Dana will be presenting the workshop Principles of Directing Dialogue 

A small-group interactive workshop with BAFTA-winning director Dana Dorian.

Explore the key principles of visual storytelling such as line of action, staging, acting, editing, composition and working with actors. Come prepared to pick up a pen and make some storyboards as you explore different ways to tell a story. (Art skills can be as basic as you like – this is about narrative rather than design.)
If you have an existing storyboard / animatic / short that you’re happy to share please bring that along as there will be opportunities to get feedback, tips and directing tricks!

Friday 21st February 14:00 – 16:00

Dana Dorian is a multi BAFTA-winning director with over 25 years of animation directing experience. Born in Malaysia, raised in New Jersey, and trained as a portrait painter in New York, he has always been fascinated with the human condition and storytelling. After receiving a fine art degree in NY he moved to Scotland, Dundee, where he earned a Master’s Degree in Fine Art . A few months later he saw Toy Story which inspired him to pursue a career in computer animation and film making.

In 1995 Dana was hired by a small CG animation company outside Glasgow where he learned to apply his painting and storytelling skills to computer animation. In Dec 1999 he co-founded Scottish based animation studio Axis Studios Group, which became the largest computer animation company in Scotland before closing in 2024.

Dana’s directorial work spans several different narrative-led styles across a variety of genres. Whether it’s motion capture, key-frame animation, or a combination of the two he strives to tell emotionally charged stories with dark undertones of humor and preferably a twist. Recently he’s contributed to the AAA story cinematics of Halo Inifinte, Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, and was the showrunner for the first two seasons of the popular Nickelodeon series, LEGO City Adventures.