It was a great honor to be interviewed by Cacao Magazine in a newly published article you can read right here!

C:Open The Portal is an extremely unique and cutting edge animation studio who collaborate with a lot of big studios but also independent artists, like Netflix, Adult Swim, and Kangmin Kim. What are some of the projects that Open The Portal had worked on, and what’s the creative process like, from ideation to final animation?

David: Maybe a good place to start on this is that you mentioned the collaborations, and we have done a lot of films with Kangmin Kim, who is one of our best friends and biggest influences. Jason has produced some of his films, Barrett has done sounds.

Jason: Yeah, I think there’s different ways that we approach and produce our narrative and creative films. One way is to work closely with collaborators, like Kangmin Kim, so basically if that’s the case, artists like Kangmin come to us and explain the vision and idea of what he wants to do, and we basically create a support system for him to execute that vision to the fullest way possible. So we give him the studio space, the materials, and the support. Everything it takes to finish the project and Barrett comes in and works with the sound. Basically, we just create a structure and support system for these collaborators.

David: On the other hand, for our independent projects, sometimes we just come up with ideas, maybe from devices that we find in stores. For example, our first animation, Robota, I found a crazy looking machine in a thrift store, and we started to develop a character, idea for the project. So what I think is really unique about OTP is that we were really open to all of the process. We don’t just look at some objects, or everything has to come from the ground up. There’s a whole library of ways to come out with idea, and we really like working with people, so it’s definitely a more open connection with people that help the entire process more clear and fresh.