The animation director, designer and model maker discusses her journey from Turkey to the U.S. and how she scored a spot as a set designer at the iconic stop-motion studio.
Check out Terry Ibele’s Animation Industry Podcast, featuring a new podcast every week focusing on the stories of today’s animation professionals - how they got to where they are and what they learned along the way. Now home to 193 episodes, the podcasts cover all areas of the industry, including storyboarding, writing, animating, directing, visual development, and game design.
Guests have included Aaron Augenblick, the notorious JJ Villard, Spike & Mike’s Spike Decker, Disney Director John Musker, Sony Lead Animator Humberto Rosa, Cuphead’s Tina Nowracki, Frederator’s Fred Seibert, Tumble Leaf’s Scarlet Nelson, and many others from major animation studios all over the world.
Episode 193: How Turkish Set Designer Merve Çaydere Got to Work at Laika
This episode features Turkish animation director, designer, and model maker Merve Çaydere, a stop-motion specialist who is currently a set designer at Laika Studios and recently worked on Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio. In this chat, Çaydere talks about the journey that brought her from Turkey to the United States in her pursuit of stop-motion set building and all the ups and downs along the way.
Tune in to Ibele and Çaydere to hear:
- How Çaydere made her way from Turkey to the U.S.
- What exactly a stop-motion set builder does
- What to do to get hired as a set designer
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Ibele, himself a stop-motion animator (see AWN’s Fresh Takes piece on his whimsical short, The Silly Duck Wizard, deftly digs into all manner of topics, encouraging interviewees to share insights and opinions on a wide range of topics like pitching shows, marketing your work online, key skills studios look for when they bring on talent in storyboarding, vizdev, character design, and animation.
In 2018, Ibele, who lives in Toronto, decided to quit his career as a Marketer and pursue his love for animation. Since then, he’s become well known for his viral animation productions, which include the previously mentioned Silly Duck Wizard, which is how AWN first came to know him and his work.
Learn more about Ibele’s work and podcast by visiting terryibele.com. You can find all The Animation Podcast episodes on his Soundcloud site: https://soundcloud.com/animation-podcast.
Debbie Diamond Sarto is news editor at Animation World Network.
