A FORMER Bournemouth animation student has moved to America to help create the next Disney princess.

James Woods, 25, who graduated from the animation and illustration course at the Arts University Bournemouth in 2013, said he had dreamed of working as a Disney animator since the age of four.

He said: "As a result, at AUB, I focused on illustrating different characters and stories to reach this goal. Even though I had always aspired to work as a Disney artist, I never anticipated it would happen."

James is now based at the Disney Studios in the US working as an in-house artist on an upcoming feature movie. Members of the public can see his work on the next Disney princess movie, Moana, which is set to be released in UK cinemas in December.

Asked about how he got the job opportunity, he said: "I heard about the Disney artist training program after some of the recruiters from the LA studio visited London to review student portfolios.

"After displaying promise, the recruiters suggested I apply for their competitive training position where a young student is picked for a certain discipline and is bought to the studio for two months to train under the Disney artists with the hope of making them production ready.

"In 2014, during my final few weeks of AUB before graduating, I found out I was accepted into the program and relocated to LA by the end of the month."

James worked at Paramount Studios for a while as one of the lead character designers for an upcoming 2019 feature film release, before heading back to the Disney studios. He is currently working as the lead designer on an unannounced film which is set to be released in winter 2018.

James said that the advice he would give aspiring film animators is that it takes a lot of hard work, training and drawing practice.

He added: "I would carry a sketchbook with me every day and draw in it consistently.

"I would encourage young artists to enrol in drawing classes at local community centres, especially figure drawing. This made up a vast portion of my training as it helped me discover and learn about the human body so I could then create characters from it.

"At the end of the day, drawing for animation is a really fun job, so stay passionate and hungry to learn and grow."