Check Out Maimuna Venzant’s Story

Today we’d like to introduce you to Maimuna Venzant.

Hi Maimuna, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
Currently I’m working as a Background Designer in the animation industry here in LA, but originally I started off in Pre-med. Growing up in Chicago we didn’t really have access to information about the animation or movie industry, so working in entertainment just never crossed my mind even though I often drew as a kid and watched behind the scenes on my Disney VHS tapes. I guess when you’re learning in school you’re mostly taught about the obvious work fields like going into medical or business.

My parents are crazy movie nerds, so I grew up watching old films and anime from a young age along with Disney movies and other live action films. My parents told me when I was around 3 or 4 my favorite movie was “The Lion King” and I would watch it over and over again; quite literally waiting for the VHS tape to rewind so I could push it back in. At some point my passion grew for the arts and I found myself drawing all the time, and I made new friends in middle and high school who loved drawing as well. But at some point I felt I needed to focus on getting a job, which for me was a doctor, so I pretty much stopped drawing to focus on school. But whenever there was an assignment that involved some kind of drawing, I just went all out. I really should have figured out my feelings then. But after high school, off I went to Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) in 2012 to pursue a career in Medicine.

But once I hit university, the door literally came ramming in my face as I realized that a career in medicine wasn’t for me. I spoke to my parents about changing my major to something else but my mom being in business and especially my dad being an engineer scientist were insistent that I stick it out. And after trying a bit longer I said nope and changed my major to computer science without telling them. But still I found myself dissatisfied in computer science as well although I found it more enjoyable than Biology and Physics. This was about the time when I found myself drawing again because it was the one thing that really made me happy. I also found myself rediscovering behind the scenes footage for old Disney movies on YouTube; and it was then that I realized what I wanted to do. Only problem is that IIT was a tech school and the closest major they had to art was architecture, so I wound up changing my major one more time to Technical Communications; a degree where I could take some communication classes but keep all my previous credits in computer science and still graduate on time. That was when I had a proper talk with my mom who figured I had changed my major without letting them know. My mom was also a professional ballet dancer and was a bit more chill compared to my dad so she told me to just finish my degree and then in grad school I could do whatever I wanted. So, I wrapped up my undergrad degree and went to Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) for Animation in 2016.

Time at SCAD was really fun as I was finally doing what I wanted to do and took classes with people who loved the same things I did, but there was still one thing left to figure out. Exactly what did I want to do in Animation? Animation is very compartmentalized, and each group works on very specific things. At the time I wanted to do 2D animation but that was pretty much out the window since 3D had taken over and if a show or movie was in 2D, they were usually shipped overseas to be done in another country. Luckily in Grad School, they had us take classes in a bit of everything but something that really stuck with me was an environment class I took in the comics department. I loved drawing characters as well but something about the detail in the lines and precision that made up a building or a tree just really stuck with me and I never looked back.

In my last year at SCAD I built an environment/ background design portfolio I felt was pretty good and I learned how to bring my environments to life with a bit of animation in Adobe After Effects. Finally, I decided to apply to some internships, and after receiving some advice, I nailed one in the Fall of 2019 at DreamWorks TV animation. There I interned on Spirit Riding Free and The Hub department where they touched on almost every show there at the time. I had a blast at DreamWorks but still had a lot to learn. Soon, out of a lot of hard work and luck one specific environment city piece I made that sprinkled a bit of 2D animation of cars and flying ships caught the attention of a Disney recruiter, Serah Barela, on Linked-In; and she asked me if I wanted to possibly intern at Disney TVA (the company of my dreams). After this, working in animation became an actual real possibility for me and really solidified this career path with my parents. While my parents have always been supportive, they really became my biggest cheerleaders after this.

My time as an intern at Disney TVA was really important for me because next to DreamWorks which was a production internship, the Disney TVA internship was an actual Art internship; so we were given real work and special art assignments that we showcased to professionals working at the studio. This was also a time where I began to doubt myself going into background design so I found myself deciding to go towards background paint instead. But after an assignment for designing backgrounds in the style of “Gravity Falls,” a background designer by the name of Luciano Herrera pulled me aside and encouraged me to follow through with background design. He thought my layouts were great and even gave me photoshop brushes they used specifically for “DuckTales.” It was really encouraging and after that I went home and threw out my entire portfolio to create a brand new one, one that would guarantee me a worthy spot as a background designer in the animation industry.

Finally, after graduating from my internships and working on a brand-new portfolio I was hired on my first show, “Disenchantment,” an adult comedy for Netflix at Rough Draft Studios. After that I was back at Disney TVA where I was offered a position on a reboot of one of my favorite childhood TV shows, “The Proud Family: Louder and Prouder.” After chillin with the Proud Family crew, I was able to go back to Rough Draft Studios and then back to Disney TVA again. Honestly, I didn’t know how it could get much better than this, until out of nowhere, I was offered a chance to defend Gotham City at Warner Bros Animation on “Batman: Caped Crusader” for Amazon Prime.

Recounting all this, I can’t express just how grateful I’ve been for all of these opportunities, some people may say it’s luck but a lot of blood sweat and tears went into where I am today. I am someone who really just can’t stop drawing unless I’m watching TV or playing video games. I love this craft so much, and to become a professional you really have to love it and put in a lot of work.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I would say I’ve had it maybe smoother than many others looking to work in Animation, but I definitely had some bumps and challenges and that’s to be expected. I think what helped me along the way is just always drawing for myself, never really worrying about what other people may want to see like on social media. If you draw what you love then you’ll find people who can truly connect with you because of that. I think same idea pretty much goes for anything.

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I specialize in Background Design also known as Layout or Environment Design in Animation; meaning my job is to draw or design pretty much everything you see behind characters in a cartoon or animation. So, things like bedrooms, parks, cities, etc. However, I love drawing medieval characters and illustrations for my personal work.

I think what I’m most proud of is just getting better and better at the craft. When you start out you’re given smaller backgrounds to do because you’re still new and learning, but over time you find yourself being given larger and more complicated backgrounds to do that really puts what you’ve learned to the test, and it just really makes me feel proud myself to know that my art director and design leads trust me enough to do such a complicated background.

It’s a little hard to say what sets me apart from other background designers because everyone is just so amazingly talented, it’s insane. But for me its probably how much detail I put into a scene; which is sometimes to my detriment. I say this because backgrounds already take a significant amount of time and effort to do, so to add more detail is sometimes a crazy idea. But I feel for us as artists it’s such a passion, if we know just one more detail of adding an extra car will make the background that much better then we will do it, even if it’s only shown on screen for one second.

Can you talk to us a bit about the role of luck?
I wouldn’t say I believe in the concept of ‘Luck’ or even ‘Talent’ whole-heartedly. I don’t like the idea when people attribute something to just luck or talent because it undermines all the hard work someone had to put in to get to get where they are. I think you really do have to put in the hard work first so that when those lucky moments show up you’re prepared for them. For example, I may have gotten lucky in meeting the creator for “The Proud Family”, Bruce Smith, but he wouldn’t have hired me if my work didn’t hold up. I’m also the one who personally asked Bruce to meet while I was an intern as well; so you really have to put yourself out there and set yourself up for lucky opportunities to happen, and again, be prepared for them when they do pop up.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.maimunaart.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/maiguy_draws/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maimuna-venzant-493578113/
• Twitter: https://x.com/maiguy_draws
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@maiguy_draws/featured
• Other: https://www.instagram.com/maiguy_sketches/

Image Credits
Maimuna Venzant