School of Animation & Visual Effects Faculty

Catherine Tate
Executive Director of 3D Animation & Visual Effects
School of Animation & Visual Effects

Catherine Tate is an accomplished Visual Effects Artist and Compositor who has worked on some of the industry’s most recognizable films and video games. Catherine Tate is currently the Compositing Lead in the Animation & Visual Effects department at Academy of Art University where she has been teaching since 2004. She established a collaborative class in 2006 at ACADEMY OF ART UNIVERSITY known as “”Studio400A”” which has produced visual effects on numerous independent films. Her objective is to connect visual effects students to filmmakers to create a more real world experience in the classroom. Some of Studio400A’s most recent work includes Beasts of the Southern Wild, which was nominated for four Academy Awards including best picture, 2013 Sundance and Festival de Cannes winner Fruitvale Station, and the feature Bluebird, which opened the 2013 Tribeca Film Festival. Studio400A also worked on the features Half-Life and Circumstance, along with the short Crazy Beats Strong Every Time, which were also official selections at the Sundance Film Festival. 

Professional Background: Industrial Light + Magic (1991-1995 and 1997-2003), The Orphanage (2003-2004), ESC Entertainment (Contractor). Visual Effects Supervisor: “Beasts of the Southern Wild”, “Crazy Beats Strong Every Time”, “Exposure”, “Circumstance”, “Midnight Son”, “Dear Lemon Lima”. Partial list of feature films compositor: “Synedoche, New York”, “Hulk”, “Men in Black II”, “House of Wax”, “Wild Wild West”, “Perfect Storm”, “Minority Report”, and “AI”. Additional studio feature film credits include: “Contact”, “Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace”, “Sleepy Hollow”, “Galaxy Quest”, “Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones”, and “Hellboy”.