How Animation Is Creating New Possibilities in Johnston County

Jonathan Breeden: On this week’s episode of The Best of Johnston County Podcast, our guest is Gabriel Smith, the owner of AnimNation in Clayton, North Carolina. We talked to Gabriel about what he does, which is 3D animation, and his time working with DreamWorks on the Kung Fu Panda game that came out a few years ago.

We also talked to him a little bit about what he does, how he helps local businesses animate their brand, and how he can help you. So listen in.

Welcome to another episode of Best of Johnston County, brought to you by Breeden Law Office. Our host, Jonathan Breeden, an experienced family lawyer with a deep connection to the community, is ready to take you on a journey through the area that he has called home for over 20 years. Whether it’s a deep dive into the love locals have for the county or unraveling the complexities of family law, Best of Johnston County presents an authentic slice of this unique community.

Jonathan Breeden: Hello, and welcome to another edition of the Best of [00:01:00] Johnston County podcast.

I’m your host, Jonathan Breeden, and on today’s episode, we have Gabriel Smith, owner of AnimNation, Production Company, and they make animated 3D graphics and all kinds of little characters and stuff and it’s gonna be a fascinating conversation. I don’t quite understand it, but he did work on the Kung Fu Panda Showdown game as the lead animator, so if you’ve ever seen that game, you’ll kinda know what we’re gonna talk about.

And he’s got a business right here in Clayton, and he’s gonna talk, talk to us a little bit about what he does and how he can help your business animate. But before we get to that, I’d like to ask you to like, follow, subscribe to this podcast wherever you see it, whether it be on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, TikTok, X, LinkedIn, or any of the other social media channels, the Best Johnston County podcast.

The Best Johnston County podcast comes out every single Monday, and it has now for over two and a half years, so we’re well over 120 episodes now. We’ve got a lot of great guests, so go back and listen to some of our previous episodes. We had Barry Woodard, owner of Hometown Realty, a few weeks ago. We had the [00:02:00] vast majority of the county commissioners.

We had Sheriff Steve Bizzell. We had Just Dog People. We had BlueLine K9 Dog Training. These are all great podcasts where I guarantee if you go back and listen to it, you’re gonna learn a little bit about the businesses, the people behind the businesses, and Johnston County. Welcome, Gabriel.

Gabriel Smith: Thank you, thank you.

Jonathan Breeden: All right.

Gabriel Smith: Appreciate it.

Jonathan Breeden: Well, we met a few weeks ago at Launch JoCo

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely

Jonathan Breeden: where you’re going through the Launch JoCo program.

Gabriel Smith: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: As a seasoned business. A lot of the businesses there are new. So anyway, but I was completely fascinated by what you did, mainly because I can’t do it. I don’t have an artistic bone in my body, and I find all of that stuff neat.

I like video games and stuff like that. So anyway, so tell the audience who you are and what you do.

Gabriel Smith: Yes. I’m Gabriel Smith, I’m owner of Animation Productions. We do 3D animation, motion graphics, and design. We also have a music studio where we do voiceover work as well. And we’re just trying to get businesses, you know, liven up their brands and have a bigger impact on social media.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. [00:03:00] So how’d you get into this? I know you’re from Raleigh. I know you taught at Central for a while. I know where you went to school, but how did you end up here doing this?

Gabriel Smith: Yeah. Well, when I actually started getting into animation my second year at North Carolina Central University. I accidentally put in the making of Toy Story 2, and so I was watching that and I was like, “Oh, this is something I can do.”

So I immediately went to my guidance counselor at North Carolina Central, and they said, “We don’t offer 3D animation here.” So, unfortunately I didn’t graduate there. I had to transfer. Went throughout my career, and now, and then 20 years later ended up coming back and then teaching. So became the guy that I needed.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. So where did you learn 3D animation at?

Gabriel Smith: So I went to the School of Communication Arts in Wake Forest. They’re no longer open.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

Gabriel Smith: It was a private school that did, focused on all the elements of 3D animation.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. All right. So when you come out, what are some of the things you, I mean, did you get a job? Like I mean, like, what’d you start working on? Like I mean, how’d you sort of begin to hone your craft?

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely. [00:04:00] So, actually one semester before I graduated, I linked up with this other local studio named it was called Charlie Breakiron Animation Studios and Design.

And he really took me under his wing, and that was the first time I saw someone run an animation studio out of their home. And I was like, “Wow, okay. You can, you don’t have to have all this overhead.” I learned a lot from Charlie. And then just going into the industry there was another guy Eric Peterson, that really gave me a really bigger picture on entrepreneurship.

And so it made me transition from being in the game industry to starting my own business.

Jonathan Breeden: All right. So I know that’s, I talked about it earlier. How did you end up being from Raleigh, living in Clayton, working with DreamWorks, the largest animation group in the world absolutely arguably the best

Gabriel Smith: Yeah

Jonathan Breeden: on Kung Fu Panda?

Gabriel Smith: All right. So Eric Peterson he was at the time, he, right now he’s the head of studio at Funcom. They just released the game Doom. Well, I worked under him for a few years at Vicious Cycle, and he’s [00:05:00] really good at, you know, getting production work and publishing titles.

So in the game, it’s kinda like Smash Brothers, where it’s just quick punches and quick kicks, and I didn’t wanna leave that with just those quick punches and quick kicks. So their opening animation scene was just a flip book, and I went to Eric and I said, “Eric, you know, we can’t do this. Like, we have to do something fun and cool and animated.”

So he believed in me. He said, “Man, let’s give it a shot.” He helped me set up some. He said, “What do you need?” I’d asked for models and everything. And because it was, like, off script from DreamWorks that he was actually able to take me with him to DreamWorks to get it approved.

So we fly out to California I meet the whole animation team, and they critique my work. And, wow, I mean, it was a great experience.

Jonathan Breeden: What year was that?

Gabriel Smith: Oh, man. I was gonna say early or mid, like, anywhere between 2010, 2012, somewhere in there.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. I got you.

Gabriel Smith: I can’t remember exactly.

Jonathan Breeden: So you worked for Eric

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely

Jonathan Breeden: and y’all worked on the Kung Fu Panda game.

Gabriel Smith: Yes, yes. And I was the lead animator there [00:06:00] just taking care of all the character animation, all the rigging that had to be taking place for. And the rigging is, like, when you set up the bones inside of the character so they can move.

So rigging and animation was.

Jonathan Breeden: Well, and you said you needed some models. What kind of models were you working with? Did you have to have, like, a life-size panda like they used in the movie?

Gabriel Smith: No, no, not necessarily. So with with 3D modeling, they’ll have a 3D version of that character, of Po.

So they set it up for the game for, for the gameplay but they didn’t have anything planned for this animation that I was saying. Like, “Hey, let’s get away from this flip book. I need a whole scene.” So I told them like, “Hey, I need environment models, I need, like, background, a little hut I need more character models.”

And then in that video you’ll see there are these little, like, puppets that Po is playing with when he’s, like, attacking. Okay. So I needed, I needed versions of that. So he really, he really-

Jonathan Breeden: So these are all digital things.

Gabriel Smith: All digital.

Jonathan Breeden: All right, ’cause I thought you were talking about that you actually had, like, a clay model.

Gabriel Smith: Oh, no.

Jonathan Breeden: Yeah, seriously. I mean, when I think about a [00:07:00] 3D model, I think of, like, like a, a clay thing.

Gabriel Smith: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: And then, you know, I think about video games where they, they put people in these suits, and they’ve got 20 probes on them and all that stuff.

Gabriel Smith: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: You ever done stuff like that?

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely. My first company… so I, yeah, I, before I graduated, I actually got hired at Icarus Studios. They hired me as a like a temp. So it was just like, “Hey, it’s just temporary.” Within six months I became the lead animator at that company, and I ran their motion capture studio. So, the whole thing, the whole suit, everything, we did a lot of motions. We did motions for Showtime Dexter iPhone game. That was really fun.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

Gabriel Smith: Doing all those s- s- slices and cuts.

Jonathan Breeden: Right. Right.

Gabriel Smith: And everything. So yeah, motion capture, not only uh, did I, lead it, but I also did acting as well in motion capture.

Jonathan Breeden: Oh, that’s cool.

Gabriel Smith: Yeah. And Animation actually has our own motion capture suit. We have two suits. And again, with learning what I’ve learned from, like, Charlie Brekhardt, you know, keeping the overhead low, I don’t have [00:08:00] a robust system. So it’s a system that doesn’t use any balls. The technology has grown a lot where it’s just sensors now.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. Yeah. I didn’t know that.

Gabriel Smith: So I could actually put the suit on underneath my clothes and act a character out. And I’ve done that at a few trade shows. It was a pretty cool experience.

Jonathan Breeden: Oh, that’s pretty neat. That’s pretty neat.

Gabriel Smith: People will walk up, and they’d see a character. And they’re talking to me, and they’re seeing, oh, the character’s also.

Jonathan Breeden: Right. You’re moving and the character on the screen’s moving at the same time.

Gabriel Smith: Yeah, it was a fun time.

Jonathan Breeden: Man, that’s fascinating. Okay. So, when did you start your own business and why?

Gabriel Smith: Yeah, so the industry it, it was all about creative ownership for me. With the game industry or movie industry, a lot of times where the projects come in, oh, they’re, you know, the job is great, you’re working, but let’s say you’re working on cars.

Well, when cars one, two and three are done, then usually the project is done, you have to, you’ll go somewhere else. So I really wanted to maintain the ownership and the creativity. Epic Games is somebody that I look up a company that I look at. You know, [00:09:00] they can make a lot of any kind of game they want, I feel like because their own game engine.

So their engine is what really what drives their company, not necessarily the games or the products. And so, we have some in-house products that we’re working on to put out. And so that whole idea of that creative ownership is what made me step out of the industry. But I was in the industry for about 10 years, and been running animation for seven years.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. Yeah. Well, you think about Epic Games based in Cary, North Carolina. You know, and you think about all the great games there from Rocket League.

Gabriel Smith: Yeah. Yeah. And Fortnite is a big one.

Jonathan Breeden: Fortnite. Rocket League. My son still plays Rocket League. And, and of course, they’ve sort of mastered the concept of giving the game away hosting the game on a server.

Gabriel Smith: Sure.

Jonathan Breeden: The game is free. Yeah. But then they sell you things to use in the game.

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely.

Jonathan Breeden: Better cars, rocket boosters, different weapons.

Gabriel Smith: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: They create, at least in Rocket League, which is basically soccer with cars in a [00:10:00] futuristic arena that looks like something out of Star Wars, and your goal is to get the car to hit this gigantic-looking soccer ball into a soccer goal.

Right. And they have, they have leagues and competitions and, you know, you’re playing live and then there’s, there’s a, there’s a scoreboard. Right. There’s ranking. And then the season ends about every 90 days, and you have to buy all that stuff again. Right. You gotta buy the new rockets. You gotta buy the better car.

Right. You gotta buy you know, it’s an ingenious idea. It is. You know, fascinating, fascinating. And to think, it’s right there in Cary, North Carolina, probably the second biggest game-making company, one of the top three or four in America-

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely

Jonathan Breeden: right here in Cary. So, that is fascinating.

Have family law questions? Need guidance to navigate legal challenges? The compassionate team at Breeden Law Office is here to help. Visit us at www. breedenfirm. com for practical advice, resources, or to book a [00:11:00] consultation. Remember, when life gets messy, you don’t have to face it alone.

Jonathan Breeden: So what can you do for small businesses like me. I know, I’ve seen your website.

Gabriel Smith: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: I love Oak City Fish and Chips. You did the digital menu there. Talk a little bit about that.

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely. So, when I first started the company, I left with a lot of clients already. So I didn’t do a lot of promotion. I was doing a lot more corporate stuff but now I’m transitioning to help more small businesses mostly with brand identity making sure that their content is copyrighted and they own it. One of my main things sets me apart are digital avatars and mascots. Simplest way I can put it is I can make the gecko for your Geico.

Jonathan Breeden: Right.

Gabriel Smith: Right, and it’s really important ’cause no one can, you know, mess with that gecko and use it on any other commercial or anything or you get sued. It’s IP.

Jonathan Breeden: Right.

Gabriel Smith: So that’s what I like to provide. Like, you know, not just animation, but also giving the small business assets that they can control and use, [00:12:00] and then we also build relationships so we can grow with them. And if their brand change, we have everything that they need in all our assets, and we can grow with them.

Jonathan Breeden: Now, I know Oak City, you did their menu board.

Gabriel Smith: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: As far as that’s concerned. What other types of things. You showed me, and we can’t show this on this podcast or YouTube, but go to his website. You showed me a dog on a business card. And you made the dog come alive.

Gabriel Smith: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: Walk around, lick something and then come back into the spot on the business card.

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely.

Jonathan Breeden: What is that? Explain that. How can that help somebody?

Gabriel Smith: Yeah, absolutely. So, that was called Fat Dog Glazer, and they make awards and statues and bunch of different items that, you know, people can use. And so I met the owner through Tech Factory Productions, and they were looking for a way to spruce up their branding, and their branding is based off of their golden retriever. So bringing it to life, we’re like, “Okay, well, let’s take pictures of your golden retriever,” and we made their actual mascot in 3D, and we made it so that it can come [00:13:00] in and out of the logo.

And they can come back and use that asset as many times as they, as, as they want to. But it was a really good way to s- you know, make them look different online and and bring their mascot to life.

Jonathan Breeden: Now, is that for their website? Is that for their banner ads? I mean, where, where does this dog go?

Gabriel Smith: Yeah, that would be more on social media. So they would use that to promote their services and businesses. Okay. So I do not only promotional videos that we can do for small businesses, but also training videos, in-house training- So we also do explainer videos and in-house training videos for companies

Jonathan Breeden: Okay

Gabriel Smith: so they can train their employees.

Jonathan Breeden: Right. So the, the avatar is teaching-

Gabriel Smith: Yes …

Jonathan Breeden: people- Absolutely … whatever the pr- whatever the employ- employees need to learn.

Gabriel Smith: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: So it’s more engaging for employee training.

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely.

Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: Much better than me standing there talking for an hour, using my iPhone and hand- ho- handing out sheets of paper. That’s how I train my staff.

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely. I think I get a lot of that from, from business owners. They always saying like, ” Oh, I have to always [00:14:00] repeat the process over and over and over again. I get a new client, I have to explain it to them over again.” Well, you know, doing the videos are, as a great way to not only have a random mascot, but I can also create you in 3D as well.

So you could be actually delivering the message with your voice with a 3D character of your own, and you don’t. You could save a lot of time as a business owner not having to repeat that information to every new client you meet or every new customer.

Jonathan Breeden: Well, that’s cool, that’s cool. Yeah, I mean, that thing with the dog, I mean, and that’s their dog.

Gabriel Smith: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: Right. So, I mean, it took a bit, like, I thought that was pretty neat.

Gabriel Smith: Right.

Jonathan Breeden: ‘Cause, I mean, I know what I’m trying to describe as people driving down the road listening to this, but like, literally the picture of the dog is the logo for the business.

Gabriel Smith: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: And in this thing, the dog comes out of the logo, runs around, goes back to the logo. Well, that’s gonna draw your attention.

Gabriel Smith: Right.

Jonathan Breeden: More than just seeing a picture of a dog in a static logo, and that’s basically what you were trying to do.

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely. Scroll stopping, that’s what I call it.

Jonathan Breeden: Right, scroll, that’s right, that’s right. So now, why should I [00:15:00] hire Gabriel Smith when AI will do whatever I want?

Gabriel Smith: That’s true. I think the biggest difference when you work with an animation studio is when you AI really just regurgitates what’s already out there. It just looks at what other people have already done, the existing work, and then they bring then it kinda spits out, you know, almost the same thing. Most multiple people can put in the same prompt and get the same result. With a studio we can stay more on, you know, branding, on your branding guidelines, and make sure that, you know, we adhere to all of your branding guidelines that your company use.

With AI you cannot copyright a lot of that stuff. So sometimes it’s good for like random promotional videos, and it’s a great tool. Like, I’m actually an advocate of it. I use AI in my tool set as well. But when it comes down to brand identity and actually controlling an IP, and you’re a serious company and you take your brand serious, you want to have something created by a human so, you know, you can go and [00:16:00] copyright it and protect it the right way.

Jonathan Breeden: Right. So if you, if I hire you, you’re gonna give me the copyright if you create it?

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely.

Jonathan Breeden: So I will own whatever I pay you for.

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely. We set up contracts for that as well. So, upon approval, you will, you know, the ownership gets turned over to that company. And not only that I love it that way because we, we look at it as building assets for the company, not just- creating a one-off video. We create assets that you can reuse and reuse. So for example with a 3D avatar you would only, you know, pay to have that avatar created once, and there’s no return. Or, you know, you don’t have to keep paying and paying over for that avatar. But then you just say, “Okay, where do you want the avatar now to be?

Where do you want it to say now?” Just like that gecko for, for GEICO, all the different locations, but the asset is always there, and it’s always owned and, and owned by the company.

Jonathan Breeden: That’s pretty neat. Well, and the other thing is when you’re doing it, you know, and I don’t know how many I mean, I’ve know way too much about branding and marketing, you know, having grown the Breeden [00:17:00] Law Office especially.

Gabriel Smith: Sure.

Jonathan Breeden: I spent a lot of time, I have a marketing team, you know, and the color scheme.

Gabriel Smith: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: Is crucial.

Gabriel Smith: Crucial.

Jonathan Breeden: Right. Crucial. It needs to be consistent. The messaging needs to be consistent, and the coloring needs to be consistent.

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely.

Jonathan Breeden: And AI is not gonna be able to make the coloring consistent.

Gabriel Smith: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: And probably isn’t even gonna get the font right.

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely.

Jonathan Breeden: And I never thought about any of this, but the more I’ve studied it and the more we’ve developed our brand assets here at the Breeden Law Office. I have begun to realize just how important that is.

Gabriel Smith: Yes. Consistency is very important, especially when you’re dealing with customers that wanna trust your brand. They want to keep seeing that consistency, that all that messaging, even if you’re not right in front of the camera speaking, you know, that messaging is in that branding, in that coloring. You’re absolutely right. The AI is gonna spit something slightly different every time. And then not only that, someone else can put a similar prompt in and get the same result.

So, you know, you miss out on that human uniqueness.

Jonathan Breeden: Right.

Gabriel Smith: That you get with a studio.

Jonathan Breeden: Right. Well, you’ve started [00:18:00] this mentoring program. Tell me a little bit about that, what you’re doing with that?

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely. So I started teaching at North Carolina Central University. Wanted just to give back and, you know, kind of pay it forward being that person that I needed at that time. And so now what I’m doing is offering some personal training and personal mentorship via Zoom. But I’m also doing, gonna be doing courses, online courses that some will be free. And then I also want to be the Epic of Clayton. That’s the idea.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

Gabriel Smith: So Epic is in Cary, you have Red Storm in Raleigh, and, you know, I wanna really get out there and make some impact with the community. Holding some hopefully some community events where I can reach high school students and early college students that are interested in the 3D animation, and really you know, hone in there, like, “Hey, this is a career that you can have, and it’s not just making video games.

It’s, you know, it’s a wide range of things that you can, you can do.”

Jonathan Breeden: Right. Well, Wake Tech has a video game-making major, I think.

Gabriel Smith: They do.

Jonathan Breeden: You get a two-year degree in it.

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely.

Jonathan Breeden: I don’t exactly [00:19:00] know what it is, but I know Wake Tech has it.

Gabriel Smith: Yeah, absolutely. The, the industry is definitely, definitely growing. And, and yes, Wake Tech has a really good program. NC State has a good program as well, as well. But there’s not a lot of c- community activity.

Jonathan Breeden: Right

Gabriel Smith: it’s more so, like, “Hey, if that’s what you wanna do, then you’ll, you know exactly where to go.”

Jonathan Breeden: Right.

Gabriel Smith: But there’s no real awareness, like, especially in Clayton, there’s, there’s no really, like, hub for it.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. All right. So how can people reach out to you and see some of your work? Your, your website is absolutely fascinating.

Gabriel Smith: Thank you.

Jonathan Breeden: You should go visit it. What is the website?

Gabriel Smith: Yeah, it says anim-nation.com. It’s A-N-I-M dash nation.com. And you can get all to my social media right there from, from that website.

Jonathan Breeden: Right. You’re on LinkedIn as well-

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely

Jonathan Breeden: under gabriel Smith, I think.

Gabriel Smith: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: Right. Yeah, no any other ways people… They can make an appointment to meet with you and see if you can help them right there on your website, right?

Gabriel Smith: Absolutely. Right on the website they can book we do free consultations where we just sit down, talk about your goals, what your business stands [00:20:00] for um, you know, get a nice background on your company before brainstorming some ideas and and, and working with you to, you know, just liven up the, liven up your brand and make it move, come to life.

Jonathan Breeden: That’s pretty cool. That’s pretty cool. So last question we ask everybody on this podcast, what do you love most about Johnston County?

Gabriel Smith: What I love most about Johnston County It really is waking up in the morning and hearing all the birds, my good God. I love it. I mean, the, the nature. Like growing up in Raleigh, it’s not like New York City like- Right.

But it’s far, farther enough away, far enough away from Raleigh where- … you get that open, open country feel, and those birds, I just can’t get enough of them.

Jonathan Breeden: Can’t, can’t get enough of the birds, right?

Gabriel Smith: No.

Jonathan Breeden: They still, there’s still country parts of Johnston County, you know

Gabriel Smith: Yeah

Jonathan Breeden: and it’s not, not the suburban… I mean, it’s coming that

Gabriel Smith: Yeah

Jonathan Breeden: but it’s not quite the, not quite like Raleigh. I understand what you’re saying.

Gabriel Smith: No, I love it. The small town feel is, it’s just great. I love how Clayton is growing but still maintaining the small town feel. I, I, I think that’s a great balance. They’re doing a good job with that.

Jonathan Breeden: They are. They are. Well look, we would [00:21:00] like to a- thank Gabriel Smith of Anim Nation, golly I did say that right, for being our guest on this week’s episode of the Best of Johnston County Podcast. As we mentioned earlier, please like, follow, and subscribe to this podcast wherever you can see it, wherever you see it, whether on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, TikTok, LinkedIn, X or Instagram or any of the other social media channels, the Best Johnston County Podcast.

If you would give, be so kind as to leave us a five star review down below, and tag us in your Instagram stories, Best of Johnston County. Until next time, I’m your host, Jonathan Breeden.

That’s the end of today’s episode of Best of Johnston County, a show brought to you by the trusted team at Breeden Law Office. We thank you for joining us today and we look forward to sharing more interesting facets of this community next week. Every story, every viewpoint adds another thread to the rich tapestry of Johnston County.

If the legal aspects highlighted raised some questions, help is just around the corner at www. breedenfirm. [00:22:00] com.