Join us in celebrating Women in Animation during the month of March! Learn about the women that have broken barriers in the field of animation. Featured women work for Disney, animated films, animated TV shows, and video games.
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Jane Baer began her animation career as an assistant animator on Sleeping Beauty. She later worked on the animation for The Rescuers, The Fox and The Hound, and The Black Cauldron. After she left Disney, she created her own animation company Baer Animation.
Photo taken from TCM Classic Film Festival
Bianca Majolie was the first woman hired in the story department for Walt Disney, where she made changes and offered different perspectives to her stories than the typical gag oriented ones. She also translated Carlo Collodi's novel Pinocchio to English, and offered advice on how the story could be improved. In 1938, Bianca provided early versions of artwork for Cinderella, and Peter Pan; as well as providing conceptual art work for Fantasia, and Bambi.
Photo taken from Celebration Press
Sylvia Moberly-Holland was the second woman to be hired at the Walt Disney story department. Sylvia was not only an artist but an accomplished musician, which proved useful for segments of Fantasia. This lead to her being Disney's first female story lead; developing art, character designs, and dance sequences.
Photo taken from The Disney Elite
Mary Blair introduced modern art to the Walt Disney studio with her childlike art style. In 1941 she was named art supervisor on The Three Caballeros, and Saludos Amigos. Her unique style influenced a lot of the postwar Disney prodecutions. She was later asked assist in the design for It's a Small World for the 1964 World's Fair, which lead to future contributions to the Disney theme parks in California and Florida.
Photo taken from Leonard Maltin.
Though her career was brief at Disney, Retta Scott left her mark as the Disney's first woman animator to receive screen credit for the movie Bambi. Soon after, she began working on Dumbo as well as portions of The Wind in the Willows, and The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad. Even after she was laid off, she still made contributions to Disney as a freelance artist.
Image taken from Retta Scott Wikipedia.
Domee Shi started working at Disney's Pixar studio in 2011, where she was a storyboard artist and animator for Inside Out, The Good Dinosaur, Incredibles 2, and Toy Story 4. Shi was the first woman to direct an animated short, especially one of her own making, titled Bao, which she won the academy award for. There are hopes that through this short, among other titles, that it would allow more inclusivity in the stories told through Disney and Pixar.
Image taken from IMDb.
Emily Dean began drawing at age 3 and making her own films at age 12, she started working professionally as a storyboard artist as age 15. She studied at California Institute of the Arts, and began training in the storyboard department of Pixar. She went on to work at Warner Bros. where she worked as a story artist for The Lego Batman Movie, The Lego Movie Sequel, and Scoob.
Photo taken from her website.
Michiyo Yasuda worked with Hayao Miyazaki on 13 animated productions. She was responsible for bringing his creations to life, leading Studio Ghibli's color department from the beginning up until her death in 2016.
Photo taken from MyAnimeList.
Jennifer Yuh Nelson's work on Kung Fu Panda deemed her a "triple threat," she was the films story artist, head of story, and contributing director. Other works consist of Dark City, Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron, Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas, and Madagascar.
Photo taken from Animation Magazine.
Atsuko Tanaka is regarded as one of the top veteran animators in Japan. She has been the key animator for many films like Howl's Moving Castle, Ponyo, Princess Mononoke, Summer Wars, and Your Name.
Photo from Anime Fest 2021
Lorna Cook started her animation career by working for major studios like Disney and DreamWorks. Currently she is working as a freelance artist. Her most notable works are An American Tail, The Land Before Time, and All Dogs Go To Heaven.
Image taken from Mubi.
Rebecca Sugar made Cartoon Network history being the first woman to be a solo creator for her show Steven Universe. Through the series, Sugar is paving the way for LGBTQ+ representation in cartoon and animation
Photo taken from KidScreen.
Taylor K. Shaw is an animator whose dreamed of hiring female animators who looked like the Black female leads that she created. It was brought to her attention that animators like she imagined were few and far between. Instead she built an animation company called Black Women Animate, to help women of color, and create equity in the entertainment industry. Black Women Animate is currently in partnership with Cartoon Network, providing original content, and production services for their new shows.
Photo from her website.
Daron Nefcy is the creator and executive producer of Emmy winning animated TV show Star VS. The Forces of Evil. She's been awarded Variety's "10 Animators to Watch" and Forbes list of 30 Under 30 for 2015.
Photo taken from Pinterest.
Kumiko Takahashi is an anime character designer and animation director for numerous anime shows. Her works include Ouran High School Host Club, Full Metal Alchemist, Snow White with the Red Hair, and InYuasha.
Jennell Jaquays has authored several Dungeons and Dragons scenarios, then eventually moved on to video games in the 1980's where she designed conversions for Pac-Man, and Donkey Kong. In the late 90's to early 2000's she created art designs for Halo Wars, and Age of Empires III.
Photo taken from Den of Geek.
In 1980 Dona Bailey joined the Atari coin-op division, where she was the only woman; two weeks into her work she was given a binder of possible ideas. Of all the ideas the one that stood out to her the most was Centipede, and everything fell into place in how she wanted the game to be designed.
Photo taken from Atari Women.
Ikumi Nakamura was the creative director and art director at Tango and Zenimax where she was the games like The Evil Within, and Ghostwire: Tokyo. She is currently a freelance game designer. Other works include Okami, Bayonetta, and Resident Evil 2.
Photo taken from GiantBomb.
Roberta Williams first step into video games was in 1979, when she created the first adventure game (Mystery House) to incorporate graphics. In her follow up game Wizard and the Princess, she included color graphics, which was another first for the video game industry. Her most notable video game creation is the King's Quest series.
Photo and information taken from VG Legacy.
