PILI, Camarines Sur—Diana Rose Figura, 21, still heaves a sigh of relief while recalling how she felt when she was accepted at the Gov. LRay 2-D Animation Training Program (GLATP), which helped her land a job at the CamSur Animation Studio (CAS).
After graduating from high school in 2007, Figura had worked as a salesperson at a bookstore in downtown Pili where she earned P1,500 a month.
The daughter of a tricycle driver and the eldest in a brood of three, she left her job in 2009 after remembering the GLATP, a skills development scheme of the provincial government for out-of-school youths.
Under the program, she learned the basics of drawing on a digital tablet—holding a stylus pen with one hand while touching keys on the keyboard to manipulate sketches with the other hand.
Figura now earns an average of P3,000 a week, twice the monthly pay in her previous job.
On the plus side, her work at the animation studio is what she loves to do for she was once an illustrator in her high school publication.
Pursuing dreams
Maxel Dominic, 18, of Iriga City, graduated from high school in 2009 but could ill-afford to go to college and take up his dream course of architecture.
He was doing chores for his mother, who was running a small eatery, when he decided to respond to a radio announcement on the digital animation training program.
A winner of poster-making contests during his high school days, Dominic applied and was accepted at the GLATP. It turned out to be a turning point in his life.
He started as an assistant animator at the CAS in February 2009 and took a three-month advanced training that enabled him to become an animator by September.
The work gives him at least P4,000 a week, depending on the speed and number of drawings he makes.
Dominic now helps provide for his two younger siblings in high school and elementary. His father, a tricycle driver, had died of a heart attack in 2010.
Employment arm
The CAS is a digital animation outfit owned by the provincial government, which serves as the employment arm of the GLATP, the studio’s training ground.
The studio is in charge of clean-up and in-between digital drawings for foreign television networks’ animation productions and independent outfits. Among the notable productions is the first full-length Filipino digital animation film “Dayo,” which was shown in 2008.
Benedicto R. Bernardino, animation training supervisor, said it would take innate talent in drawing for a person to become eligible for its program.
Thirty talented out-of-school youths are learning the traditional method of drawing animation, modeling and animation production. They may become assistant animators at the CAS.
Raul N. Mimay, animation director, supervises the advanced training of 15 for the in-between drawings, which consists of sequential drawings of a character’s action from one point to another point.
The cleaned-up drawings are those with permanent borderlines being readied for rendering of digital ink and paint. Studios abroad complete the production.
Exact replicas
“They must learn to render the exact replica of a character in the model sheet provided by the client, from the rough sketch of the storyboard to the finished part with black borderline. From here, only they can draw the in-between images,” Mimay explained.
Armand V. Salva II, GLATP consultant and CAS manager, said the studio had clinched production contracts from television networks in India, Poland and Germany. It has been sustaining its operation since 2007 when it was able to establish links with animation studios in Manila.
Salva said the first animation project was contracted by the Philippine Animation Studio, which asked for a clean-up and in-between drawings of three episodes of “Biker Mice from Mars,” a film shown in the United States.
Since then, the projects have been coming, enabling the studio to expand to two daily shifts—8 a.m. to 7 p.m and 8 p.m. to 7 a.m.
“We have 25 animators and 75 assistant animators who are paid P15 per drawing,” Salva said.
Since the GLATP started in 2006, around 300 out-of-school youths have already been trained. Members of past batches have found employment in animation studios in Manila and abroad.