Todd Shaffer has over 20 years of production experience
in the entertainment and advertising industry, working on commercials,
movies, television shows, video game cinematics and documentaries.
As a director, he has directed both live-action and animation, including
cel animation, 3D CGI animation, and stop-motion animation. As a
writer, he has two feature-length screenplays sold, one in pre-production
and one in developement.
After graduating from the Film and Television Department
of Montana State University, Todd moved to Los Angeles and
worked crew on a documentary and low-budget feature film while shopping
his senior film to animation studios. Within weeks he was hired
by the Academy Award winning animation shop Playhouse Pictures
in Hollywood, where he would spend the next nine years working his
way from production coordinator, to character animator and animation
director, often supervising the live-action shoots where the studio
would add the animation later.
After nine years of tight deadlines and incessant pressures from
ad agencies, Todd left Playhouse Pictures to focus on character
animation. For the next 4 years he worked as a freelance character
animator for Duck Soup Productions, Cornell Abood, Sim Ex
Digital, Celluloid Studios, Kurtz & Friends, Big Fish Studios,
Klasky Csupo Commercials, and Rich Entertainment
who brought him on board to animate the lead characters
of Anna and the King for the feature animated version of The
King and I.
During his time in LA, Todd had animated many cartoon celebrities
including Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Tony the Tiger, Fred
Flintstone, Diggum the Frog, Toucan Sam, Tigger and Winnie
the Pooh, just to name a few.
In 2001 Todd moved to Montreal where he would direct commercials
for Pascal Blais for the next five years. In 2006 he joined
Big Bang Digital Studios to