Ever since

David Torres saw the Disney film "Aladdin," he has wanted to

be an animator. Torres, a 1995 graduate of McIntosh High School, got his

chance and is making the most of it. He was one of the computer animators

on the recently released film "Ice Age."

Torres, a former

member of the McIntosh soccer team and President of the National Honor

Society, went to the Ringling School of Art and Design after high school.

He got his bachelor's degree in computer animation and went to work upon

graduation.

His first job

was at Imagineering in Disney. He worked with animatronics at the Disney

theme parks in Florida and California. He did the animatronics on the

"Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin" ride. He also did some

animatronics with a robot in Epcot Center during the Millenium celebration.

Torres went

from Disney to Portland, Oregon, where he worked at Will Vinton Studios

on the popular M&M commercials. Torres made three of them before heading

to Texas to work on the new Metroid game for the Nintendo Game Cube. He

only stayed in Texas for a brief period of time before Blue Sky Studios

came calling and offered him a job on "Ice Age."

The making

of "Ice Age" was a three-year process that started with the

script and then went to storyboards, which is like a comic book of the

film. Torres worked on the film with the other animators for approximately

16 months. After the storyboards are created, models are built and the

process of rigging begins. "Rigging" is putting skeletons inside

the characters. The animators then get the characters to do what they

are supposed to do on the screen.

"Animators

are very much like actors," said Torres. "We hear the voice

track and pose the characters to get the performance we want. Every day

we would get notes from our director to make some changes, like to make

a character sadder or ove quicker. It was fun because we put a little

bit of ourselves in the characters as well."

Any style of

animation can be time-consuming and though technology is advamcing rapidly,

computer animation is stil a long process.

"There

are 24 frames of film per second," Torres explained. "Each animator

may produce five to 10 seconds of film a week."

"Ice Age"

had 25 full-time animators and between four and five contract animators.

The work day varied for Torres and the animators as well. Some days would

last from 9 a.m.-10 p.m. while others would be the regular 9 a.m.-5 p.m.

It all depends on the deadline.

Torres finds

there are some misconceptions about what computer animators do. "We

do not draw in the computer. We manipulate the characters, like puppets."

Torres and the animators didn't get to work with the celebrities who provided

the voices either. "We had videoptapes of them to watch, but lots

of times we would use our imaginations on how the characters would move."

He also is

very excited about the rapidly changing technology in computer animation.

"The machines are getting faster and are able to do things that couldn't

be done before. We have a machine that relects light in the computer."

Though there

are many changes occurring in the world of computer animation, Torres

doesn't see any major jumps in the near future. "The speed is changing

and animation may be a little faster, but it is still an art form and

depends on the individual and his or her talent."

As for now,

Torres and Blue Sky Animation have already begun work on their next film,

which Torres couldn't divulge anything about. He would like to make more

movies and perhaps one day even direct his own features. He is very excited

about "Ice Age" and really likes the style of animation in the

film. "It is more the Chuck Jones, Tex Avery style of animation,

which is a lot of fun."

Torres's family

is very proud of him and his sister attended the premiere with him at

Radio City Music Hall in New York City. Torres should do many great things

in the future and it won't be another "Ice Age" before they

occur.

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