Health insurance can be confusing: What’s covered? What’s not? How much will YOU have to pay? We worked with the folks at Banner Health to help take the mystery out of medical billing through a three episode series. Episode One is all about Pricing Transparency and Patient Estimates. Episode Two is all about Co-Pays, Co-Insurance and Deductibles. Episode Three covers the overall Billing Experience. Hopefully these videos can help demystify the health insurance billing process, helping us all feel more empowered– we definitely learned a lot!

Here are some of our favorite behind-the-scenes elements from the series:

Storyboards

Style Frames

Animations

Want to gain professional experience in a production studio? At Planet Nutshell we’re all about telling great stories and creating animation with impact. We offer seasonal internships for college students and recent college graduates to learn and assist with our production process, from concept and storyboarding to designs and animation.

Under the guidance of our team, you’ll have the opportunity to collaborate with other designers and animators while honing your artistic skill. At the beginning of each internship we work with you to determine your goals and throughout your time with Planet Nutshell you will go through each phase of production: Pitch, script, storyboard, style frames & design, mograph and character animation.

We will give you projects to help you develop and grow your skills in the area you choose via small assignments and working closely with your mentor staff member. (Please note that we are working remotely during the Coronavirus Pandemic.)

What you need:

• Positive attitude and willingness to learn
• A willingness to look at your own work with a critical eye, listen to feedback, and make changes accordingly
• Proficiency with After Effects and Adobe Illustrator.

What we offer:

• Guidance and mentorship to help you build your portfolio and professional work experience.
• A flexible schedule: Length of internship and daily hours are negotiable.
• Current students can earn credit, or if you’re just out of school you are eligible, as well.
• You will be paid for any client work you do.
• Fall Internship: September-November
• Winter Internship: January-March
• Summer Internship: May-July

We post our Call for Interns approximately one month prior to the start date. Please check this page at that time for a link to the application and any other necessary information. We ask that you please prepare your reel, behind the scenes materials such as sketches, and resume prior to applying.

Want to know more? Here is our handy Nutshellian Guide to Animation Internships: How to Get One & Get the Most Out of One!

In honor of Black History Month, the Planet Nutshell team is paying homage to some of the Black artists who have inspired our own work.

Kicking it off is Songyi Park, with a portrait of the incredible Jean-Michel Basquiat. Before turning his attention to painting, Basquiat got his start as a graffiti artist in the 1970s. His work caught the attention of Andy Warhol, who became a friend, and at 22, Basquiat was the youngest artist to ever exhibit at New York’s Whitney Bienniel. See his paintings for yourself at basquiat.com.

This is a portrait of director Peter Ramsey, created by PN’s resident film buff Jen Sanchez. While Ramsey is best known for directing Rise of the Guardians and Spiderman: Into the Spider-verse, he actually got his start as a storyboard artist on films like Fight Club, Minority Report and Independence Day. To learn more about him, visit Sony Pictures Animation.

For her portrait, Mollie Davis chose artist and innovator Kara Walker. Walker is most known for her investigations of race, gender, sexuality and violence through the use of room room-sized, black-paper silhouettes. She is one of the youngest-ever winners of the MacArthur Genius grant, and her name even appears in a Le Tigre song. For more info on Kara, check out karawalkerstudio.com.

We have a small staff here at Planet Nutshell, with a core, full-time team of just four: Josh is our Creative Director, Jen is our Art Director, Mollie is our Senior Animator and Sam is our Producer. But though we are small, we are mighty, and manage to get a lot of work done. However, there are times when project deadlines overlap, and we need to call in some trusted back-up.

Luckily, over the years, we’ve developed great working relationships with talented freelance artists all over the world. Writers, designers, 2D & 3D animators, voiceover artists, sound designers, musicians, translators… you name it. Whatever the project, we have someone we trust that we can call on. 

And we are always on the lookout for new freelancers, too, with unique skills and talents that can compliment or serve as an extension of our own. We all spend a lot of time on Dribble, watching animation reels and reaching out to inspiring artists. 

We know how helpful a freelance roster is… and how intimidating it can be to develop. You always want your clients to experience studio quality-work, even if that work is being completed by non-studio staff. So we asked Jen (our art director who directly oversees our freelancers) to describe their top attributes when it comes to some of the more common types of freelance artists we employ as an animation studio.

1. Design Freelancers

When it comes to design, there are two key attributes we look for: versatility and experience with animation-friendly designs. When we find a designer who is versatile, we can use them on a wider range of projects, and when they know how to make their designs animation-ready (aka full designs, layers and all clearly labeled), we know we’ll be able to run with whatever they send along and meet whatever deadline we are up against.

2. Character Animators

At PN, we are passionate about using characters to tell stories and making those characters as true-to-life as possible. So when looking for character animators, we put a lot of weight on their ability to execute believable movements. We also look at animation style. The majority of our projects are 2D, but an ideal freelancer has more than one style in their repertoire (puppeted, hand-drawn, 3D, etc), so we can offer a wider range of services and styles to our clients.

3. Mograph

With motion graphics, it’s all about timing/easing skills, and artists’ ability to convey different kinds of momentum and energy through their animations. Though, of course, we never discount technical ability and complexity. We love seeing interesting transitions or animations that combine a variety of skills into a single project, such as shape layers, tweens, textures, lighting, effects and 3D skills.

4. General Freelancers

For all of our other freelancers, there are four main considerations. The first is organization: Do they keep their files clearly labeled so that we can go in and make quick edits internally as needed? The second is software: Do they have fluency in the software that we use here internally (Adobe Creative Suite & CD4)? Third, communication: Do they share updates with our team as they go so we can feel confident in the progress that’s being made? And last (but not least) is time management: Do they hit deadlines and keep the work pipeline moving? Certainly there have been incidents where life happens and delays occur, but if we notice a pattern, we have to do what’s right by our clients and will generally choose to work with someone else in the future.

There are so many things we love about animation here at Planet Nutshell (obviously!), but one of them is definitely the collaborative nature of animation as an artform: Many talents and visions coming together to make something better than one could alone. We’re so lucky we get to collaborate with such talented freelance artists year after year, and we’re constantly amazed at what can be done remotely, from ANYWHERE, when you all work together as a team.