Dan Root

Dan is a Lecturer on BA (Hons) Animation and BA (Hons) Animation and Visual Effects.

Dan teaches various types of 2D animation, from motion graphics to hand drawn frame-by-frame. He has a particular interest in 2D FX and game animation and has an award-winning YouTube channel that studies animation in video games. He has animated in the games industry as an FX artist and has hosted many talks on video game animation for conventions and other events.

One of my interests within animation is how video games are animated, as they have an additional set of fundamentals that need to be followed as well as the traditional animation principles. This thread of research, which began as a YouTube channel, has led me on a path of enquiry that has connected me to industry professionals and provided me with opportunities to work within the games industry as an animator.

I love animating weird and wonderful characters and exploring visual effects, like fire, water and fairy dust. I enjoy the process of figuring my own methods for capturing the illusion of movement, which always comes down to the study of movement itself and then stylising that movement. My practice has allowed me to work with other professional animators like Kevin Parry with my visual effects animation.

Motion graphics, puppet rigging and frame-by-frame animation are processes I am very familiar with and enjoy teaching.

Practice

• 2018 – Wireframe Magazine – Article on the history of Mega Man
• 2020 – YouTube Silver Play Button – Award for hitting 100k subscribers
• 2021 – Uplink Con Talk – Talk about video game animation
• 2021 / 2022 – Agora Community Talk – Talking about animation in video games
• 2023 – Ember Knights video game – FX animator
• 2024 – Post Graduate Certificate of Higher Education – Fellow

Other academic activities

• Animation Consultant: 2023 – current, Forust Studios, Game Studio
• Animation Workshop Tutor: 2014 – 2016, Signals Media Centre