As a child of the 90’s, I was lucky I was introduced to art, film and books at a very early age. My mother is a mixed media artist and introduced me to a myriad of interesting and colourful people and I attribute my love of storytelling to her. My father was a general manager and I got my sense of humour from him. Since I was 8 years old, I’ve been telling my stories. At first it was in written form and submitted to a local children’s newspaper, but, as my interest in turning words into visuals became stronger, I began submitting comics. I was not aware that a career as an animator was an option at all, I assumed only people who worked at Disney, Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon were allowed to create these amazing shows and films. And those studios seemed very far away from where I was in Chennai. At 15, when it became clear that I wasn’t going to be a doctor, engineer or lawyer (by all the doodles and comics in my textbooks and on one or two exam papers) my father told me about the National Institute of Design and suddenly the dream of being an animator didn’t seem so unattainable. The reason I wanted to be an animator was because I felt animation could tell stories in an unassuming but powerful way. I believe, even now, that animation can broach subjects from comedy, satire, obscure and serious issues in a relatable way, keeping the intended emotion intact. Recently, movies like bread winner have made this more apparent. One of the happiest moments I remember was my acceptance into the Post Graduate program for Animation and Film Design at NID. It was at design school that I met people who appreciated me for the loud, odd, geeky person I was! It wasn’t uncool to collect indie graphic novels or talk about/dissect your favourite animation movie. I had found my tribe! Fresh out of college, my first job was as an animation designer. I was lucky to have two amazing bosses, both women, who motivated me when I was so clearly scared the first few months and later encouraged me to take up projects from start to finish. It was here that I began experimenting with the idea of original content for animation. At this point, I have recently jumped into the role of a freelancer. I have always been a hands-on artist and love collaborating with different artists to create the next story.