Letter of intention

Dear teachers and friends and The Animation Workshop,

My name is Josephine, I am a 22 year old girl, living in the small town of Hvidovre in

Copenhagen.

I am writing this letter with the intention of joining your highly praised animation workshop in Viborg.

This may lead to the you asking, “Thats very nice, but why exactly would you like to join this school?”

Well, the reason is simple: I LOVE to draw, obviously. I love it so much that I deeply wish to make a living of it, building a career through my deepest passion. Ever since I was a little girl I've always taken great inspiration in cartoons, animated movies and games – the thing that interests me the most about it is the ability to express so much feeling with facial expression and body-language, creating a story with this and a fitting character-design. So.. As you might've guessed, I will be applying for the Character Animation-program!

It just feels right thinking about sitting in a company, say, 6-7 years from now, doing creative works for either cartoons or games, so that is what's going to happen!

In terms of skill, I am self-taught. I have been drawing since I was 6 or 7 and along the way I've been participating in croquis-classes but nothing fancy.

My way of learning has been through books (Andrew Loomis is my hero!) and through the internet. Back when I was a teen I started participating in casual Manga-drawing classes and befriended the teacher along the way, resulting in my working as his assistant a couple of years later – so I've been teaching children in the style of Manga for some time. Even though I have grown out of the style in the past few years I still adore it and return to it from time to time.

When I draw I primarily do it on my laptop. For this I use a Wacom Bamboo tablet and Photoshop CS6 as my tools of trade. Photoshop is a dear friend of mine and I would say I got enough experience to call myself an intermediate user!

When I draw I am heavily inspired by especially Peter Madsen, the artist of the danish comic “Valhalla” but also Disney. Disney has so many different styles and universes and I like how they can come up with a theme for each individual story they create! As I mentioned earlier I started drawing when I learned about Manga(actually it was Pokémon back then) so obviously this is a huge influence for me as well. Amongst artists within the manga-genre I can mention Eichiro Oda, the author of the “One Piece” series as a great inspiration.

Also, ever since I learned about concept-art books for games, I have been developing my style and experimenting a lot. Especially books for games like World of Warcraft, Skyrim, Dark Souls, and Tomb Raider have had a huge impact on me.

This, of course, have had me dreaming about a future workplace within the gaming industry.. I am madly thrilled about creating some of these atmospheric and beautiful sceneries that exist within the gaming world. Along with big dreams like working for Disney or Cartoon Network, I have also dreamt of working for Bethesda, Blizzard, Ubisoft or Valve, maybe.. Although now, I have found that I dream about making drawings and especially characters come to life – so, animation it is!

I am absolutely in love with sci-fi and therefore I like films/TV like Star Trek, Star Wars, Inception, Interstellar and games like Fallout, Portal, Crysis and Mass Effect. I think it might be because of all the things we dont know about the future. It gives an artist the opportunity to run absolutely crazy with ideas for characters, races, weapons, worlds, cities and vehicles. There are no boundaries and no rules you have to abide since we dont know a thing about the future! Heck, it doesn't even have to be about the human race! This excites me and I am always thrilled about when someone has a new design for a futuristic world!

I really, REALLY hope that my letter has affected you in some way, because I basically cant see myself anywhere else than in this business. Really. I want to create my own sci-fi-animated cartoon! :D

I will have no problem financing the education, since I am a Danish citizen, which gives me the opportunity for SU, plus the fact that I have been adding to a saving for some time, specially designed to save up in case I am short of money when school starts! So it wont be a problem.

Again, I thank you a lot for the time – enjoy my portfolio, made for you! No matter what I will be seeing you guys soon!

Sincerely,

Josephine Renée Haase

E-mail: Akumari@live.dk

phone: +45 51 93 81 86