Rob Buchanan

Rob Buchanan.

Robert Buchanan (or Rob Buchanan) is a writer, animator, actor and creative director. He was a story editor on the first Shantae game and one of the lead animators on Shantae: Risky's Revenge. He's currently working at RRKidz/Reading Rainbow.

Youth and studies

Rob Buchanan claims he was a quiet kid. Young, he was fascinated and frightened by the art of Maurice Sendak in Where the Wild Things Are, and also loved the art of Richard Scarry. He drew his first comic when he was five, but only started considering seriously a career in art in high school. However, he didn't take any art class before college. He was paid for his art for the first time during his college years, for a comic strip he did for the college newspaper. He has studied at the California Institute of the Arts from 1991 to 1993, and graduated in 1993 in character animation.

Career

Rob Buchanan has worked at WayForward Technologies from 1993 to 2012, during which time he contributed to Shantae (as a story editor), Shantae: Risky's Revenge (as a lead animator), Looney Tunes: Duck Amuck, Where the Wild Things Are or SpongeBob SquarePants: Creature from the Krusty Krab. Besides his work there, he has also worked in parallel at Klein Productions from 2003 to 2009. Since 2012, he is the creative director at RRKidz/Reading Rainbow.

On RRKidz website, Buchanan claims to have worked on over 60 video games, two TV shows and several Disneyland/Disney Cruise projets. He also claims to have appeared in three Hollywood movies.

Personal life

Rob Buchanan has a meteorite on his desk which he has nicknamed "Steve".

Influences

Besides Maurice Sendak and Richard Scarry when he was a child, Buchanan claims to admire the works of Milt Kahl (which he considers the greatest animator ever), Marc Davis, Frank Thomas, Ollie Johnston, Andreas Deja, Nick Ranieri and Ronald Searle.

Works

This is a list of projects Rob Buchanan was involved in according to Metacritic, Moby Games and a google search over allgame.com.

Direction

• SpongeBob SquarePants: Creature from the Krusty Krab - director (2006)
• Looney Tunes: Duck Amuck - director (2007)
• Where the Wild Things Are - director (2009)
• Centipede: Infestation - art director (2011)
• Silent Hill: Book of Memories - animation director (2012)

Design

• SpongeBob SquarePants: Creature from the Krusty Krab - designer (2006)
• Looney Tunes: Duck Amuck - designer (2007)
• Where the Wild Things Are - designer (2009)
• Mighty Switch Force! - original concept (2011)
• Descendants - design (2015)

Art and animation

• Mickey's Ultimate Challenge - character animations (1994)
• Casper Animated Activity Center - lead animator (1998)
• Outburst - Exie animation (1998)
• Microshaft Winblows 98 - animator (1998)
• Super Scattergories - Heads animation (1999)
• WCW Mayhem - animation (2000)
• Godzilla: Domination! - character animation (2002)
• The Scorpion King: Sword of Osiris - hero animator (2002)
• Rescue Heroes: Billy Blazes - animation (2003)
• Ping Pals - featured artist (2004)
• The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie - character animation (2004)
• SpongeBob SquarePants: Lights, Camera, Pants! - additional art (2005)
• God of War: Betrayal - enemy animation (2007)
• Batman: The Brave and The Bold - The Videogame - additional art direction (2010)
• Shantae: Risky's Revenge - lead animator (2010)
• Thor: God of Thunder - animator (2011)
• BloodRayne: Betrayal - animation management (2011)
• Aliens: Infestation - animator (2011)
• Double Dragon: Neon - additional animation management (2012)

Writing

• Shantae - story editor (2002)
• Descendants - writer (2015)

Programming

• Mass Effect - programmer (2012)

Consulting

• Star Warped - animation consultant (1997)

Quality assurance

• Terraria - beta/QA tester (2011)