Last month, we spoke to Tom Box, co-founder of major U.K. animation studio Blue Zoo, about the future of working. Box told us of his vision for a post-pandemic hybrid model that will combine studio and remote work, freeing staff to live further from the city. As he puts it, Blue Zoo, a long-time pillar of the London animation industry, “is no longer really a London-based company.”
Needless to say, this discussion is being had around the world, as a year of restrictions forces a paradigm shift in our views of work. Case in point: a recent Twitter debate prompted by Jorge Gutierrez, director of The Book of Life and creator of Netflix’s forthcoming Maya and the Three. Addressing L.A.’s animation industry, Gutierrez asked why anyone would want to go back to the studio in the future:
LA Anim friends, once kids go back to school and we’re all used to working and making things from home, why go back to a physical studio? And lose all that time and energy driving LA traffic? A year into this and it makes no sense to me to go back to the old ways. What say you?
— Jorge R. Gutierrez (@mexopolis) February 28, 2021