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Stefan Pruss grew up on the shores of Denmark. With a wild imagination and creative mind, he was the class geek, loving to draw, watch movies and cartoons, play computer games, and slaying dragons by the roll of a dice.

In the fall of 1997, his life long practice in drawing opened the doors of a well respected course in traditional animation. While studying and practicing the principles of traditional animation, his fascination with computer art and animation grew rapidly, leading him to walk the digital path when the course ended.

Stefan landed a 4 months internship at Belgium based Imagination in Motion. Where his talent lead him to animate commercials for major companies such as Coca-Cola. The 4 months went quickly and despite being offered a permanent position at Imagination in Motion, Stefan decided to return to Denmark to work as the lead animator at Pixeleers, a major games company.

Sadly, a year later Pixeleers closed down and Stefan started looking for work back in the field of film and commercials. Denmark's leading cg animation studio Ghost, hired him as a freelance animator. At Ghost, a great personal and working relationship evolved. At Ghost, Stefan is a frequent freelance artist on various projects such as Lego, Sony and Tuborg Beer.

In search for a greater challenge, Stefan shipped a handfull of reels abroad. It wasn't long before he was offered a position at London's Framestore-cfc, working on the main cg-character of the big budget 3 part mini-series Dinotopia. His experience on the project proved to be a fun production in which he was able to be challenged and grow as an animator. When production wrapped he was offered to stay at Framestore-cfc for another project, this time it was animation work on Harry Potter & the Chamber of Secrets.

In the near future, Stefan will go on his own adventure as he's set to start production on his first animated short film.

Stefan's thoughts on Production:
Animation is hard work, but it can also be a lot of fun! I find it essential that you bring a positive attitude, a flexible mind, and team spirit to any project. It'll always be a team effort to get things done smoothly, and without people communicating or taking an interest in the project, it'll end up a bumpy ride.

Projects can be very different from one to the other, some a bloody nightmare and others a pleasant joyride. I've never worked on a project that hasn't had it's share of bad sides though, and I don't think they exist.

The key is to focus on the bright sides and let them be the motivation that drives your workload. In any creative job you'll need that motivation along with the passion for the medium, to push yourself to do your best work. I try to always keep the work challenging by taking on difficult shots when ever possible. It's a really good feeling when you finish a shot that you thought you could never do, and it ends up looking great!

That's when you know it's all worth it.

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