Travis Knight Quotes

Too many of Disney animators, and a lot try to emulate Disney, are trying to hit what they call quality levels. They're boring mannerisms.

I love hand-drawn animation, but I have to say I have fallen in love with CG animation. What you can do in terms of visuals is pretty stunning, and I think if I did go back and do a hand-drawn animation, I would want to make sure that, from a stylistic standpoint, it would be as beautiful as 'Hunchback of Notre Dame' at least!

I'm a big fan of pantomime storytelling, being an animator.

I was influenced by Ray Harryhausen and Lotte Reiniger, with her twitchy, cutout animation, which I happened to see at a very young age, but also by the Warner Bros. cartoons, 'Tom and Jerry,' and of course Disney. And also by Fellini's 'Giulietta of the Spirits' and Kurosawa's 'Ran.' And by other American illustrators and painters.

Sure, they were simple desk lamps with only a minimal amount of movement, but you could immediately tell that Luxo Jr. was a baby, and that the big one was his mother. In that short little film, computer animation went from a novelty to a serious tool for filmmaking.

I'm interested in animation. I actually feel like I've learned so much about the process how to make an animated movie.

All of the things we learned on 'Coraline' we applied to 'ParaNorman,' and all of the things we learned on 'ParaNorman' and 'Coraline' we applied to 'The Boxtrolls.'

For characters where, in a comic, I'd avoid using screen tone because it's such a bother, I'd deliberately use it in animation in order to highlight their individual characteristics.

I think we kind of changed how people did humans in CG animation after. If you look at films before 'Incredibles,' they tended to be photorealistic in a clunky and ugly way, with pores in their skin and too many eyelashes. It's kind of disturbing. And since, the designs have gotten a lot more playful in a lot of people's films, not just ours.

With my own cartoon, it was just me being goofy by myself, but when it comes to an animated film, you're working with 45 animators and assistant animators. It's a whole different ballgame.

In animation, what's wonderful is that when you start to work with multiple nationalities, the common language becomes a visual language rather than a spoken language, which blends beautifully with the art form.

I don't think that photorealism is required to offer emotions. You can have very abstract characters and renderings offering the same type of emotions - look at Pixar movies: they're not photorealistic; they're stylised, and it doesn't prevent emotion from happening.

The very first pieces of film that I did were really graphic designs translated to film. Graphic designs that moved. That was a very new notion.

We are able to create incredible set-pieces here in the US that TV shows often don't have the resources to create in the UK.

I don't know if animation is a style. It's a format.

Visually, I'm always considering shots and composition quite a lot, and I love putting art into films, and I do a lot of the art.

On the 'Tom and Jerry's,' Joe and I would sit across a desk from each other and develop the story. Joe would do the storyboard and I'd do the timing and the direction of the animation.

I always loved that solitary experience of making things. There's a solitary aspect to animating... It's ultimately the animator and the puppet coaxing a performance out of it.

Very few people view stop motion the way we do. We really try to use it - and animation generally - as a powerful visual medium by which you can tell virtually any kind of story in any genre.

All my films have been larger-than-life. And since I've sat on almost all the scripts of the films I've produced, I do not compromise on aesthetics and visuals that could add to a scene.

I think, as a director, it's always worth pushing yourself and finding out new areas and exploring new ways to tell story.

As a storyboard artist, you have to be able to draw anything.

I do love sparse cartooning.

Animation in itself has so many different looks and styles and possibilities.

Scoring animated films, I have the exact same approach and philosophy as I do for a live action. It's all story- and character-driven. I don't care if it's a mouse or Tom Cruise.