Short version
K Kypers is an award-winning animator/editor working in the greater New York City area. Throughout her career she’s found herself in varied roles: teaching clay animation to Girl Scouts, animating doodles for Post-it® Notes, and animation director for a key sequence in Vera Drew’s indie feature, The People’s Joker. Her short educational film for Amaze.org, Jim's Introduction to Gender Identity (a.k.a. My Friend Is Transgender) (written/directed by K) has earned recognition and accolades at national and international film festivals. K currently holds the position of Senior Animator/Editor for Ogilvy Health.
Longer version
K Kypers was raised in Vernon, NJ, a rural town known for its pastoral landscapes and infamous water park. After graduating from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia in 2012, K spent a summer as the Artist-in-Residence at a Girl Scout camp in New Mexico, teaching troops of Girl Scouts to make short clay stop-motion films. Before the summer was over K was also given the responsibilities of the Arts Coordinator, keeping track of supplies and coming up with lessons for just about anything the girls were interested in: drawing horses, writing poetry, comic strips, etc.
Upon returning to her native New Jersey, K completed a personal film project (Vaschel: Portrait of a Paper Bag) and began a digital design internship at Little Airplane Productions in New York City. In 2013, she moved to Boston to accept a storyboarding job on one of the last shows that would be produced by Scholastic's Soup2Nuts studio, Astroblast! The technical and creative skills developed while working in a studio setting meeting deadlines for television would prove invaluable moving forward. When production on the series drew to a close by late 2014, K shifted her career to focus on finding work as a freelancer in the industry. To this day much of K’s freelance work can be attributed to connections made in Boston, frequently collaborating with Boston-area studios like FableVision, Hero4Hire Creative, MORE Advertising, and Shadow Lion.
One of the first projects K directed/animated as an independent contractor was a collection of short holiday-themed videos for Post-it® Notes social media (released between December 2014-May 2015). This came about after sharing her Tumblr page, Dream Doodles on Sticky Notes, directly with 3M and their ad agency Zeus Jones.
After serving as an animator on Rachel Gitlevich's Boobs and More for Amaze.org (a short film about female puberty), K was selected to write/direct/animate a short film for Amaze about gender identity. Jim's Introduction to Gender Identity (published online as My Friend Is Transgender) has been featured in several national & international film festivals, including the Manchester Animation Festival 2017, the Merlinka International Queer Film Festival 2017, the Westfield International Film Festival 2018 (where it won for "Best Animated Short"), the Florida Animation Festival 2018 (where it won “1st Place - Mixed Media/Experimental”) and the ASIFA-East Animation Festival 2018 (where it earned a Craft Award for "Excellence in Education"). Following the success of K’s film, she was invited to speak at a number of different venues both on the subject of animation as well as gender identity (sharing her own transgender experience).
In 2020, just as the pandemic was starting, K had her first collaboration with queer pop musician Siena Liggins, who she would go on to collaborate with again on a segment of her music video for Ms. Out Tonight. 2020 also began K’s relationship with Shadow Lion, eventually leading to her directing/animating ten short videos for social media to promote the Man In The Arena podcast (2021-2022). In addition to her continued work in animation, it was around this time K began to expand her resume as a video editor. She maintained a longtime freelance video editor/animator role for Studio Rx between 2022-2024 (contributing to several award-winning projects). She currently holds the position of Senior Animator/Editor at Ogilvy Health.
The pandemic also led to K volunteering to be a part of Vera Drew’s The People’s Joker: the wildly popular indie Batman parody that turns the Joker’s origin story into a trans coming-of-age film. Vera entrusted K with assembling/leading a small team primarily comprised of student animators to make the film’s 2 1/2 minute fight sequence parodying Batman The Animated Series. In addition to her own animation on this sequence, K organized/reviewed/revised the work by the team communicating entirely via Zoom and email. Involvement in The People’s Joker was a labor of love, resulting in working odd hours at the end of already busy days. K is very proud to have been a small part of the People’s Joker phenomenon/community.
K Kypers currently resides in the greater NYC area. She is a frequent presence at the Milkweed Poetry Workshop which currently meets the first and third Wednesday each month in Sugar Loaf, NY. K has contributed several poems and illustrations to the workshop’s journals and zines.