A partial timeline of QAS:

1980
Quickdraw Animation Society is envisioned
Doctors and research scientists began meeting in a conference room at the Foothills Hospital to watch cartoons. Discussions about forming an Animation society and seeking non-profit status began with founding members Greg Lucier, Rita Egiizi and John Edstrom.

1984
Quickdraw is Born
Quickdraw Animation Society was officially born. Grants were written and sporadically received. Screenings and workshops took place on borrowed equipment. The newly established board of directors begins looking for a permanent space

1988
Quickdraw has a home And operations funding
QAS finds it’s first permanent home in 1988 and receives its first operational funding. Animation equipment is slowly getting collected for production purposes

1988
Educational Programming Begins
Animation classes and workshops begin at Quickdraw. Different animation techniques are explored

1989
Academy-Award Winning Animators hold workshops with Quickdraw
John Weldon ( Special Delivery) and Jimmy Picker ( Sundae in New York) both Academy Award winning animators hold workshops with Quickdraw Animation Society at the Alberta College of Art and Design

1990
Professional Standard Video Pencil Test Purchased
Quickdraw’s first piece of professional animation equipment- a standard video pencil tester is purchased.

1990
First Quickdraw Staff Hired
Quickdraw hires their first part-time paid staff member, an administrator to help in grant-writing and programming development.

1992
Quick-Kids Programs Start
Children’s animation classes and camps begin at Quickdraw. Getting children to work in such a time-intensive, production based art form was unheard of, but the Quick-kids program took off with a great success, still running today with hundreds of amazing films being produced by local kids.

1992
Cameraless Animation Explorations begin
Cameraless Animation, the technique in which visuals are drawn or scratched directly onto 16 or 35 mm film is explored by many Quickdraw members, including Richard Reeves the iconic Canadian animator of the award-winning cameraless film “Linear Dreams”

1992
The First Animation Stand
Quickdraw makes their first animation stand with a 16mm Bolex camera, a plastic sewer pipe and yellow nylon rope. Many early Quickdraw films were shot on this stand, including works by Ron Slamp, Kevin Kurytnik, Don Best and Gary Tallin.

1993
Quickdraw Moves Downtown
Quickdraw moves into a 2400 sq foot facility in downtown Calgary

1993
McInnis Camera Stand is Purchased
The first official camera stand is purchased by Quickdraw. The McInnis Stand was previously housed at the National Film Board facility in Winnipeg, where iconic animations including Cordel Barker’s ‘The Cat Came Back’ and Richard Condie’s ‘The Big Snit’ were shot on the McInnis Stand

1994
Hamish D. Rat adopted as official mascot
Hamish D. Rat, created by Scott Higgs was adopted by Quickdraw as their official mascot. Hamish is the anti-mickey mouse adopted from an old Farmer Alfalfa cartoon

1995
NFB/Quickdraw Production Scholarship Established
The NFB/Quickdraw Production scholarship is established in order to aid first-time film-makers in both technical and educational assistance.

1995
Quickdraw Member published in Animation journal and Theoretical Animation Textbook
Sandra Law has an article “Putting Themselves in the Picture: The Work of Selected Women Animators in the UK” published in Animation Journal, being the first of Quickdraw members to be published professionally on the topic of animation. In 1997, an extended version of this article is published in one of the first theoretical textbooks on animation studies “A Reader in Animation Studies” edited by Jayne Piling

1995
Movements of the Body Short-listed for Academy Award
Wayne Traudt’s animated short, Movements of the Body is short-listed for an Academy Award and is screened at the Cannes Film Festival. The film is first developed at Quickdraw.

1997
Linear Dreams is Produced and Filmed at Quickdraw
Richard Reeves’ film ‘Linear Dreams’ was made at Quickdraw, and is to-date the most internationally-screened of all Quickdraw-produced animations. The cameraless animation won at Ottawa Animation Festival in 1998 and Richard is internationally recognized as the heir to Norman McLaren’s legacy.

1998
Linear Dreams Wins Best Canadian Animation at Ottawa International Animation Festival
Richard Reeve’s film Linear Dreams, wins Best Canadian Animation at the Ottawa International Animation Festival

1999
ASIFA/Quickkids Collaboration
ASIFA ( Association International de Film d’Animation) contacted Quickdraw to participate in the project ‘When the Water is Sick the World is Sick”, in which children from 15 different countries completed films in a themed collaboration.

1999
Fantonche 99 Festival of Animation
Quickdraw was invited to present of series of Quickdraw-produced films in Baden, Switzerland to a panel of European curators and scholars

2000
First Step into Digital
Quickdraw’s first step into the digital realm began with the purchase of RETAS PRO, a digital ink and paint system

2000
ACAD Animation Elective at Quickdraw
The Alberta College of Art and Design’s animation elective is now taught at the Quickdraw facility, as the Media Arts and Digital Technologies department at ACAD is developed. The class is taught at Quickdraw for five years before returning to the college under the Visual Communications department.

2000
Master Oxberry and Jr.Oxberry Stands find their way to QAS
Quickdraw receives a Master Oxberry Stand on permanent loan from the Banff Centre for the Arts and a Junior Oxberry Stand from the Alberta College of Art and Design

2004
Mr.Reaper’s Really Bad Morning Completed
This character animation was drawn on Quickdraw’s first digital paint and ink software RETAS and was produced by Kevin Kurytnik and Carol Beecher. Much of the film was drawn at Quickdraw and many Quickdraw members assisted Kevin and Carol in the production of the film. It is one of the most internationally-screened of Quickdraw produced animations.

2005
GIRAF Festival is Born
GIRAF, the Giant Incandescent Resonating Animation Festival is launched under the direction of Brandon Bloomhart and Keith Murray.

2012
Animated City
Animated City, a series of public large-scale animated projections on Calgary buildings and businesses is included as a part of GIRAF festival 2011. The projections were a combination of selected animations and animations developed in the Quicktrack residency