Panagiotis Rappas

He has worked with all the major Hollywood film studios and for many European co-productions of 2D and 3D animated films. The core of his work concerns children and the adaptation of children’s literature into animated films. His work has won several international awards in Europe and the USA.

Having significant experience in issues of management and production of animated films, he often acts as a special advisor in such productions, while he occasionally teaches the art of animation in intensive workshops at schools of fine arts and colleges. He has also worked for the theater, one of his great interests alongside painting, and he has illustrated children’s books. He is a lifetime member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS).

He was born and raised in Hydra. At an early age, he attended painting lessons with Marios Loizidis, who lived and worked on the island at the time. After the completion of secondary education, he moved to Germany and studied sculpture with Felix Jomü, and animation with Wolfgang Urchs and Hal Clay. He participated in two films in Berlin and Munich, before becoming one of the first artists working for the studio that Spielberg’s company Amblin and Universal co-founded in London in the late ’80s, which today is DreamWorks. He participated in all the films produced by the studio.

In the mid-90s, he co-founded the studio Stardust Pictures in London and, as a creative producer, he undertook part of the production of many films for major Hollywood studios, such as Warner Bros, Paramount, Nickelodeon, DreamWorks, as well as for European studios, such as Trick Company and Munich Animation. Working as both a producer and a layout artist/animator, he supervised the production of part of the film “1001 Nights” for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, based on images designed by Yoshitaka Amano and directed by Mike Smith. The short film “The Periwig-Maker” by Stefen Schäffler, for which he undertook pre-production (storyboard and Leica editing), won many international awards and was nominated for Best Short Film Oscar.

In 1998, he moved to Los Angeles to participate in the productions of Paramount, Nickelodeon and Klasky-Csupo, “Rugrats the Movie” and “Rugrats in Paris”, as a layout supervisor and sequence director. There, he founded the production company Time Lapse Pictures, based in Los Angeles and later in Athens.

In 2001, he returned to Greece and continued to cooperate with various Hollywood and European studios, such as Paramount, Nickelodeon, Klasky-Csupo, Columbia, Filmax and Munich Animation. He also attended sculpture courses with Nikos Tranos at the Athens School of Fine Arts.

In Athens, he started cooperating with Eugene Trivizas, professor of Criminology at the University of Reading and famous writer of children’s books. A very fruitful and creative cooperation, which would result in the production of two Animation Christmas TV Specials, in co-production with the Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation. “The Little Mouse Who Wanted to Touch a Star” / Panagiotis Rappas and Angelos Rouvas, 2007, and “The Boy and The Tree” / Panagiotis Rappas, 2009, were screened in many international festivals, received acclaim from both critics and audience and won several awards. The film “The Boy and The Tree” was voted as the best animated film for television by EBU (European Broadcasting Union) and Second Best TV Production in Europe for Children and Juniors 2009. The soundtrack of the film was composed by Dimitris Papadimitriou, one of the major contemporary Greek composers. They also worked together for “The Fountain of Youth”, a film based on a novel by Lafcadio Hearn – Yakumo Koizoumi, which premiered in 2011 at the Onassis Stegi, during an event dedicated to the great Japanese author, who was born in Greece to an Irish father and a Greek mother, which also included readings of his work and exhibitions of his books from Takis Efstathiou’s collection. The film and the event contributed to the author’s acclaim in his homeland.

In 2015, he set out to cooperate with Ever After Tales, a Los Angeles-based company, which creates digital books-applications for children, based on animated children’s literature. He became the art director και animator of the company’s applications. The book “Little Emily”, based on Eugene Trivizas’ fairytale, won the important Kidscreen Award for best digital book of the year in the USA.

Special effects and digital cinema are also an important part of Panagiotis Rappas’ work and, as an experienced Vfx animator, he has often undertaken this significant task for 3D animated and live action films.

He has a keen interest in all cinematic forms. He considers cinema to be the narrative art par excellence, which can fulfill this old dream of artists to create artworks that combine all art forms. That is, to create a real Gesamtkunstwerk.

A significant part of Panagiotis Rappas’ creative work is the commissioning of films, mainly by public-benefit organizations, which concern contemporary social and scientific issues. Research on a topic, the use of the cinematic form which is called to present a problem and its proposed solution, sparing words and investing on sharp images, are exercises in style, addressing wide or very special audiences. In cooperation with the scientific consultants of the organizations, he finalizes the scripts and then creates the films, choosing the technique and style that will best serve their goal. He has made films for such issues as autism and its early diagnosis, the promotion of breast-feeding, domestic violence and the protection of intellectual property, among others.

He has also designed and directed dozens of commercials.

Awards

“Little Emily” / USA 2016

Kidscreen Awards 2016: Best preschool e-book of the Year

“The Fountain of Youth” / Greece 2011

7TH Athens AnimFest 2012 / GREECE: Best Animation

14th Patras International Film Festival 2012 / GREECE: Best Animation

35ο International Short Film Festival in Drama / GREECE: Special mention

“ROZAFA ANIFEST ” AWARDS 2012 Shkoder / ALBANIA: Special Prize

“The Little Mouse who Wanted to Touch a Star” / Greece 2007

Martha’s Vineyard / USA: Best in fest

Cyprus International Film Festival / CYPRUS: Best Animation

London Greek Film Festival / UK: Best Animation

Athens AnimFest 2008 / GREECE: Special Prize of the Jury

Patras International Film Festival GREECE: Best Animation

“The Boy and The Tree” / Greece 2009

Athens AnimFest 2009 / GREECE: Best Animation

Voted by the EUROPEAN BROADCASTERS UNION (EBU) / GENEVA:

Second Best TV Production in Europe for Children and Juniors 2009

12th Patras International Film Festival 2009 / GREECE: Best Animation

4th Documentary Film festival of Chalkis / GREECE: Special Jury Award

Filmography

“Frankenstein REC” (2016) Post Production and Vfx Supervisor (Live action)

“Dragon Rider” (2017) 3D Layout Artist

“Love, Love, Love” (2016) Post Production and Vfx Supervisor (Live action)

“Little Emily” (2015) (animated app) Art Director/Animator (awarded)

“Tale of Sasquatch” (2015) (animated app) Art Director/Animator

“The Amazing Popcorn” (2014) (animated app) Art Director/Animator

“Family Guy” (2011) (TV Series) Animator

“The Fountain of Youth” aka “I Pigi tis Niotis”(2011) Director / Producer (awarded short)

“The Boy and the Tree” (2009) Director / Producer (awarded short)

“The meaning of Life” (2009) Producer

“The Little Mouse who Wanted to Touch a Star” (2007) Director / Producer

“Jester Till” (2003) Studio Producer (Time Lapse Pictures)

“Rugrats go Wild” (2003) Storyboard Artist/Layout Supervisor/Studio Producer

“El Sid: The Legend” (2003) Studio Producer (Time Lapse Pictures)

“Eight Crazy Nights” (2002) Studio Producer (Time Lapse Pictures)

“Rugrats in Paris: The Movie” (2000) Sequence Director/ Layout Supervisor

“The Periwig-Maker” (1999) Mural painter/Leica editor (Oscar nominated short)

“Käpt’n Blaubär-Der Film” (1999) Storyboard Artist

“Pippi Longstocking” (1998) Layout Artist

“The Rugrats Movie” (1998) Layout Supervisor/Storyboard Artist

“Fern Gully 2: The Magical Rescue” 1998 Storyboard Artist/Layout Artist

“1001 Nights” (1998) Producer/ layout Artist/Animator (awarded short)

“Die furchtlosen Vier” (1997) Animator

“Kleines Arschloch” (1997) Animator / Studio Producer (Stardust Pictures)

“Space Jam” (1996) Animator/Vfx Animator

“Pinocchio” (1995) (CD-ROM game) Animator

“All Dogs Go to Heaven 2” (1996) Animator/Layout Artist

“Felidae” (1994) Animator

“Asterix Conquers America” (1994) Layout Artist

“We're Back! A Dinosaur's Story” (1993) Layout Artist

“An American Tale: Fievel Goes West” (1991) Layout Artist

“The Magic Voyage” (1992) Character Animator- Vfx Animator

“Stowaways on the Ark” (1988) Head of assistant animators