Bruce Alcock – Born and raised in [Newoundland|newfoundlandlabrador.com], Bruce Alcock has worked internationally as a director for the past 19 years. He continues to develop a technique-agnostic approach to production: live action, CGI, drawing, painting, photo-animation, film scratching, stop-motion: whatever is right for the project. Bruce studied tuba performance and comparative literature at the University of Toronto, then moved to Barcelona, where he apprenticed with animator Dirk Van de Vondel. Global Mechanic is his third production company; he founded Cuppa Coffee Animation in Toronto (1991) and Tricky Pictures in Chicago (1995). He also designed the font [Soupbone, distributed by [FontShop International|fontshop.com/fonts/downloads/fontfont/ff_soupbone_ot/]. His most recent short film [Vive la Rose|nfb.ca/vivelarose], a co-production with the [NFB|nfb.ca], is a heartbreaking story of unrequited love based on the [Émile Benoît|heritage.nf.ca/society/benoit.html] recording of the song. It is currently in its festival run, with stops so far at TIFF and Sundance among many others.
Justin Longoz – Born and raised in Vancouver BC, Justin is an up and coming creative with experience in most forms of animation. He has been working for Global Mechanic since 2006 and in that time has had hands on experience animating for short films and commercials in all kinds of formats and styles. He’s the co-creator of 1998creative and runs the Global Mechanic blog. In his free time Justin enjoys posting to his tumblr account, drawing comics, animating small projects, watching 90s action films and traveling when he gets the chance.
Joe Truesdell – Born and raised in Vancouver Joe spent his formative years dismantling and trying to put back together anything he could get his little hands on. His future was set the day he successfully hooked up his dads’ 8mm camera to his Betamax to make home movies. From then on his passion was electronics, solving problems and video production. In his early 20’s Joe worked in telecommunications by day, then sweated it out behind a guitar at night. After the sinking of the telecommunications biz, Joe completed his CompTIA A+ certification then started and ran a successful Systems Support company with Global Mechanic as one of his clients. Global Mechanic’s growth was great enough that they called on him full time. Now he’s the guy responsible for all our Technical gear, communications and workflow.
He’s not a Mac or a PC… he’s both.
Here’s some more Joe stuff
Nathaniel Akin – was born on an island and grew up along the west coast of North America. He moved to Canada in the early nineties and started a diversity of work in architectural art, cinematography and set sculpture for films and commercials. While studying at Emily Carr he rediscovered his childhood love of animation and started blending it with a natural inclination toward technical wonder. He’s created interactive design work for the web, kiosks and video games. Nathaniel joined Global Mechanic as a Director in 2003 and has created ad campaigns for clients including Bell Canada, Kelloggs and Bank of America. He posts random odd images on [tumblr|mix.filmblender.com] and suffers from the occasional bout of [tech-envy|techenvy.com].
Ken Meyer – Raised in Chicago drawing in his sketchbooks, Ken moved to Tucson, AZ to pursue 350 days of sunshine per year and a BFA at the University of Arizona. Upon graduation, he spent five years at East West Media Productions creating 2D, 3D, and stop motion animation. In 1998 he moved to Vancouver to experience six months of rain a year and study character animation at the Vancouver Film school. After completing the course, he was hired as the Animation Director for Lost Boys Studios where he worked until 2004. Ken then founded Jackrabbit Pictures and the Caffeine Collective. Ken currently lives in Vancouver remotely collaborating with international artists, directors, agencies, and studios creating high quality, creative, digital imagery for the film, television, and gaming industries.
