Henry Selick

This Disney-trained stop-motion animation specialist worked successfully in advertising and "personal" short subjects before making a triumphant feature directorial debut with the popular and playfully macabre "Tim Burton's 'The Nightmare Before Christmas'" (1993). Selick became a Disney animator after graduating from the first class at CalArts to complete Disney's character animation design program. As he rose through the ranks to become a full animator, Selick worked on "Pete's Dragon", "The Small One" (both 1977) and "The Fox and the Hound" (1981) before taking off eight months in 1979 to work on his own projects with American Film Institute backing. One such was "Seepage" (1979), a stop-motion depiction of a poolside chat that utilized watercolor animation of two figures--one in profile, the other looking straight ahead. The film garnered prizes on the animation festival circuit.

Selick left Disney and Burbank for northern California where he founded his own production company, Selick Projects. He became known for producing dense, jam-packed promos for MTV including a Clio award-winning spot called "Haircut M" in which a fanciful insect carves the station logo into a red big hairdo. Working for the San Francisco-based Colossal Pictures, Selick also revitalized the then 28-year-old Pillsbury Doughboy campaign. He also helmed the award-winning Ritz Bits ad in which hundreds of crackers ski down peanut butter slopes and fly to the moon in search of cheese.

MTV sponsored Selick's most ambitious project up to that time--"Slow Bob in the Lower Dimensions" (1990), a surreal six-minute short combining stop-motion and live action. He was subsequently recruited by fellow Disney alumnus Tim Burton to helm his "Nightmare", the first full-length stop-motion animated feature produced by Walt Disney Pictures. Selick Projects transformed into Skellington Productions in 1991 for this massive project. A critical and commercial hit, "Nightmare" led to another stop-motion feature for Disney, "James and the Giant Peach" (1996). Even more complex than its predecessor, the film combined stop-motion animation with elements of computer-generated imagery and live-action. Selick also directed the film's extensive live-action prologue. The film opened to critical and commercial acclaim.

• Born:
  November 30, 1952 in Glen Ridge, New Jersey, USA
• Job Titles:
  Director, Stop motion animator, Character designer, Producer, Storyboard artist, Assistant animator

Significant Others

• Wife: Heather Selick.

Education

• California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA, character animation, 1977
• Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ, science
• Burbank Adult School, Burbank, CA

Milestones

• 1956 Began drawing by age three
• 1973 Became interested in animation by watching a PBS program featuring experimental animation at age 20
• 1977 Worked as an animator trainee and an in-betweener on Disney s Pete s Dragon and The Small One
• 1979 Took eight months off work on personal projects sponsored by the American Film Institute
• 1979 Was funded through the National Endowment for the Arts to make his debut short, Seepage
• 1981 First credit as a full-fledged animator, The Fox and the Hound
• 1983 First credit as sequence director, Twice Upon a Time
• 1985 Created the storyboarded fantasy sequences for Walter Murch s Return to Oz
• 1986 Founded own production company, Selick Projects
• 1990 Created the award-winning six-minute pilot for an animated series called Slow Bob in the Lower Dimensions ; sponsored by MTV
• 1991 Sellick Projects became Skellington Productions
• 1993 Feature directorial debut, Tim Burton s The Nightmare Before Christmas ; was the first full-length, stop-motion feature from a major studio; nominated for an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects
• 1994 Skellington Productions was re-named Twitching Images, Inc.
• 1996 Directed the live-action/stop-motion adaptation of Roald Dahl s classic children s book, James and the Giant Peach
• 1996 Miramax agreed to fully fund and finance as well as cover all operating costs for all film projects through his company, Twitching Images
• 2001 Directed the live action/animated adaptation of the underground comic, Moneybone
• 2004 Developed stop-motion animation for Wes Anderson s feature, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou
• 2004 Joined the Portland based animation studio, LAIKA as supervising director for feature film development
• 2005 Directed LAIKA s first computer-generated animated short, Moongirl
• 2008 Directed the first three-dimensional stop-motion animation film, Coraline ; the first feature by LAIKA studios
• Directed commercials for the Pillsbury Doughboy and Ritz Crackers
• Directed promotional spots for MTV, including the award-winning Haircut M campaign
• Directed two short animated films while attending CalArts, Phases and Tube Tales
• Studied under animator, Jules Engel, while working at Disney