SpongeBob SquarePants and Patrick Star sharing a joyful moment at a vibrant carnival, surrounded by colorful lights and attractions, with SpongeBob excitedly singing while Patrick looks amused.

A sheen of simplicity

Playing an instrument when you’re in the profession of animation helps – especially in regard to timing. For Animation Director Andrew Overtoom, it’s the guitar.

He says: “I can play the guitar. But as far as the piano goes, I’ve been playing it since I was 15, but only more seriously in the last four years.” Though no matter how much Andrew practices, he barely gets better – at least “compared to Thelonious Monk or Ray Charles”, to put it in Andrew’s delicate vernacular. “I really stink. But it’s fun. It keeps my music theory and harmony percolating.”, says the man who charted on the Billboard Alternative Video chart before imprinting himself on animated culture through contributions to The Angry Beavers, Family Guy or SpongeBob SquarePants.

For Andrew, good animation oftentimes is “simple but complex, it’s multilayered but not complicated”, as he says it – at least on shows like SpongeBob or animated oldies like Rocky & Bullwinkle or George of the Jungle (both of which got turned into Brendan-Fraser-starring live-action feature films in the 90s). Back in DP 06:21, where we carved out a chair out of a pineapple for Jacques Daigle, who ...


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