About Kickstand

Kickstand is a research and development studio for animation production. Innovative content often calls for cutting-edge techniques to bring it to life. Most studios, however, can not afford to keep R&D or even tools developers or technical directors on staff and must search for freelancers to create hurried and temporary fixes. The number of capable freelancers in this area is small and the challenges are increasingly complex.

With almost 30 years of combined industry experience, Kickstand can provide consulting, tools development, pipeline engineering, character development and timely maintenance that's tailored to your studio's needs. We are always ready for your studio's everyday and upcoming challenges. We believe that the creation of innovative techniques opens the door for new forms of creative expression and that content and story-telling are the sparks for technological innovation. Technologies developed in-house by Kickstand will be showcased and tested through our own production work so keep a lookout for what's coming next!

Partner Biographies

	Daniel Dawson leads Kickstand's Character Technology Division and has been in the computer graphics industry for nearly ten years. Before founding Kickstand, he worked at DreamWorks Animation as a Character Technical Director on films such as "Shrek 2", "Shrek the Third", and "Monsters vs. Aliens". While at DreamWorks, he was given a technical achievement award for his involvement in the development of a system for animating and simulating hair. He presented on behalf of DreamWorks at The Visual Effects Society, and Siggraph. Daniel also worked in the video game industry as a modeler and character technical director. He worked on the NBA2K series of games published by Sega Sports.
	Greg Elshoff leads the Kickstand Studio Tools Division. He developed the patented pipeline at Launch, in New York, that provides the flexibility and speed demanded by test commercial production. Greg presented at the Autodesk Developer Conference and Autodesk's Masterclass with his unique knowledge in the Autodesk MotionBuilder SDK. He started his education at The Ohio State University in Computer Science and Engineering and finished in the Computer Animation program at Full Sail Real World Education. Greg began his development career at The Ballistic Pixel Lab in Orlando, Florida where he created tools and pipelines for 3D character animations, game cinematics, and an online 3D home interior design application.
	Rob O'Neill is the Kickstand Producer and leads the Research and Development Division. Rob received his BA in Anthropology from Brooklyn College (CUNY) and an MFA in Digital Design and Technology from Parsons School of Design. Previous to founding Kickstand, he was a researcher at the American Museum of Natural History, Character Technical Director at DreamWorks Animation on "Shrek 2" and "Madagascar", Character Technical Director at Charlex, Studio Technical Director at Eyebeam, and Director of the Digital Arts Research Lab at Pratt Institute. He is the author of the textbook "Digital Character Development: Theory and Practice" and is on the Digital Arts faculty at Pratt Institute and a Mentor at TD College.