Bonnie Bright studied Fine Arts at UC Santa Barbara and Illustration at Cal State University Long Beach. Her parents, Mike and Patti Bright, raised her in the mountains of Malibu where she built forts, ran around barefoot, climbed trees and spent a lot of time in the ocean. Her creative parents, Mike a talented woodworker and Patti into crafts, allowed Bonnie to draw and paint on her bedroom walls.
Both of Bonnie's parents were volleyball Olympians. Bonnie earned a scholarship to the University of California, Santa Barbara, and, as a starting freshman, held the digging and service ace records while there. She also played professionally on the WPVA and AVP beach circuit and earned All-American status in D1 high school, Pac 10 college and the at the US Nationals.
From a very young age, Bonnie knew she wanted to illustrate children's books; creating tiny paper books with tiny illustrations, not more than one inch wide.
After 5 1/2 years of college study, she was ready for work. Luckily she met her future first boss while working at an art gallery in Long Beach. He hired her to illustrate backgrounds and animate characters for educational computer games. That launched a fifteen-year, full time career in computer games. The studios ranged from educational games at Knowledge Adventure/Vivendi to RPG games at Mindcraft and Virgin to console games at Angel Studios.
After giving birth to her daughter in 2000, Bonnie quickly realized working a 10 to 12 hour day in her game career was not going to allow her to raise her daughter properly.
She stepped down from her career and began freelancing from home while raising her daughter. Immediately, she began teaching herself how to build web sites for clients, and was fortunate to find work illustrating books for self-publishers.
Bonnie has illustrated more than twenty children's books. She also does volunteer work at elementary schools, teaching animation, mural painting and book making. Additionally, she ran her own beach volleyball club for four years and coached indoor club volleyball for ten. Much of this was accomplished while caring for her paralyzed father in his later years. A hard-working "doer", Bonnie has also animated and illustrated several books for iPad, painted murals and has done graphic design.
Bonnie's digital game career happily came full-circle while working for Hatch Early Learning as a 2D Animator, Illustrator and Graphic Designer. After three years at Hatch, that itch to go back to full time book illustration was powerful. She stepped down from the position in 2024 to pursue book illustration full time.
In her spare time, she tends to an organic vegetable and berry garden, paddles, runs, lifts, hikes and still plays indoor and beach volleyball.
CAREER NOTES:
I've illustrated more than twenty children's books and various book covers. The first book I illustrated, "I Love You All the Time", has sold more than 100,000 copies worldwide. "The Tangle Tower" was listed as a top 20 children's book on Amazon/Kindle. Many of my clients self-publish their books and hire me to illustrate, lay out and prepare their book for publishing. I'm happy to answer any questions.
I'm an experienced 2D educational game animator and character designer. Adobe Animate is my primary choice for animation. I have also used Spine and Unity.
Logo Design, Magazine Ad Layout, Web Design, Mailers, Brochures, Social Media Posts, Web Banners, Package Design, Catalogs, Book Layout...
I am experienced in the creation of illustrated game backgrounds and 2D animation. The bulk of my career has been in educational games, working for companies like Davidson, Knowledge Adventure, Virgin and Hatch Early Learning. I have also worked on 2D isometric battle games and side scrolling games for companies like Mindcraft and Virgin. At Angel Studios, I was a texture artist, texturing buildings, cars and props. I have worked on cell phone games for Pick Up & Play and have also created assets for 2D web-based games at Division 13.
I work in the following programs and am always willing to learn more: Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, Animate, Pro Motion, Premier...Corel Painter, 3D Studio Max, Cinema 4D, Blender, Unity, Solidworks, Spine
BONNIE BRIGHT
email bonnie@brightillustration.com #bonniebrightillustration
Portfolio: www.brightillustration.com LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brightillustration/
SKILLS: Game Art, Tile Sets, Texture Maps, 2D Illustration, Graphics, Vector Art, 2D Animation, 3D Models, Children’s Book Illustration, Layout, Icons, Web Design, Social Media, Positive Attitude, Team Player
PROGRAMS: Adobe Suite, Photoshop, Illustrator, Animate, Flash, Dreamweaver, InDesign, Premier, Cinema 4D, Spine, 3D Studio Max, Blender, SolidWorks, Unity (Level Builder), Corel Painter
“I’m a hard-working team-player who likes to stay ahead of deadlines. I light up when given a new task and, while I have more than 20 years of experience generating artwork for games, animating and illustrating, I will always be hungry to learn something new. I’m motivated by feedback and will work to apply it. I love working towards a finished product we can all be proud of. I’m also an athlete and I know the value of working as a team.
Please review my history below to see the variety of work I have done. I’m always open to new adventures!”
WORK HISTORY
2020-Present
Hatch Early Learning – Contract 2D illustrator, animator, and game designer using Illustrator, Unity and Animate.
Monochrome Workshop – Freelance 2D animator, 2D game assets, art direction, Unity level builder for Xbox game.
Project Steampunk – Freelance 2D character animation and tile set artist for RPG.
2019-2020
Innovative Concepts in Entertainment, Inc. – game decal design, game design, graphics and layout for magazine ads, banner ads, social media artist/animator, 3D Artist, 2D Animator
2019-2020
Simply Fun Illustrator for children’s toys and card games.
2008-2015
Division 13- 2D and 3D game art and illustration, animated fly-throughs and QA for major movie web sites like Shrek, How to Train Your Dragon, Hellboy, League of Extraordinary Gentleman, Ice Age and Paddington.
2007-2008
The Word Wits- 3d modeled backgrounds, textures, animations and web site design for the production of a puppet show for DVD.
2007
Mozaik Multimedia- 2D background illustration, character design, character animation, assets, icons and game design for children’s educational games.
2004-2006
High 5 Productions- 3D backgrounds, 3D models, texture mapping, and 2D Animation for children’s television programs aired on PBS and ported to DVD.
2003-2018
Pick Up & Play- Game asset creation in the form of 2D backgrounds, illustration and 2D animations for cell phone games like Around the World in 80 Days, Alien Siege and Wok Rabbit.
2003
Digital Ink Illustration- Cartoon background colorist for the animated feature, Leap Frog Movie.
2002-2003
Otterslide and Urban Entertainment- Storyboarding, background illustration, layout and art direction for an animated television series and animated feature films including The Golden Blaze, My Babies’ Mommas and I Was A Teen Pop Star.
2001
Vivendi Interactive and Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey- Background illustration, character design and 2D animation for an educational game packaged in a cereal box.
1999-2001
Angel Studios- Texture artist, and 3-D props modeler for Xbox games like Midtown Madness II, Test Drive Off-Road and Transworld Surf.
Prior to 1999
Knowledge Adventure- Art director, lead artist, 2D animator, background illustrator, character and game designer for Jump Start educational games.
Wannabe Interactive/Cloud 9- background artist for interactive games.
Fanfare Software- Art director, lead artist, 2D animator, character and game designer for educational games.
Mindcraft Software- tile-set background artist and character walk cycle animator.
Virgin Games- Tile-set background artist for the pirate level of Cool Spot Goes to Hollywood.
Davidson and Associates- 2D background artist and animator for educational games.
CHILDREN’S BOOK ILLUSTRATION 1999 to PRESENT
“Peli Can Surf” written by Eric Munoz, “You Can’t Always Win, The Good Loser” written by Mark Nixon,
“Greenie and the Tree Frog, A Metamorphosis” written by John Manesis, “Mom and Dad Are Always So Busy” written by Dr. Annye Rothenberg, “The Best Kind of Pirate” written and illustrated by Bonnie Bright
“Jasmine and the Snowman” written by Marc Frederic, “Ocean Adventures with Jax” written by Pamela Jackson,
“Why Can’t I Be the Boss of Me?” written by Dr. Annye Rothenberg, “The Good Deed Manger” written by Christopher P. Cammack, “Denny’s Pets” written by Marc Frederic, “Jenny’s Pets” written by Marc Frederic,
“Cellphoneitus” written and illustrated by Bonnie Bright, “I’m Getting Ready for Kindergarten” written by Dr. Annye Rothenberg, “Casey’s Compost” written and illustrated by Bonnie Bright, “Bunny’s First Vacation” written and illustrated by Bonnie Bright, “The Truly Great Noodle” written by Sam Berman, “I Want to Make Friends” written by Dr. Annye Rothenberg, “Surf Angel” written by Terry and Heather Kraszewski, “The Sad House on Moving Day” written and illustrated by Bonnie Bright, “Tangle Tower” written by Jessica Elin Hirschman and Bonnie Bright, “Are You Upside Down In Your Bed?” written and illustrated by Bonnie Bright
“I’m In the Bathroom,” by Jessica Elin Hirschman and Jennifer Elin Cole, Cookie Bear Press, Inc.
EDUCATION
FINE ARTS, UC SANTA BARBARA
Dean’s list, Senior Art Show, Volleyball Scholarship
ILLUSTRATION, CAL STATE LONG BEACH
Focus on children’s book illustration.