INDUSTRY 101 EVENT SERIES
Animation 101
Wednesday, August 12, 2026 | 5-6:30 PM PT | Online
Thinking about a career in animation, but unsure where to begin? We’ll discuss opportunities that exist to help get your foot in the door, storytelling for animation v. live-action, a quick run-down of The Animation Guild and Foundation, and more.
PANELISTS
Madison Bateman
Madison has lent her voice as a writer on shows like Turbo: Fast (DreamWorks), Ducktales (Disney), Spy Kids (NBC Universal), The Ghost and Molly McGee (Disney), and Chibiverse (Disney). She is a magpie of genres, having written comedy, action, fantasy, sci-fi, mystery, romance, short form, and musicals. She’s also worked in live-action vertical videos - catch the Locker Diaries: Descendants, now on Disney+. When she’s not working or watching too much TV, she can be found collecting new hobbies like they’re Pokémon: gardening, baking, woodworking, quilting, singing little songs to her cats, or learning Welsh for some reason! (The Welsh LL is not for the faint of heart.)
Danny Lin
Danny is a storyboard artist, revisionist, and director based out of Southern California. She studied at California Institute of the Arts before joining the animation industry in 2014 and has since worked for Cartoon Network, Warner Brothers, Nickelodeon, Titmouse, Disney TVA, Netflix, Paramount, and Sony on both TV and feature animation projects, including Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem 2, The Mitchells vs. the Machines 2, Primos, and Adventure Time: Fionna and Cake. She currently serves as the President of The Animation Guild.
Jason MacLeod
Jason MacLeod is a hands-on technical leader with over 25 years in animated feature animation and visual effects. He builds and coaches the engineering teams and production technology that let artists do their best work, from render pipelines and studio tooling to AI-assisted workflows, most recently at Nickelodeon Animation. He spent 17 years as a CG artist working on films at Walt Disney Animation Studios including Moana, Zootopia, Frozen, and Wreck-It Ralph.
Kris Wimberly
Kris is Co-Founder and Head of Creative for Studio Smokescreen, an independent, Black-owned animation studio dedicated to leading significant changes in diversity and inclusion across the animation industry. The full-scale, Los Angeles-based “bridge” studio, the first of its kind, is designed to elevate marginalized and underrepresented talent striving to break into roles on big studio projects. Kris is a classically trained director and storyboard artist who currently serves as director on Disney’s animated series, Firebuds and currently working as a supervising director on Sofia the First: Royal Magic. Additional credits include HBO Max’s Close Enough, Universal’s Curious George 4: Royal Monkey, Nickelodeon’s Spongebob SquarePants and Cartoon Network’s Teen Titans Go! He specializes in comedy and action-comedy, and has worked on animated productions of nearly every type – from 2D, CG and Flash Animation to script-driven and storyboard-driven, and across preschool, kids and primetime television series, as well as feature films.
MODERATOR
Alexandra Drosu
Alexandra Drosu began her career as a journalist, where her curiosity and commitment to factual, compelling storytelling laid the foundation for a successful career in strategic communications. Over the past decade, she has served as Director of Communications for The Animation Guild, combining her communications expertise with her passion for supporting the animation industry. She also played a key role in launching The Animation Guild Foundation, where she serves as Executive Director, helping advance initiatives that celebrate, preserve, and support the animation arts community.
