Katie Steed

15/01/1984
info@katiesteed.co.uk

All about me:
Anyone who knows anything at all about me knows that I have five passions in life: Animation, travelling, fire dancing, Disney and pineapple juice. This site is a shrine to the first three of these passions- Disney are quite capable of blowing their own trumpet, and there really isn't that much that I can find to say about pineapple juice.

Animation:

I've been in to animation before I even really knew that it existed. You know the song by Savage Garden "I knew I loved you before I met you?" (add really cheesy music to the list of interests if you will). It was like that with me and animation; I loved to draw, loved movement and dance and pushing the body, adored reading and telling stories, and had a supremely pedantic nature that took a strange pleasure in repetitive tasks. When I found out that there was something that combined all of those things AND meant that my parents couldn't complain when they caught me watching cartoons...I knew I'd found my true calling!

So I started with a really basic program called Astound on my Dad's computer, back in the heady days of Windows 3.1. The software was really for presentations, but some of the clip arts in it were animated and I soon found out that there was a way of seeing those clip arts frame by frame and editing them so that I could get the result I wanted. It also had motion paths and a few transitions. I made a film about my dog Sally, and how excited she got when she saw my Dad had changed in to his 'walking' trousers. When I win my Oscar some little bugger is going to find that film and hold me to ransom with it...perhaps I should just destroy the evidence right now...

My best subject at school was actually English, not Art or Graphics, and I enjoyed making up stories and animating them in my mind (way less time consuming). I had a bit of an obsession with dragons during A levels, and most of my sketchbooks from the time are filled with fantasy drawings and cartoons. Like most people considering a career in animation, I learnt to draw Manga (a habit that would be well and truely stomped out of me by the time I got to Art School). When I wasn't at school (and I seemed to be there an obscenely large portion of my formative years) I played badminton, made websites, played flute and piano, enjoyed skiing and almost any other sports, especially ones which involved high speeds and large risk factors.

I started at the University College for the Creative Arts in 2003 after leaving St. Georges with A level A's in Art, Graphic Design, English, Art History and IT (and after spending a gap year in Australia). My first year I made a film called "Ernie," a claymation film to the Benny Hill song "Ernie the Fastest Milkman in the West." My family still thinks it's the best thing I've ever done. I think I'd probably pack up my lightbox for good if I agreed! In my first year I dabbled with claymation again, then put it behind me and concentrated on drawing, knowing that if I got my drawing skills and representation of movement right then I'd have no problems in any other medium. When you spend ages on a hundreds of individual drawings, there is no thrill in the world that compares with seeing it move for the first time...except maybe bungee jumping...that was quite fun too.

My third year project was a single film, called 'Death by Scrabble.' I had been planning on making a film about a fish, because I'd done a watercolour of a Koi Carp and wanted to see it move. So I typed in to Google 'Short story fish' and was presented with a short story about a game of scrabble between a husband and wife by a man called Charlie FISH. I fell in love with the story as soon as I read it, but had my reservations because I could see the difficulties in making it visually interesting.

Well 5,000 drawings, 30 Faber Castell brush pens and enough paper to scare a small forest later and the film was finished. I hated it. Absolutely hated it. I'd spent every minute of an entire year bent hunched over my light box, I'd not even opened the curtains for the last 3 months, had scared off most of my friends with my bizarre appearance and I hated the fruit of my labours. Guess that must be what post natal depression is like!

No body was more surprised than me when it scored one of the highest marks that my University has ever given out. My astonishment turned to sheer flabber-gastedness when the festival screenings started coming in, and I had only just recovered after hearing that I had been shortlisted for a Royal Television Award when I heard that I'd got in to Annecy Animation Festival. I can finally watch my film again now, it just needed a little time after finishing it before I could bear it. That film contains a lot of my blood, sweat and tears, and I've never felt as naked as when sitting in a theatre staring up at my drawings.

In the last few months before the Disney staff finished Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, several of them pre-booked themselves in to a psychiatric ward. In the last few months of my third year (when I was working in Europe's largest animation archive, as well as in a sports shop, was Chairperson of the Graduation Show Committee AND Student Representative) I knew that I'd be following them to the Loony bin if I didn't get away from everything for a while. So I packed up my faithful backpack and went to Eastern Europe for three months.

When I got back, I set up Slurpy Studios with my partner Aaron Wood. Working together we do animation, web design and we're hoping to get in to Illustration at some point in the not too distant future. Things are going well, and we're always interested to meet new people and hear about new projects or collaborations. If you want to chat about anything, you can always contact me. I'm very nice.

Travelling

To my mind, travelling is everything. So long as I've got a toothbrush and a spare pair of undies (and preferably a good book) I can be happy. I've always thought that someone who wants to be an artist, who wants to represnt the world in a visual way to other people, really has to see as much of the world as possible.

I've been so lucky when it comes to travel. When I was 16 I went on a World Challenge Expedition to Argentina with a group of other people from my School. It opened up my eyes to a whole lot of things, (not least of these was the vital importance of having good toilet facilities), and it gave me the itchy feet that I've not really managed to shake since.

A year in Australia followed when I was 18. Then 3 months in Canada, a brief sojourn in China, and another 3 months working in Disneyuworld Florida spread over the next few years. My last big trip was after my third year. I went to Spain, Morocco, Greece, Tukey, Bulgaria, Romania and Poland over about 4 months. All of these were unforgettable; people, places, events and experiences that shape personalities happen almost every day when you're travelling alone and relying solwly on your own wits to survive.

I'm a lucky girl. I've been to every continent in the world, and I've worked in most of them. I've been a fruit picker in New Zealand, a door-to-door sales person in Australia, a croupier in the largest casino in the Southern Hemisphere and a fire-dancing busker in Italy. I have also sold temporary tattoos on the streets of Sydney, gathered scientific data in China, built a greenhouse in Argentina and created databases in Canada.

Fire Dancing

I first tried fire dancing in Australia. An aborigine man gave us a thoroughly impressive demonstration, then asked for a volunteer. I was blown away by how beautiful it had been, and so volunteered, although I was a little surprised to be handed chains of fire straight away! After a fairly disasterous first experience I brought some poi of my very own, and started learning. I don't get to do it that often at the moment, but there really is nothing in the world quite like standing in the center of a ring of fire that you control and feeling the heat but knowing that you're safe.

It's not just fire dancing that I love, I adore all circus acts. I am interested in anything that requires the skill, precision and committment that mastering a circus act takes, and the extent to which people can push their bodies and their abilities. I own fire clubs, a fire staff, a unicycle, and a contact juggling ball. All of which I'm determined that I will master, but all of which spend a depressing amount of time hidden in my drawer calling to me while I sit at my desk. Animation and other hobbies don't always go together that well!