Villarreal talks Cannes, visual development, and life of an artist

Teja added an American twist to the celebration of the embodiment of spiritual energies, by mixing pop music with traditional music.

Balinese dancers added to the celebration, expressing the story through gestures with fingers, hands and whole bodies along with head and eye movements. In Hinduism, dance helps enact the perpetual dissolving and reforming of the world.

With assistance from the Professional Student Photographer Association, run by Bladimir Carelamunoz, photographers were on hand to capture the celebration.

Thanks to all participants and to Campus Life.

Megan Padilla is an Academy of Art University student.

Nicolás from page 1 as a character designer for Walt Disney on the film “Tinkerbell.” He continued to do freelance work before being hired as an AAU instructor.

“I always thought there was something very honorable in teaching,” he said. “I wanted to work, which I still do, for movies and video games as a character designer. And teaching was in the back of my mind. I liked the idea, but my goal was first try to start working as a character designer and keep working. To work as much as I can and maybe become a teacher one day.”

“Pasteurized”

“Pasteurized” is an animated short of seven minutes and 33 seconds about a scientist who receives an unexpected visitor while conducting experiments in the middle of the night. Villarreal’s initial inspiration for the film comes from a family trip to Paris in 1998.

“We went to the Museum of Science in Le Parc de la Villette. They had an exhibit of fire and water in zero gravity,” he said. “It was a mockup candle, but the flame was making a perfect sphere, which is incredible. The water was slowly settling into a bubble. And that looked like the moon to me. So that idea stayed in my mind.”

“Pasteurized” has already been well received at several film festivals, including ones in Austin, Burbank, Savannah and Nevada, where the film won the Silver Screen Award.

“I just feel lucky that [the film] gets in some festivals, because I didn’t realize how hard it was,” he said. “I feel very grateful. As long as they like it a little bit, I’m happy.”

The film took Villarreal 27 months to create, which he did with the assistance of a small creative team, including editor and AAU alum Alessandro Squitti and AAU Director of Animation Sherrie H. Sinclair. “[Sinclair] helped me through the whole film. Since the first initial sketches with Alessandro to the final stage, they were helping,” he said. “I did the short pretty much by myself. I had help from friends; that was crucial to finish it, but the visual aspect, it was pretty much just me. And sometimes I needed fresh eyes that knew what they were doing, to notice things that I couldn’t notice, because I was staring at it so long.”

Advice for students

For students aspiring to follow in their instructor’s footsteps in the festival circuit, Villarreal shared some key advice he received when he was in school.

“The advice I got from my parents was, ‘try to take it as seriously as you can and work as hard as you can,’” he said. “It’s very competitive, and I know this is going to sound cliché; if you go to your classes and you take it seriously and you follow the instruction of your teachers, that’s the best advice I can give.”

Kirsten Coachman is our Assignment Editor. Follow her on Twitter: @AAUPaperGirl1

“I love 2D animation. It’s just the look that [makes it] different, because any type of animation is animation; it could be stop motion; it could be 3D. I like 2D animation, because I like to draw. I really enjoy 3D movies and stop motion movies, as well. In the end, it’s all animation.”

Nicolás P. Villarreal