Will Blank is a director, editor and animator best known for his work on Pigeon Businessman with Academy Award® nominated animator Bill Plympton.

Will grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area interested in art and filmmaking. He attended an experimental, technology-based high school where he was exposed to early digital video cameras and editing software. He used that advanced technology to make silly comedy shorts.

He then attended UC Santa Cruz and transferred to UC Berkeley as an undergraduate where he majored in Comparative Literature, French and English. He doesn’t really know why he did that, he should have just gone to art school. Oh well! Now he speaks French.

Despite his choice of major, during that time he met other creative collaborators and continued making comedy shorts, some of which went viral and garnered millions of views on YouTube.

He leveraged those videos into briefly making a living entering viral video contests, earning upwards of $10,000 in prizes. From there he started a commercial production company, 512 Media, which still operates today.

Will’s love of the editorial process lead to a career as a television and film editor for networks like NBC (Last Call with Carson Daly), MGM+ (Godfather of Harlem) and WGN (Underground). He’s also edited independent features and short films, including Brandon Buczek’s Something Casual. As an assistant editor, Blank has worked on hit TV shows such as Preacher (AMC), Sneaky Pete (Amazon), Counterpart (Starz) and the Spielberg-helmed reboot of Amazing Stories (Apple).

As a director, Will worked with Academy Award® Nominee Sam Elliott and Independent Spirit Award Nominee Raúl Castillo on “LIMBO,” earning fans the likes of Guillermo del Toro, who described it as an “excellent” short film. After a successful run of the largest genre film festivals in North America, LIMBO won the prestigious Cine Gear Expo Grand Prize for Best Independent Short.

The pandemic lead Will to explore his artistic passions, including drawing, model painting and diorama building. He entered his work into the OrangeCon model painting competition, the largest gathering of model painters in Southern California, and received 1st, 2nd and 3rd place prizes across the Sci-Fi/Fantasy Figure and Sci-Fi Diorama categories.

Will always had a love of animation and decided to finally dive in and take classes to learn. He attended Don Bluth University while working a full time job, studying under Don Bluth himself, which lead to taking classes with Bill Plympton at the Plymptoons School of Animation. Under Bill’s tutelage, Will created Pigeon Businessman, his first animated film, which will play the prestigious Annecy International Animation Film Festival this Summer.