D.C. is not an animation town, but maybe that will start to change, at least a little bit, with a partnership between Bowie State University and Laika, the studio behind Academy Award-nominated animated films “Coraline,” “Kubo and the Two Strings” and “Missing Link.”
The Oregon-based animation studio has pledged to fund the creation of a stop-motion animation studio on the university’s campus in Prince George’s County, the two announced last week. The exact amount of the donation was not revealed, but the studio will fund the construction and buildout of the studio.
The pledge is a “dream come true” for Tewodross Melchishua Williams, associate professor and chair of Bowie State’s Department of Fine and Performing Arts. Stop-motion is where Williams got his start, and he’d like to see more students get into it. The technique requires moving an object, frame by frame, to create the illusion of movement. It’s how Laika makes its films.
