Exciting post today! My professor and thesis director Ron Honn connected me to Steve Arguello, a friend of his who currently works at Laika as a VFX Modeler. I had the pleasure of interviewing him over the phone, and transcribed the Q&A below! He was incredibly friendly and humble, and I definitely learned a LOT from hearing about his job and how he got to where he was. I found it inspiring and encouraging to hear his story, and I was beyond excited to hear about the inner working of Laika, one of my favorite stop-motion studios. Thanks again Steve for taking the time to speak with me! And without further ado…
Above: Steve Arguello's latest demo reel on Vimeo
1. Tell me about your story – how did you get started in animation to how did you end up here?
Well first of all, I’m not an animator. I started out with aspirations of being a character animator and I kind of figured out animation is hard. I started falling into modeling and I quickly figured out that’s what I wanted to do.
I have a very peculiar story. I didn’t really have much direction or focus. I was more of a 2D artist. I used to do a lot of drawing, not so much painting, more pencil, stuff like that. And I didn’t know what to do with it. I come from a small town in California. Los Angeles is pretty far away, and San Francisco was pretty far away, and it seemed like a…dream. It seemed like something I was never going to be able to achieve. I was actually a poor kid too. I didn’t really have money for school, [or] money for equipment, so I didn’t have big aspirations. I started going to the local community college and luckily I made some friends with people during my drawing classes, and people would go on and go work at Café FX and go off to work at Disney. And I kept in contact with that person, and he kept pushing me in the direction of Café FX and I had no inclination to work there. It was computer graphics at the time…I barely knew how to use Photoshop. And I was like there’s no way in hell…what am I [going] to do there? He gave me a chance for an internship [and] I almost didn’t accept it. I just didn’t think I had what it takes. What am I [going to] to do there? They’re going to laugh at me. *Laughs* I had a long talk with myself, "Just give it a shot, see what you think."a I didn’t have anything to present, you know how you present a demo reel…I didn’t even know what that meant at that time. [But] I had a bunch of drawings. I could show them that. So I showed them a bunch of drawings, wrote them a solid letter, and said yeah I’m a hard worker, blah blah blah, give me a chance, you won’t be disappointed, you know, corny stuff. The funny thing was it was between me and another kid, I was 22, and he was right out of high school. He was already up for the internship, and he was already doing computer graphics in high school, [and] I just [kind of] figured he was a shoo in. But he didn’t want it. He was going to go to school that summer and he [said], nah I’m [going to] go to school, and so they gave it to me. Because of this kid passing up on this opportunity, and me pouncing on it, you know, and here I am, twenty years later. So it was a lot of luck, and putting myself in the right spot, and having good friends, a good support system. That’s kind of how I did it. Like I said, I worked there for eleven years, started an intern, and at the end I was a supervisor.
"It was a lot of luck, and putting myself in the right spot, and having good friends, a good support system. That’s kind of how I did it."
Then I remember applying for a job at Laika and asking anybody if they knew anybody here, and one of my coworkers from Café FX [said] yeah, I know this guy! I had the job within a week. So I’ve had a lot of support. I’d like to say I got to places on my own merit or that I’m good at this, good at that…I’ve been very fortunate. It’s not the best way to get into places. It’s not [really] a pulling myself out from my bootstraps [story]…making the best demo reel that I could…it was more or less me just knowing the right people, taking advantage of every opportunity that I got.
I’ve been here at Laika for nine years. There was a small stint, there [were] a couple people that after Café FX folded that [stayed] around in the area and they tried getting work, and I stayed with those guys for about four months as a freelancer. After that I decided I needed to get a real job with benefits and all that fun stuff. That’s why I came to Laika.
I leaned everything at Café FX. I had a very limited knowledge of 3D. I did a small 3D project at community college, and I was majoring in graphic design so I had Photoshop experience, Illustrator experience, Dreamweaver, there was program called Director that was just Flash animation, doing that kind of stuff. So I was working towards more web design kind of stuff. But that was my experience. 3D? I had none of it. When I got hired at Café FX, they wanted me to be a 2D artist. They knew I had some drawing ability. They wanted me to paint and roto stuff. So that’s what I started out doing. I would see everybody else doing 3D stuff and it looked really neat, really cool. I would sit down and try experimenting here and there. Luckily when I was working there, there [were] like six artists. So it [was] a really, really, tiny team. And everybody was just really cool, you know, a bunch of guys just hanging out after work. Everybody was in the same boat. So we were all buddies, we would all go to lunch together, hang out together, we’d play counterstrike at five o’clock. So it was just a bunch of dudes hanging out every night. They were all really cool guys and they all showed me the ropes. I was very fortunate that because of the small team, I was able to learn compositing, I got to learn tracking, I got to learn a bunch of stuff. We would get work [such as], ‘I need you to do this shot,’ and we would spend time trying to figure it out.
"Every production is getting more and more complex, and they’re starting to move to a more digital workflow. Especially on the building side. They’re using machettes, [and] using 3D software to design the armatures underneath the bodies."
2. What is your job?
Right now I’m the lead modeler for the VFX department. I kind of do whatever comes my way. I like to texture, I like to help out with whoever needs help. Laika in itself [is] really kind of crazy because it’s a big, quote on quote, big company. I think there’s three hundred something employees there. But the VFX team is really small. Right we’re like a Noah’s Arc of artists. There’s two compositors. Two animators. Two modelers. Right now [that’s] because we’re not in production. Another thing too is that the primary content builders [are in] the studio. Everything is built practically. Everything has to be designed on the practical side. So there’s people building all the sets, there’s people building puppets. And we follow their lead and we supplement them. And it’s changing. Every production is getting more and more complex, and they’re starting to move to a more digital workflow. Especially on the building side. They’re using machettes, [and] using 3D software to design the armatures underneath the bodies, and how the bodies are created. They’re taking a more digital approach.
What we do as a VFX team…we’re like any standard VFX house. We just take plates, usually the plates consist of a hero puppet on a green screen or on a set. And then we supplement the shot. So if the shot is Norman from Paranorman in front of his house, and he’s riding his bike down the street, well that street can only be so long right? [Because] the stage is only so big. So based on the kind of buildings we will make houses that match the style, and we’ll extend the street, and we’ll model the street and whatever hills are in the background, put a CG sky, a CG sun. And the same thing when he’s walking to school. They can only animate so many puppets. Any background puppets that are just walking around…they’re all CG puppets.
"We’re like any standard VFX house. We just take plates. Usually the plates consist of a hero puppet on a green screen or on a set. And then we supplement the shot."
3. So basically you make magic? That’s what I’m hearing.
No, I wouldn’t go that far. *laughs*
4. What’s your typical day like?
[My] typical day is pretty straightforward. I show up to work, get coffee, read my email, and get to work. Currently my task is helping to build a crowd system for an upcoming feature. So [we are] building a series of heads, body types, so that we can plug them into a system so that we can output a bunch of different variables. [We can] match this body to that head, that head to that body…so I’m doing that right now. Most days it’s just me working. We have Monday meetings. We have dailies for assets. I don’t really have anything to present normally. I don’t really go to dailies. Dailies are shot centric. They’re for people who are showing their latest comps or look dev stuff. If there are models in the look dev phase, I will be sent in. So yeah, just dailies. Lunch. Then I finish up my work. Then I coordinate a meeting with different department heads. Like standards and practices. And then I go home. It’s a pretty straightforward day.
"Currently my task is helping to build a crowd system for an upcoming feature. [We are] building a series of heads, body types, so that we can plug them into a system so that we can output a bunch of different variables. [We can] match this body to that head, that head to that body."
5. So it’s a very nine to five job?
Yeah!
6. And you don’t have to work on the weekends?
Nope. Yeah, Cafe Fx was rough. Not all the time but when we had projects and we needed to hurry up and do something. During the end of Alice in Wonderland, I worked probably a good seventy, eighty hour work week. And I have three kids. I would come home for dinner, and they were little at the time, [I’d] eat dinner with the family, put [the kids] to bed, and then go back to work. I’d work from 7:30 or 8 till midnight or 1. Get up. Go back to work at 8. I’d work from an eight to on a rough day, sixteen hour day. And then I would work weekends, at least a ten or eight hour day. It was rough. And I did it for months.
7. That’s awful! Did they pay you for all that?
No, because I was a supervisor, so I was exempt. So I was making pennies. *laughs* I got paid well but if you broke it down by the hour, I was probably making ten to twelve dollars an hour.
8. It’s a lot better at Laika then?
Yeah. Ever since I’ve been at Laika, for the nine years here, I’ve probably worked eight Saturdays. And when we ramp up we work fifty hour work weeks, so an extra two hours a day. I’ve done that for a couple months. But when they told me that, [they said], “You know, when things get rough, we’re going to ask you to work a fifty hour work week…” I was like, uhhhh, okay! Sure!
It’s department wise. For the last show, Missing Link, we had a lot of assets to do before they actually started getting plates in so we could begin comping. So we started fifties in the beginning for about two to three months…so we were ahead [and] we didn’t have to work overtime in the back end. So we weren’t choking the pipe.
Café FX unfortunately, whenever we had overtime, it was a company wide policy. All hands on deck. Everybody needs to be here. It was really bizarre. On some shows where I didn’t have anything to do, but I had to sit at my desk and try to help somebody out with something, [or] get started on the next days work, just keep working. It was kind of crazy. The problem with that too, because I was a lead, modeling supervisor at the end, I had to be there to answer questions. It was kind of a pain. Compared to that, Laika is pretty chill.
9. Leading from that, what is the working environment at Laika?
It’s pretty diverse. It’s pretty big.
10. What is it like working there?
For me, my environment is awesome. It’s crazy because it’s a VFX team but as I told you, it’s like a Noah’s Arc. And everybody that works in our department is kind of senior and really good at what they do. There’s a lot of confidence in everybody. There’s not any task that I think will worry me. Before when you’re working with a bunch of misfits, and you get a project, you don’t know what’s going to happen. *Laughs* You just kind of hold on tight and hope you do the best.
"For me, my environment is awesome. It’s crazy because it’s a VFX team but as I told you, it’s like a Noah’s Arc. And everybody that works in our department is...really good at what they do. There’s a lot of confidence in everybody. There’s not any task that I think will worry me."
11. What kind of person would work well at Laika?
You [have to] be creative, you have to be crafty. You have to be not necessarily artistic, but you have to have that artistic [quality]. Most of the people there will come up with the most creative solutions to complex technical problems. Especially on the practical side. There’s the whole rigging department. Those people do these cool little experiments…like how are we going to do stop-motion water? And they’ll do these rigs where they’re putting a trash bag [on something] or they’ll print out a place of glass that they’ll spin, and they’ll shine light at it from different angles. Or they’re doing smoke so they’ll get tulle fabric, and they’ll scrunch it up and spin it in a weird way, and shine light through it. They do really neat things to get really cool practical looking effects. Half of them are there to actually do them in shops, but most of the time because they can’t do that on a grand scale, it comes to us, and it’s inspiration for us. So it’s like, we’re thinking of making clouds but we want them to look like this. We’re going to make clouds do this.
"You [have to] be creative, you have to be crafty. Most of the people there will come up with the most creative solutions to complex technical problems."
12. How has 3D printing impacted stop-motion?
Oh Jesus. I had no idea when I saw Coraline, I remember watching it and I knew it was stop-motion. When I saw the faces from the movie I was like how the hell are they doing that? What is going on? That’s not normal! There’s such articulation in the faces. And when I started, day one, I remember walking into my supervisor’s office and he had a Coraline puppet on his desk, and I picked it up, and it all made sense! He told me they print all the faces and they hand paint them. So I was like oh my god they’re modeling the heads in 3D, animating in 3D, and printing them out. That blew my mind. Basically, that’s still how they do it. And it’s crazy how much the advancement is with the materials. They’re doing color printing. They’re doing multiple materials. Different types of materials like rubber. They have things that can be printing in rubber – and it’s colored too! So you can squash and stretch. They’re forging with printing companies to keep evolving the technology. It’s pretty nuts. Everything that we do hinges on the rapid prototyping department. They dictate how the faces look. They dictate how we light things, how we texture things, how we render things. [Their] final puppet is what we have to replicate. We’re even going as far as to mimicking their process in 3D. We go so far as to simulate the printer lines. Because ultimately our stuff can’t and shouldn’t look like a CG character. We’re trying to be as complimentary as we can without being distracting. It’s pretty intense. The scrutiny here is on another level.
13. That attention to detail is insane! How many people have to be overseeing to make certain everything is up to standard?
Well everything that we do, let’s say I make a character who’s generic male whatever, everything that makes him, has to get approved by the respective departments. So his body has to be approved by the puppet fabricators. His face has to be approved by the rapid prototype team. It has to be able to have the same performance as their puppets. And costume has to go through the costume department and be approved by the costume department. You have to use the materials that they would use. And the hair has to even match the hair from the hair department. So we have meetings with the hair [department], they give us samples, and we try to mimic everything that they’re doing with the hair. Like if they’re doing little color trims to give interesting highlights, or they’re gluing it a certain way, or they’re twisting it a certain way, we try to do everything that they’re doing. We have to go through a multi-tiered approval process in order to get our stuff bought off.
14. What is one of your favorite memories from your career?
I don’t know – I’ve had a lot of fun. I remember just pitching myself every once in a while because I am what I am. Basically from the history that I told you, as a small town kid, not really thinking I’d ever…not that I made it big or won the lottery…but I’m working at a pretty cool studio that’s unique, and sometimes you forget that. And every once in a while I’m in a review and we’re talking about silly things like puppet shoes and things like that…this is crazy! *Laughs*
But that doesn’t answer your question. I think my best memory is probably showing up day one at Café FX. The funniest thing about that was that I show on the first day on my interview, and they ask me to go to the store to buy margaritas. So here I am as an intern, walking around with a pitcher of margarita, and just filling up everybody’s cup. That was day one of my internship. They were having a barbeque that day. And I just remember thinking, this is so cool. This is going to be fun. And it was fun ever since then.
"I think my best memory is probably showing up day one at Café FX. They were having a barbeque that day. And I just remember thinking, this is so cool. This is going to be fun. And it was fun ever since then."
Probably the other best day was…[well] I didn’t do just one internship. I begged for a second one. And they gave it to me. And they let someone else intern, so they had two interns at the same time. After that second internship I was going to go to the Art Institute of Santa Monica to ask if I could become a junior artist in Los Angeles. And my boss said, I don’t think that’s going to work because we’re going to offer you a position. And he said it really dead face, I wasn’t really expecting it. He offered me ten bucks an hour and I was like…I’m rich! Twenty years ago, minimum wage was $4.25. So ten bucks an hour was pretty cool. That was a pretty awesome day. Being able to go tell my boss at the gas station, I quit.
15. That must have been an awesome feeling.
It was awesome.
16. What’s the hardest thing about your job/the industry?
The hardest thing about my job is reviews. No matter how confident I’m feeling about something, whenever I get called up for a review I always [feel] a bit of anxiety wash over me, and a bit of fear that they’re going to pick me apart, rip [my work] to shreds, I’m going to have to do this, I’m going to have to do that. I think that’s the worst part. Everything else before that is exciting. Like we’re going to this? Okay cool! And then it starts to become ugh, I just want to get this done…and you have to present things and you’re nervous and whatnot…that’s the hardest part. You think it gets easier with experience but it just doesn’t. I always get nervous. I’m twenty years in and I’m always nervous to show something.
17. Is it normally huge feedback or small constructive notes?
It’s always a mix. Some people are harder to please than others, so it’s a mix.
18. How many revisions do you get normally?
It depends. When we do background characters, we internally review them before we show them to the department heads. Usually before we show it to the department heads it’ll be two or three reviews. With department heads we limit it to a two [time] review maximum. Like here’s the model in its current state, let us know what you want, and if it works or it doesn’t, we’ll change it. The next review is with the changes and textures. We don’t have time to go over all the details, especially on background characters. Sometimes we have to expedite that process. Otherwise we’ll work on a background character forever, because no one’s every completely happy, everybody wants something. [They want] the clothes a different style or his shirt is too short or whatever...and in context that guy is never fully on screen so you have to limit those things.
19. What project/character/scene that you worked on are you most proud of?
The Nessie was a lot of fun [in Missing Link]. I worked on the Nessie, and the Yeti guards. I think they came out really nice! As far as that project goes, that was pretty fun.
One of the most fun projects I worked on was Mr. and Mrs. Smith. I remember getting to do a lot, and having a lot of fun doing it. Getting to take things from beginning to end. I got to track things, do the CG, do the comp, all that stuff. That was a lot of fun.
"One of the most fun projects I worked on was Mr. and Mrs. Smith. I remember getting to do a lot, and having a lot of fun doing it. Getting to take things from beginning to end. I got to track things, do the CG, do the comp, all that stuff."
20. Do you have anything else you’d like to add? Any advice for someone like me, interested in pursuing a career in stop-motion?
The only advice I always give everybody is just keep doing what you’re doing. It sounds stupid, but if you keep pushing in that direction, something’s going to break. Something’s going to give. People are going to take notice or you’re going to fall in…I’m on your web page right now and it looks like you already work at Laika, you know what I mean? You’re really passionate about it and it shows. So just keep up with the passion and that job’s going to present itself and you’re going to jump on it. You’re going to have fun, you’re going to learn, you’re going to laugh, you’re going to cry…and you’re going to make a living off it. That’s it really. Just don’t give up.
"The only advice I always give everybody is just keep doing what you’re doing. It sounds stupid, but if you keep pushing in that direction, something’s going to break."
To recap, I'm so thankful to Steve for sharing his experiences and kind words about the stop-motion industry. It was fascinating to find out about how a production company like Laika works, and to hear how the VFX department is run. If you would like to learn more about Steve Arguello, check out his IMDB or Vimeo reel:
