After poking my head into my old shared office space and receiving some inquisitive stares from its new occupants, I made my way into Catherine's office overlooking the beautiful man-made lake behind the Main Building. The walls were covered with Clone Wars sketches, artwork, tracking charts, and more, with a couple artifacts from previous productions she'd worked on thrown in -- a poster from Ice Age and an animation cel from MTV's early '90s Aeon Flux (the animated series, not the live-action film). A big fan of the progressive animation and storytelling of that series, I was confident Lucasfilm Animation had picked the right person to produce their new Clone Wars series.
I discovered Winder actually got her start in animation while touring in Asia. "I was backpacking around the world and ended up in Japan, where I kind of fell into a job at Disney," she explains. "They had just bought a Japanese animation studio, and because I'm Canadian and spoke some Japanese, I was hired to represent and help the American directors and producers based in LA. I was taken under their wings and taught in Japanese how they produce animation and became their communicator when they subcontracted out to Korea and Taiwan. I was the link for the main studio back in Los Angeles."
She later moved to Taiwan to manage an animated film for Hanna-Barbera/Turner Pictures, and then arrived in the states producing such series as Spawn and Spicy City for HBO and of course Aeon Flux for MTV. Joining Fox Feature Animation, she built up and reconfigured their Blue Sky studio in New York and oversaw the Oscar-nominated film Ice Age. She somehow even managed to co-author a book in the process with a friend, Producing Animation, which opened up a consulting career in LA that allowed her to work from home. It was at this time (Spring, 2005) that she met Lucasfilm Animation's General Manager and Vice President, Gail Currey.
"Gail asked me to come in and work with her to spearhead the writing of the business plan and put the whole strategy together to set up the studios here and in Singapore," says Winder. Initially reluctant to leave LA, Winder was ultimately convinced to raise stakes and move north to work at Big Rock Ranch, a location she has found to be highly conducive to creativity.
As executive producer of Lucasfilm Animation, Winder oversees the development and production of all the projects in the studio. Collaborating with Gail Currey she helped set- up studios at both Big Rock Ranch and in Singapore, Winder maintains that it's the startup period on a project that she finds the most exciting.
"I love building something from scratch," she says, "and really, Gail and I started with a blank piece of paper. Having the resources and background, particularly in technology, and the infrastructure here to help support a startup has been wonderful."
