Working in the creative business can help develop a layer of tough skin as you learn that every failure is just one step closer to success. The demanding schedules of Animators and their long working hours, is what creates a never-say-die attitude in the many artists, who make up the animation industry.

Read the Exclusive Interview

Richard Bazley is one such Animator who moved up the ladder of success through sheer grit and hard work. An enthusiastic at heart, he was turned back at Disney for his inexperience, but he found his way in, a few months later and worked his way up to being a Lead Animator at the Disney Studios in Los Angeles. He learnt never to take ‘No’ for an answer.

Bazley was born in Exeter, Devon, the South-West of England. He grew up in the countryside with an interest to draw, from a very young age. He studied Graphic Design and graduated at the Liverpool Art School. Early in his career, he worked as an Art Director with a couple of advertising agencies. With an urge to animate, he then switched to a career in Animation, following a break he got at Disney UK, working as an inbetweener on ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit’. He spent the next four and a half years at Don Bluth Studios in Ireland, Supervising on such films as ‘Thumbelina’ and ‘Pebble and the Penguin’, before he went to work for Disney on ‘Pocahontas’ and became a Lead Animator for Disney on ‘Hercules’. He then moved on to Warner Brothers, Supervising sequences on ‘The Iron Giant’ and being the Lead Animator for ‘Osmosis Jones’.

A self-taught animator, who is comfortable with animating both, in the traditional 2D as well as CGI, Richard returned to England to set up his own studio Bazley Films, in Corsham. Situated in the heart of the Wiltshire countryside near the historic town of Bath, which houses a spectacular state of the art film studio, Richard’s first release was ‘The Journal of Edwin Carp’ a significant short film in Flash animation. Based on the illustrations of Ronald Searle, the film was completed using Macromedia Flash and Wacom Tablet besides the voice of top British Actor Hugh Laurie. It was featured in ‘The Flash 5 Bible’ where Bazley was a contributor. He also co-authored the book ‘Flash-Cartoons and Games’ with Bill Turner and James Robertson.