Faculty

Catherine Tate

Executive Director of 3D Animation & Visual Effects / School of Animation & Visual Effects

Catherine has been a VFX Supervisor and/or compositor on over sixty feature films and shorts, including Academy Award nominated features, Beasts of the Southern Wild and Theeb.

She also was the onset and post production VFX Supervisor on Fruitvale Station, directed by Ryan Coogler (Creed, Marvel’s Black Panther.) Fruitvale Station also won the audience and grand jury awards at the Sundance Film Festival in 2013.

Catherine worked at Industrial Light and Magic for ten years as a compositor and worked on dozens of projects, including “Star Wars,” and “Men in Black.” She also worked at other noted companies including Framestore, London and Esc Entertainment.

Catherine has been a faculty member at Academy of Art University for fifteen years. Her collaborative studio based classes at AAU, called StudioX, have been featured in the Wall Street Journal, East Bay Times, San Francisco Chronicle, KGO news and other local news channels.

She believes working in a real world production environment in school can better prepare students to get a job and succeed in the industry.