Radford Sechrist

Radford Sechrist, also known as Rad Sechrist,

Career

Early career and feature animation Sechrist who begin his professional animation career by working at DreamWorks Animation in 2006 as a storyboarder. He began as a story trainee on Bee Movie. He would later be a story artist on Kung Fu Panda 2 in 2011 He would come up with the idea for Kipo, beginning it as a webcomic, while working as a story artist on How to Train Your Dragon 2 and noted his inspiration from The Walking Dead and Game of Thrones.

In 2021, he served as Head of Story for the Sony Pictures Animation film Wish Dragon. Peter Gal, a DreamWorks Animation Television executive, noted that the company found the online comic while looking for original developments, "fell in love with it," responded to it on a "gut level" and then contacted Sechrist, who they learned worked at DreamWorks, then later pitched to Netflix as "part of its ongoing multi-year agreement". Sechrist developed the pitch of the series as "The Walking Dead, but everything that's trying to kill you is adorable," aiming to blend post-apocalyptic stakes with vibrant, optimistic storytelling. When the series was pitched, Sechrist, and Bill Wolkoff, the series executive producer, knew that the series would feature a gay character, with Sechrist saying the romance between Benson and Troy was the result of our the show's entire crew.

As showrunner and executive producer, Sechrist oversaw all three seasons of the series, which concluded in October 2021. The show received widespread critical praise for its innovative animation style, diverse cast, complex worldbuilding, and themes of empathy and community. It was particularly noted for its positive LGBTQ+ representation, featuring an openly gay main character, Benson, which earned the series a GLAAD Media Award nomination in 2021. The series was also nominated for a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Children's Animated Series. Sechrist later stated that Netflix was clear the series would only have 30 episodes and there was no opportunity for more episodes in a fourth season and she said that he would like to do a story of Wolf when she is age 15. He also expressed interest in possible films to continue the story.

Teaching and entrepreneurship Parallel to his production work, Sechrist has maintained a career as an educator. He has taught storyboarding and animation at several institutions, including the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts), Academy of Art University, George Washington University, SCAD, and the Los Angeles Academy of Figurative Art While at CalArts he taught a class entitled Life Drawing for Animators which applied "life drawing techniques to animation."

In 2021, he co-founded Project City with animators Ethan Becker, Chase Conley, and Coran Kizer Stone. Described as an "animation incubator," the venture focuses on developing independent animated projects and providing educational resources for artists. He also ran online platform named Rad How-To School, offering instructional content on drawing and storyboarding.

Other work Sechrist also ran a skateboard company named Plastic Walrus, where he met Andra Gunter, in 2014 or 2015, with Gunter working on Kipo as a music composer and vocal contributor, and known as Oz the Originator in the show.

In 2020, Sechrist said he was in "development at DreamWorks features" in a non-Kipo-related project. in which he designed the character Derpy Tiger. Sechrist based the character's design 90% on minhwa and the rest on his cat named "Yumyan," which was named after a cat character from Kipo named Yumyan Hammerpaw, and he was said to have designed characters and written "a lot of the scenes" for the film. He talked about the film on social media, noting why he felt that the film had been such a hit compared to The Bad Guys 2 and Elio.

Personal life Sechrist is married to animation director and story artist Maggie Kang. He gave her the idea for merging Korean mythology and K-pop, which became the film K-Pop Demon Hunters. According to Kang, she and Sechrist thought up the concept for the animation film, which was bought by Sony, and began development, a week after it was pitched over lunch in 2018. Their daughter voiced the protagonist as a child, while Sechrist designed the character Derpy Tiger in the film, basing it upon minhwa and his cat Yumyan. Before this, in 2020, Sechrist stated that a standout part of the third season of Kipo were the K-pop narwhals, adding that since Kang would take him to BTS concerts, the genre was close to his heart.

Filmography

Feature films Year Title Role Notes Ref 2007 Bee Movie Storyboard Artist First job in animation industry 2010 Megamind Story Artist 2011 Kung Fu Panda 2 Story Artist 2012 Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted Additional Story Artist 2013 Turbo Additional Story Artist 2014 Mr. Peabody & Sherman Additional Story Artist 2014 How to Train Your Dragon 2 Story Artist 2014 Penguins of Madagascar Story Artist 2017 The Lego Ninjago Movie Additional Storyboard Artist 2021 Wish Dragon Head of Story 2025 KPop Demon Hunters Story Artist Designed Derpy Tiger

Television Year Title Role Notes Ref 2012 Ultimate Spider-Man Storyboard Artist 1 episode 2016 Kung Fu Panda: Secrets of the Scroll Storyboard Artist Television special 2020 Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts Creator, Showrunner, Executive Producer 30 episodes, based on webcomic