We interview the alumni Ian García, head of Animation at Petoons Studio

Video games have become a haven for many people during confinement, generating record numbers of gamers connected daily to the multiple platforms that exist today. To better understand how this industry works, we have interviewed the alumni Ian García, head of Animation at the transmedia IP incubator Petoons Studio.

- Tell us about your professional career.

I started my career with Dario Durán, who had been my professor at Seeway - LCI Barcelona. The project consisted of a series of 12 chapters of 1 or 2 minutes for the music group Helloween. I have also worked as an animator in the children's series Nina de l'espai and Molang.

- How do you remember your student days? How has everything you learned with us helped you?

I chose this School because it offered me what I was looking for at that time: a Master in 2D and 3D Animation. During that stage I learned the necessary bases to understand how the world of animation works and, after finishing my studies, I was able to start animating.

- How did you start working at Petoons? What are your tasks in the studio?

My partner knew one of the workers. I sent the portfolio and they liked it. My task since then is to keep track of the animations, clean ups and inbetweens done by the animation assistants, apart from taking care of the more complex animations and main characters. I share this latest work with Arnau Martín, who is also a Seeway - LCI Barcelona alumni. He helps me to keep everything up to date.

Ian started working at the studio over a year ago

- How is the day to day in Petoons?

The atmosphere is great. We are all part of the product we are creating and each one provides details to improve our game. We have moments of jokes and others when we must get more serious. During the break we relax together with video games or board games.

- How has your work changed with confinement? How have you adapted to this new situation?

Since the confinement began, we have been doing home office. The level of production and the mood have been affected, but we do our best to keep this afloat and we are looking forward to meeting again in the studio and joking together. One of the drawbacks of teleworking is that we cannot see what another department is doing and, since each of us works with a specific program, it becomes quite difficult to keep track of areas that are not part of our specialty. In my case, for example, the fact of testing animation within the game.

- You are developing the video game Curse of the Sea Rats, which you have already tested in the past NiceOne Barcelona. What can you explain about it?

It is a very ambitious project. We want to merge the best of a Metroidvania style video game with the best of visual art. We will launch the Kickstarter soon, so stay tuned to our channels to support us.

The Kickstarter of Curse of the Sea Rats will be available soon

- In the studio you have students from our School in practice. What does working with students trained here contribute to you? What is their role within Petoons?

We are very happy with our interns, they always want to learn and they understand very well what we ask for. They are mainly in charge of clean up, inbetween, color and light, but from time to time we challenge them to make the animation of a secondary character with very good results.

- Finally, to what extent do you think video games help people to cope with this situation?

People have their ways of being distracted. Evasion has become a necessary thing during confinement, but I don't think video games have varied their function. Although the demand has increased, they meet the same goals as always: to entertain and amuse people.