Stuart Sumida
Biology Professor & Animal and Human Anatomical Consultant
Stuart Sumida is a biologist and paleontologist who earned his bachelors and doctoral degrees from UCLA, and later did postdoctoral work at the University of Chicago.??He is now a professor of Biology at the California State University campus in San Bernardino.??He studies animal structure, function, and evolution; he has written three books and nearly 100 peer-reviewed publications. He has worked as an animal and human anatomical consultant to animation, VFX, and game studios for over 25 years, first working with Walt Disney Feature Animation on?Beauty and the Beast, Lion King, and others.??Since then he has worked with DreamWorks, SONY ImageWorks, DreamQuest, PIXAR, Blue Sky, MPC, FrameStore, Double Negative, and ILM, Guerrilla, Blizzard, RockSteady, and Creative Assembly Games, and Walt Disney Imagineering.??He has worked on over 60 feature films, including the first and last?Harry Potter?films, the?How to Train Your Dragon?films,?Life f Pi,?Ratatouille, the first?Guardians of the Galaxy, Greatest Showman, Jumanji, Zootopia,?Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom, and others. Most recently he’s received screen credit for his work on?Abominable?with DreamWorks and on?Soul?with Pixar. Upcoming projects include Spirit Riding Free with DreamWorks, and Season Three of His Dark Materials with FrameStore.
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LinkedIn: Stuart Sumida
Events featuring Stuart Sumida
The Importance of the Skeleton and Joints: from Model to Rig to Animation
Stuart will review major anatomical concepts of use to animators when working on animals and animal-inspired creatures. Specifically, the importance of an internal skeleton, not just as a basis for a rig or joint placement, for for whole-character design, construction, and movement. Artists are welcomed to get together with him for questions afterwards about animals, people, and creatures more generally, or just to play ‘stump the scientist’.
Animex Industry