Meet Tatyana Drewry Carvin | Director, Storyboard Artist & Animator

We had the good fortune of connecting with Tatyana Drewry Carvin and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Tatyana, what role has risk played in your life or career?
One of the biggest risks I’ve taken was to move from France to the United States back in 2010 to try and be part of the animation industry in L.A. My husband and I quit our jobs and moved with just a backpack, a luggage and a laptop with no concrete trail of any potential jobs in L.A.

I was born a U.S citizen as my father was American but had only been there two weeks when I was 16 to meet my grandparents for the first time. The citizenship was huge as it allowed me to sponsor my husband to get a green card which required a ton of work but also made our move a lot easier than having to deal with visas.

Once in L.A, I remember reaching out to all the 2D Animation studios I could find online while living in a hostel in Venice Beach to try to work as a 2D animator with no response for a couple of months until one of the artists I had reached out to via LinkedIn (David Haines) offered to meet in a café to sketch people. He was kind enough to give me the email addresses of the supervisors of the show he was working on at the studio Wildbrain. The next day I emailed them with the same kind of message I had been sending for the past 2 months except that I received a response this time and even an animation test! I returned the test 2 days later and started working the following day! Thank you immensely David Haines for being the bridge I needed! If it wasn’t for him, I might have returned to France with a sour taste of defeat in my mouth 🙂

After I started as a 2D animator at Wildbrain, I never stopped working, jumping from shows to shows at my full time job and also freelancing at night and over the weekends until Ghostbot offered me another full time job in San Francisco. I was incredibly inspired by the quality and the look of their art. Working with them was very enlightening as they had so much to teach me and learning is all I’m looking for so I jumped onto the occasion and moved to San Francisco which started a long and rich collaboration of 7 awesome years. It’s also at Ghostbot that I had my first Director experience while working on shows for clients such as Cartoon Network, Disney and Lucasfilm. This gig led me to being then hired as a Storyboard artist at Lucasfilm on the last season of The Clone Wars. I’m still working with them today as a Senior Storyboard Artist after some time spent at Ubisoft as a Director in their cinematic department. Spending some time at Ubisoft directing on their cinematics was an incredible experience which allowed me to come back to Lucasfilm with more tools and a sharper understanding of story telling.

So taking risks has played a huge part in my career and life!
Today I am a fierce believer of doing complicated things and going out of my comfort zone. I’ve learned with this experience that growth comes with taking risks. Fear is just a sign we’re out of our comfort zone and learning a lot. So let’s do scary things! 😀

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
I’m currently working at Lucasfilm as a Senior Storyboard Artist on some new and exciting Star Wars shows. The pipeline at Lucasfilm is both pretty amazing and challenging as we create 3D animated storyboards. It’s like multiple jobs in one as we work on lighting the set, posing out the characters in the environement, animating them, recording our shots and then editing them together. So as a Storyboard Artist at Lucasfilm, I could say that I also work as a Layout Artist, Previz Artist, Animator and Editor.  Because drawing is a passion of mine, I often start with small thumbnail sketches on a piece of paper to lay down ideas of shots as I read the script and then quickly start exploring in the 3D software to get a good understanding of what is feasible with the reality of the set and the characters. This job being so rich and complexe, I’m always learning something new and each episode has a new set of challenges which keeps me on my toes. I don’t think there will ever be a “comfort zone” in this profession, which is a big part of why I decided to come back to Lucasfilm after working at Ubisoft as a Director in their Cinematic Department. Learning and growing as a storyteller and being surrounded by folks who have a lot to teach me is important to me and this is what I’m lucky to experience within the Star Wars universe!

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
These are the recommendations I have for each place I lived in :

Montreal :

– I would recommend a long walk up the hill of the park Mont-Royal to get a gorgeous view of the whole city! Then go for a Ramen treat at Tsukuyomi Ramen.

San Francisco :

– A bike tour around the Presidio is a pure delight. With gorgeous trees, the sea and the Golden Gate Bridge in sight.

L.A :

– Don’t miss a lovely walk in the Griffith Park with its panoramic view of the city.

Paris :

– I’d recommend spending half a day in the museum Pompidou. They have some of the best exhibitions, a fabulous view of the city on their 5th floor and its architecture is incredible! Then go sit at the terrace of any café nearby and watch people walking by while enjoying a cup of coffee and a croissant.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I want to give a big shoutout to my mentors and ex-bosses Alan Lau, Brad Rau and Roque Ballesteros for being such great leads, teachers, friends and a huge source of inspiration for the seven awesome years we spent working together at Ghostbot ! I will never forget the impact they had and keep on having on my life, the way I draw and tell stories.

I also wanted to give a big shoutout to my friends Samia Khalaf and Mirella Toncheva. They are two incredible artists whom I tremendously respect and admire. I always feel inspired and motivated when I see their art and get to hang out with them. They are very special to me. Check out their work and feel the feels!

Samia Khalaf : https://www.instagram.com/samsoomfull/?hl=en

Mirella Toncheva : https://www.instagram.com/mirellatoncheva/?hl=en

Website: https://taty555.blogspot.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tatyanadrewrycarvin/?hl=en

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tatyanadrewrycarvin/