Meet Alexandre Cazals, one of the talented graduates from Supinfocom who created the beautiful animated short A Fox Tale – which features on the cover of the latest issue of 3D World. Watch his 2011 showreel and read what inspires him…
On A Fox Tale Alexandre Cazals worked on the Wu Song model, lightboard and colourboard, look development, environments, texturing and shading, lighting, rendering and compositing. Now Cazals is a freelance 3D artist currently working in London.
Supinfocom is renowned for the quality of the shorts its students produce, but A Fox Tale is exceptional even by the French school’s high standards. You can read about the character design process in the issue 161 of 3D World where Alexandre Cazal and his fellow graduates reveal behind the scenes of A Fox Tale, in the meantime, read on to find out more about this talented young artist.
Alexandre Cazals worked on the Wu Song model for the animated short A Fox Tale - which features in the latest issue of 3D World.
3D World: When did you first discover your talent and decide to become a 3D artist?
AC: I used to always play with colours and do paintings when I was a kid, my parents were computer engineers so I used to play with a lot of very old computers, trying to install games in secret folders and things like that!
When I discovered there was a way to combine playing with colours and images, and playing with computers all day, I just knew that it was the best way for me to continue having fun! I discovered what I wanted to do as a job when I was 19 – I even previously tried to do pharmacy studies, but I stopped three months later and took an oil painting course with a French artist.
3D World: Do you remember what your first piece of CG was?
AC: I think my first piece of CG was a scene of a circus with a monkey – it was a lot of fun! At the beginning it was difficult to get used to the 3D view and to remember where the tools and objects were!
3D World: Where do you find inspiration?
AC: I find inspiration mainly in movies, paintings and illustrations. The internet is such a good tool to find inspiration, nowadays everyone is sharing their work and there are so many talented poeple everywhere! It’s like a big melting pot of artists. I think it’s incredible.
During Summer 2009, Alex was employed as a CG Artist Junior, doing some modeling, texturing and shading) at Space Patrol, Paris. Here is a still from a Nescafe commercial he worked on
3D World: Who or what has influenced your work?
AC: When I think about it, I’ve been raised by Disney, Dreamworks, and so many other cartoons. To mention some of them: Anastasia, Mulan, Prince of Egypt, Fantasia, Le livre de la jungle, The secret of NIMH, etc … I think I know every song of those cartoons by heart… More recently I’ve been influenced by Japanese animation as well, like Studio Ghibli, Gainax or Madhouse!
3D World: Do you think you have developed a certain style of work?
AC: I really don’t know about that…I’m adapting my style to best suit the project to be honest.
3D World: What is your favourite 3D software and why?
AC: My favorite 3D software is 3ds Mmax, maybe because that’s the one I know the most ! But in the end, the software is not really important I think.
3D World: What’s your favourite film and why?
AC: I don’t have any favorite film, I like a lot of movies and they are all different! But if pushed I would say Pixar’s Toy Story as it’s the first full CG animated feature film. It completely amazed me! I think I didn’t even wonder how it was made – it was just different from what I had seen before, it was alive.
During his second Internship, Alexandre worked in Ankama Animation (Roubaix). He worked in the compositing department on the animated series: Wakfu. This is a still from the animation
3D World: What’s your favourite animation and why?
AC: A 2D animation I really love is Studio Ghibli’s Spirited Away. I used to go to a very old cinema where they projected Japanese and independent movies, it was there that I saw a Miyasaki animation for the first time and I wasn’t prepared. I literally fell in love with the characters, everything is so beautifull in his work.
3D World: What are you currently working on?
AC: I’m currently working on a cartoony commercial for Soho-based animation studio Picasso Pictures.
3D World: What’s next for you?
AC: Now I’ve been working freelance for one year, I would love to have the opportunity to settle down somewhere and work with a motivated team of nice people 
I think what I like the most about making films is the human experience behind. Added to that, I would love to have this opportunity to have a little bit more time to light scenes and find out what I can achieve when I have time to polish things!
Many thanks to Alexandre Cazals for this interview. We can’t wait to see what this talented young artist does next!
Please visit Alexandre Cazals’ website for more information: www.mrmcfly.com
Posted on Thursday, September 13th, 2012 at 2:29 pm under Showcase. You can subscribe to comments. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.
Tags: A Fox Tale, Alexandre Cazals, Animated short, Meet the 3D artist, supinfocom
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