital Arts)
Senior Lecturer

Mark Henne started working in animation and visual effects in 1990 when he joined Rhythm & Hues Studios in Los Angeles. In 1994, he moved to Pixar, where he worked on the original Toy Story, and continued there until recently. On their film Brave, he spent four years refining the technology and finished look of the hair and clothing. His major credits include Crowd and Simulation Supervisor for WALL-E and Hair and Cloth Simulation Supervisor on The Incredibles. His other projects include Ratatouille, Monsters, Inc., A Bug’s Life, and the short film The Blue Umbrella.

Henne has spoken in courses at SIGGRAPH about his work on Toy Story and Monsters, Inc., as well as co-authoring a Pixar technical report titled “Volumetric Methods for Simulation and Rendering of Hair.”

While at Rhythm & Hues in 1993, Henne earned a Primetime Emmy certificate for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Special Visual Effects, recognizing his work on the wormhole effect for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. His pioneering cloth animation for the 1992 Lexus “Car Cloth” commercial was included in the New York Museum of Modern Art’s presentation titled “The Art and Craft of the American Television Commercial.” Henne also worked on smooth skin articulation algorithms for the very first Coca Cola Polar Bears commercials.

Henne has an MS in Computer Science from the University of California Santa Cruz. His expertise is in using simulations to create organic movement in computer animation, and the design and implementation of facial articulation software and controls.

Film Credits

  • The Blue Umbrella (2013)
  • Brave (2012)
  • WALL-E (2008)
  • Ratatouille (2007)
  • The Incredibles (2004)
  • Monsters, Inc. (2001)
  • A Bug’s Life (1998)
  • Toy Story (1995)

Learn More

Pixar Veteran Mark Henne Works to Broaden MFA Program

Suzanne Kaufman

Adjunct Faculty
Senior Lecturer

Suzanne Kaufman received her Bachelor of Arts in Computer Animation and Photography from the University of Wisconsin. She then went to work for Free Range Digital, a special effects studio. During her tenure there, she animated on various projects for Discovery Channel, Fox, and Universal Television.

In 1996, Kaufman relocated to Seattle, where she animated, modeled, and textured for Boss Game Studios, Microsoft Corporation, and Sucker Punch Productions. As the 3D lead of animation and environments at Sucker Punch Productions, she was proud to have modeled and animated characters and their fantastical environments for the critically acclaimed Sly Cooper trilogy of games on the PlayStation 2. Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus, won the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences’ “Innovation in Art Direction” and “Innovation in Animation” awards and Game Developer magazine’s “Best Original Game Character” award. Sly 2: Band of Thieves was awarded the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences’ “Children’s Title of the Year.”

Kaufman has been a guest speaker at SIGGRAPH (for Maya on the “Making of Sly Cooper”) in San Diego and at 3D December (for Alias) in London. She’s also been an industry panelist for the Women in Games International conference and a speaker for World Cyber Games – Women in Gaming Symposium.

Kaufman joined DigiPen Institute of Technology in 1996. In addition to teaching, Kaufman is a freelance animator, game art director, and children’s book author/illustrator. Her first book, I Love Monkey, came out in 2009 to numerous awards. For more about Kaufman, visit her website and art blog.

Television and Game Credits

  • Space: Above and Beyond, Fox
  • Understanding Computers, Discovery Channel
  • Bump in the Night (pilot), Universal Television
  • Combat Flight Simulator, Microsoft
  • Flight Simulator 2000, Microsoft
  • Sly Cooper and Thievious Racoonous, Sucker Punch Productions
  • Sly 2: Band of Thieves, Sucker Punch Productions
  • Sly 3: Honor Among Thieves, Sucker Punch Productions
  • Unidentified Flying Oinker, Serendipitous Bits
  • Princess and the Pea, Nation Nine

Learn More

DigiPen Animation Instructor Finds Voice in Illustration

Pamela Mathues

Senior Lecturer

Pamela Mathues graduated with honors from the Columbus College of Art and Design with a major in illustration and minor in fine art. She worked for Walt Disney Feature Animation for more than 10 years, contributing to such films as The Lion King, Pocahontas, Mulan, Lilo & Stitch, and Brother Bear. She also worked on the 2D game The Act for Cecropia (now React Studios).

After that production, she moved west and became a Grand Canyon river guide and an award-winning photographer. She then moved with her husband to Washington to teach at DigiPen.

Film Credits

  • Brother Bear (2003)
  • Lilo & Stitch (2002)
  • Mulan (1998)
  • Pocahontas (1995)
  • The Lion King (1994)

Learn More

From the “House of Mouse” to DigiPen: How a Group of Disney Animators Found a Home with the Dragons

Richard Scott Morgan

Senior Lecturer

After watching various animated Disney films as a child, Richard Morgan was hooked on animation as an art form. In high school, he met two of his heroes, Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston, authors of The Illusion of Life, considered to be the bible of animation. They encouraged him to push for a sense of storytelling in his artwork.

In pursuit of his dream to be an artist, Morgan attended Ringling College of Art and Design in Sarasota, Florida. During the weekends and summers, he worked with Walt Disney Creative Entertainment, the theatrical and live performance division of Walt Disney Imagineering. In his spare time, he would do extensive study — in figure drawing class, the local zoo, or even at the mall — to sketch people and animals from life. In doing so, Morgan soon had a portfolio that would earn him a much sought-after internship with Walt Disney Feature Animation. After graduating, he earned a full-time position animating on feature films including The Lion King, Pocahontas, Hercules, Mulan, John Henry, Tarzan, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Lilo & Stitch, Brother Bear, and others.

After more than a decade with Disney, he moved across the country to start his own company, Aspen Sienna Art Studio. Morgan and his wife opened a gallery and he painted plein-air/studio landscapes for five years in beautiful Montana. Before long, however, he realized he missed the energy and excitement of the animation industry (not to mention the warmer weather of Florida).

Teaching seemed like a good fit for him and he became an instructor of Design and Film Theory courses at his alma mater. He continued to paint and show in galleries throughout Northern Florida. Morgan eventually found his way to DigiPen Institute of Technology in Singapore. He taught there for three years before transferring to DigiPen’s Redmond campus as a senior lecturer.

Morgan enjoys the creative process and giving back to the next generation of artists and game and film developers. He currently teaches animation courses including Basic/Advanced Animation, Digital Painting, and 2D Film.

Film Credits

  • Brother Bear (2003)
  • Lilo & Stitch (2002)
  • John Henry (2000)
  • Tarzan (1999)
  • Mulan (1998)
  • Hercules (1997)
  • The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)
  • Pocahontas (1995)
  • The Lion King (1994)

Learn More

From the “House of Mouse” to DigiPen: How a Group of Disney Animators Found a Home with the Dragons

Chris Mosio

Senior Lecturer

Chris Mosio’s career as a filmmaker began after graduating the University of Southern California’s School of Cinematic Arts. Since then, he has worked as a professional cinematographer for 30 years.

Mosio has worked on nearly two-dozen feature films, from small independent projects (like The Gamers: Dorkness Rising) to Hollywood studio productions (Akeelah and the Bee). He’s had the good fortune to work with such talents as Will Smith, Lily Tomlin, Angela Bassett, and Laurence Fishburne, as well as the supreme privilege of filming some the most extraordinary ordinary people all around the world — amputees in Haiti, flood victims in Bangladesh, and people whose lives have been indelibly touched by cancer, right here in Seattle.

Documentary films are an important aspect of Mosio’s filmmaking background, and perhaps the genre he loves most. Mosio received an Emmy Award for his cinematography on the documentary film The Cultivated Life. He continues to find his voice and vision in filmmaking as well as teaching and mentoring young adults at DigiPen.