During the Winter 2021 semester First Fight, a local Detroit based animation studio, sponsored an Animation project course within the Entertainment Arts Department at College for Creative Studies. Students were introduced to the concept through early ideation and advanced the entire execution of the short film including; storyboarding, visual development, hand drawn animation and compositing. The resulting project will be shared via First Fight’s social media to promote their studio and submitted to various animation festivals.

This moderated panel discussion will consist of the instructor for the sponsored project course, the First Fight contacts and select student leaders from the studio course. Topics for discussion will range from:

• Factors that went into the creation of the course both from the perspective of CCS and First Fight.
• Design process.
• Student engagement with the project.
• Commercial application.
• Connection to Detroit and the animation industry that is emerging.
• Student experience
• Sponsor experience
• Overview of the process of creating the finished project.
• A variety of other topics will be discussed.