LeSean Thomas
| LeSean Thomas | |
|---|---|
| Area(s) | Producer, Director, Writer, Artist, Animator, Character Designer |
LeSean Thomas, a South Bronx native, is an American television animation producer, director, animator, comic book artist, writer, character designer in Los Angeles.
He is currently producer and director of the Black Dynamite TV series.
His recent, notable projects include: Legend of Korra animated TV series for Nickelodeon Animation & Aaron McGruder's The Boondocks animated TV series for Sony Pictures Television.
Career
Thomas' contributions as Supervising Character Designer and Co-Director on Seasons 1 and 2 of Adult Swim's The Boondocks animated series helped propel the show to be nominated for an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Comedy Series and win the honorary Peabody Award.
His early production credits include character designer, layout and key animator on Showtime's web series WhirlGirl, assistant animator for Lizzie McGuire and story board artist for shows Kim Possible on The Disney Channel, Ben 10: Alien Force for Cartoon Network, The Batman, Batman: The Brave and the Bold and DTV Green Lantern: First Flight, as well as supervising character designer for Superman/Batman: Public Enemies for Warner Bros. Animation.
LeSean landed his first production deal with the late George Jackson's UBO Network, where he created an animated online series called BattleSeed. Thomas wrote, produced and directed the series which was presented at the New York Anime Film Festival in 2000. He produced a BattleSeed original animated trailer which aired in theaters as a promotional trailer for the Sci Fi Channel. Thomas also provided production development for the action adventure movie UltraViolet.
Thomas is also a comic book artist, with work on such titles as Arkanium, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. His books include sketch bible Nervous Breakdowns: The Art of LeSean Thomas Vol. 1. He has also released the artbook Midnight Marauder: The Art of LeSean Thomas Vol. 2 and currently working on Cannon Busters, a creator-owned graphic novel.
In 2009, Thomas relocated to Seoul, South Korea at the request of Korean animation studio JM Animation to be hired in-house as part of the animation production staff. He was later hired as in-house Storyboard/Animation production artist at Studio Mir for work on the Legend of Korra for Nickelodeon animation studios. Soon after Moi Animation studio looked to hire him as a Producer/Director on several other independent projects, marking him as the first American animator to be hired to work in-house as permanent, independent production staff for animation studios in South Korea. His exploits in the Korean animation industry have been recently recorded and featured in a web-documentary he produced & directed, "Seoul Sessions," presented by Creative Control TV, an online TV network that features coverage of talents in music, fashion and the arts. Thomas was also recently invited to speak at the 5th annual TEDx in SInchon, Seoul South Korea, where he spoke about his journey and the importance of "Successful Failures".
External links
Interviews
- Seoul Sessions web-docu on Creative Control TV
- Failing your way to success: LeSean Thomas at TEDxSinchon presentation
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