Jason Fruchter
Illustrator, Animator, Designer
Thank you for visiting my animation portfolio! The samples on this website represent animation projects I've worked on since 2001. However, my love for animation and the beginning of my professional career as an animator began many years earlier.
As a kid I loved to draw cartoons and dreamed of someday bringing my characters to life just like the Disney, Warner Bros, and Saturday morning cartoons I grew up watching. In high school I began studying the art of animation from the classic Disney animation book The Illusion of Life by Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnson.
My animation bible!
Filming animation the ole' fashioned way.
I created my first animated film in college at the Rhode Island School of Design. Back then in the early 90s animation was done the old fashioned way, by hand! For my Junior film I drew 2,000 drawings on paper and filmed each one individually using a 35mm Oxberry animation camera. My senior film was a bit shorter, but just as labor intensive. To edit the films I used a Steenbeck flatbed editing deck. The film and soundtrack were synchronized on separate reels. I used a splicer and tape to cut the film and paste it back together. Literally "cutting and pasting"!
Looking back on it now, I am very grateful to be one of the last generations to experience animation in this truly traditional way before everything went digital. It definitely makes me appreciate the art of animation as a "hands on" medium. I'm proud to have learned how to create a film like the old masters did who pioneered the art of animation. With a solid foundation in the principals of animation and film making, I was now ready to dive into the digital animation world.
After graduating RISD in 1992 I began working in New York City as a digital graphics artist and animator. For 10 years I worked for several animation and design studios in NYC creating animation, video graphics for sports arenas, commercials, video games, and TV animation including MTV's The Head. When the dot com boom hit in the early 2000s I became art director for one of the first web based animated series called Whirlgirl. After the dot com bubble burst, I continued working as a freelance animator on television pilots, animatics for ad agencies, games for the web, and other fun projects.
Today I work from my home studio in Seattle, WA where I continue to work on animation projects for mobile app developers, interactive kiosk designers, toy manufacturers, and other clients. I am also a children's book illustrator for licensed and original properties.
Do you have a need for an animator, illustrator, or designer for your project? If so, I'm always looking for new opportunities and would love to hear from you. Please feel free to contact me anytime. Thanks so much!
MTV's "The Head" was my first experience working at a large animation studio.
For samples of my Illustration and Design work, please visit my other online portfolio at
