Mentee Update: Kathy Liu

Titmouse Foundation wanted to take a moment to congratulate Kathy Liu (2022 Future Directors Program) on becoming an assistant director at Marvel Animation! We caught up with her to learn more about her journey and any advice she may give to other artists interested in directing.

A sample of Kathy’s comedy-action work created as a part of the Future Director’s Program

Many board artists are interested in climbing the ladder and landing their first directing position. How do you think you got the position over others?

Let's be real, there were a lot of people more qualified for the job who said no! I work with a lot of wildly talented people who are absolute experts in their craft AND experts in their outside passions -- people who draw/board way better than I do, people who know so many things that I don't know. The way I see it, animation is a dynamic village that plays a lot of musical chairs, which means that sooner or later, we're all going to be boarding and directing and working for/with each other in recombinant ways. In certain respects, I don't know how to compare myself to other people; I just know what works for me, board artist or no, director or no, so... here goes! 

I make a lot of mistakes, often dumb mistakes, all the time. It's the only way I know how to learn, which

requires a healthy amount of forgiveness for yourself and for others

in order to keep going. Endurance + second chances = resilience. They're underrated skills that I'm still building upon, but are worth everything.

I also unironically enjoy meetings, and I think that helps in the day-to-day. I spent the first few years of my career in production management for VFX and then indie games, and those roles are pretty much allll meetings. Those years gave me an invaluable chance to find my voice as a teammate (aka. a communication style). From the production side, you also really get to see how important each person's contributions are, their unique needs, strengths, and the 'language' of how their minds work... and you also get really flexible about what it means to exercise your own creative muscles and contribute.

Can a well-delivered question be a creative act?

Can taking notes, and making a point of highlighting the cool idea that your brilliant colleague shared in the room, be a creative act? Can a spreadsheet be a beautiful and satisfying creation, organizing chaos into order, possibility into structure... just the same as any other artwork? Why not! 

When you're working a production role, you're exposed to a pretty enormous amount of change, big and small, that crops up on a daily basis.  Things are *often* not as anticipated (perhaps especially true in game development).  It becomes a matter of survival to learn to adapt.  Change isn't always fun, but you can, in fact, learn to be more comfortable with surprise, uncertainty, and disappointment through practice and exposure.  To this day, I'm still working on growing this in myself too.

Regarding visual storytelling itself -- talking over TV/movies, spending more time reading, and working as a board artist have, over time, really helped me tune into my personal opinions/tastes. Style is one part of that, sure, but maybe the most useful part of a personal sensibility is simply spotting what works, and having a sense of what mystery-ingredient to add if something feels missing...  Other than that, I try to be as open as possible about what that looks like in practice. 

I love other people's ideas. I love asking questions. I love being surprised by people. I love jamming together where you're so utterly immersed in the brainstorm, that the 'winning' idea that gets everyone excited doesn't even 'belong' to a single person anymore. Now that's magic. I'm motivated and ignited when I have a sense of purpose, when I feel that people are counting on me to do a good job, to make space for them, to really see and understand them, to do right by them. I like listening and holding hands when things get hard. I like getting creative with problem-solving when we hit a wall or some other cartoon crisis. It can be kinda transformative to put out proverbial fires together, to discover new strengths and capacities in yourself and the amazing people around you. And surviving those fire drills is only possible with respectful honesty: direct and clear, yet inviting and gentle. 

Drawing by Kathy Liu

Is the position what you expected or different?

Going in, I'd been aware that directing and AD'ing isn't necessarily a linear scale-up of the 'creative control' or 'creative satisfaction' that we all dream about sometimes… but you do have a bit more room to make choices that you might not have been responsible for before. Sometimes that's fun and creative, and other times it's the kind of problem-solving that doesn't appear to be so 'artistic' but is meaningful nonetheless! 

At times, I find that you have to make a personal choice between your need to 'be the hero' vs. really doing the right thing by others. It's tricky -- those two things are not always the same thing.

In other words, it's an ego-check.

And I think that choice counts a bit louder when you're leading vs. contributing individually. 

AD'ing on Xmen 97 is pretty much half storyboarding and half shadowing/supporting my episode director, David Au. It's really fun. I love that I get to spend more of my hours talking to people, and still get a little smattering of drawing time too. It's lots of multi-tasking, which keeps things fresh and limber, but is also regularly challenging.

I sincerely don't think I could have asked for a better place to have my first assistant-directing experience. It's a really good team to be a part of, because people are so genuinely supportive of one another and everyone just wants to help -- all credits to Sean Gantka, our producer, for laying the foundation of how this team was built. The more I see and understand, the more impressive and special it lands on me. So a good bit of this experience has been 'easier' than expected because there are so many good intentions in the air, and that makes it easier to be your best self too. 

You've taught a boarding class as well, has that helped you in any way on your journey to being a director?

Absolutely. Teaching was an incredible and humbling opportunity for me to learn how to help others grow along their own unique journeys. 

At Gnomon, I taught a class where the majority of the students in the class were there as part of their foundational curriculum, not typically with the intention of becoming a board artist. Cool! I had to make something that could still be valuable and relevant to them, while the school needed me to hold their work to industry-level standards for storyboarding. How? Go deeper, and stay flexible. Put your student's goals first and try to speak to the things that would help them get closer to the things they cared about… NOT to measure them against the template of the ‘ideal storyboarder.’ As a teacher, you're there to set up opportunities for growth, and embrace whatever result comes out of it. The result may be different from what you expect, and sometimes it'll excite you, and sometimes it might puzzle you. But that one result isn't the end-all be-all either... it's a much longer, iterative process of learning and becoming. 

Over time, it revealed to me what lessons mattered most -- what are the hardest things to teach? That the students might not have the chance to learn through their later-curriculum classes (which catered towards specialization)? And when the tools and technology will almost certainly change by the time they're on the job? Storytelling, meaning, film language, how to make choices, how to make people feel feelings, how to 'see'... and hopefully, how to continue learning forever.

My teaching experience showed me how much I needed to mature myself too. I'm kind of a blunt, small-town East-Coast Chinese woman in my raw form. I'm a sensitive being at heart like most artists, a little rough around the edges, and I have needed to learn both how to be strong and how to be gentle. When someone is looking for my feedback, I'm not sure if it's generous enough for me to say, "Looks good, keep going! You’re awesome!" I've never thought I was being helpful enough by saying just that. But I ground all feedback as much as possible in the truth and in specificity, rather than blanket statements of judgment. It's about what's working, or what might have a bit of a gap between the

original intention and its execution. I like to invite, suggest, and "try things out" – together. You can sometimes really limit people when you spell out exactly what you want them to do, so I try not to dictate instructions unless I'm really trying to die on a hill, which is (hopefully) not very often. 

I read this amazing quote in a book once that goes something like:

"The greatest sin of a leader is to extinguish the human spirit."

I think there's a responsibility there that you have to carry very tenderly as a leader and as a teacher. 

Any advice for other board artists interested in directing or assistant directing?

Spend some time finding your voice — not just artistically, but also as a teammate. Some of it you can learn on the job, and some you really can't. Go out in the world to learn about yourself. Figure out what’s important to you, what you can live without, or what you can be looser with.

Read something, anything— it doesn't matter what, just start with something that's interesting to you. You don't have to squeeze yourself into the box of what you think people want you to be but explore what is natural and enjoyable to you and see what happens! 

Look for / stumble upon / forever appreciate good mentors. Mikhael Fallik, Eric Elrod, and Ken Wong are some of the people I've had the enormous privilege of learning from and walking alongside baby step by baby step (aka. stumble by stumble). On X-Men ‘97, those awesome folks were Emi/Emmett Yonemura and David Au. Maybe not formal "Mentors" with the big fancy sticker, but credit where credit is due: they've each been incredible teachers who really shaped the kind of artist, filmmaker, and teammate/leader that I want to be. Your mentors will have other names, other styles, other amazing things to share. Your story, your people, and your path will be your own. 

When you're spending time with a mentor, do probe for the wisdom, the hot-takes, and the opinions with the proverbial 'stinky-tofu funk' (as in, some will love it, some will hate it). Remember that someone else's opinion doesn't have to be your own, and the more comfortable you are with that, the more you'll find capacity to expose yourself to a greater variety of interesting, valuable, funky, offbeat opinions that you couldn't have discovered yourself (and still don't need to agree with at the end of the day). That's what filmmaking is all about, right? Empathy and POV. 

The best mentors that I've known have always had both the hot-takes AND the room to let me make up my own mind. In all collaborations, I believe it's similarly essential to ensure everyone at the table is given this creative and intellectual autonomy and respect.

When it comes to finding your own mentorship experience, listen to A LOT of different people's stories and appreciate the diversity of them.

One of my favorite parts of doing the Titmouse Future Directors program

was hearing all the different stories and philosophies each session mentor shared… and admiring just how unique each story was! 

Watch stuff! You don't have to watch what everybody else is watching (unless you want to), and you don’t have to do the IMDB Top 100 List or the Criterion Collection or the latest & greatest. But you do have to watch stuff that's not just your favorites on repeat, because you don't want to get stuck reinventing the wheel when you're boarding/directing/filmmaking. When you watch a healthy amount of things that are new to you, you'll have some things to talk about, and examples to pull from when you're jamming. 

Director or no, I think it's really important to figure out how to make it sustainable.

It's a long road, and you don't want to burn out. Part of the practice is how you take care of yourself in a practical sense or how you manage your time inside and outside of work… But the other, I think, is spiritual. What are the stories you tell yourself, when things are good or when things are hard? Do you have a kernel of your soul in which you can stake your inherent self-worth, to weather the ups and downs that the journey will take you on and test of your worthiness? Do you have beliefs worth fighting for? 

Finally, be brave! There's nothing wrong with reaching out to someone and asking a question— the worst that can happen is someone says no, and you graciously move on. But you can at least rest easy knowing that you tried a little something, and the next day you'll try a little something else.

Congrats again to Kathy for her promotion and if this interview is any indication, we are positive she’s going to an amazing job!!