Light & Magic is the 2022 documentary TV series directed by Lawrence Kasdan, produced by Lucasfilm and Imagine Documentaries. The series is available now on Disney+ in six episodes.
Lawrence Kasdan has managed to make a brilliant and thoughtful look at the creation of ILM, especially the early years around the time of Star Wars. The documentary has an incredible array of interviews with the industry’s most respected directors and VFX supervisors. It is an ambitious and deep look at how Industrial Light & Magic contributed so incredibly and completely to the craft of visual effects.
This week’s VFX fan boys are:
- Matt Wallin * @mattwallin www.mattwallin.com
- Jason Diamond @jasondiamond www.thediamondbros.com
- Mike Seymour @mikeseymour. www.fxguide.com
*Special thanks to Matt Wallin with help from Jim Shen for editing the show.
In this episode, we mention Matt’s other podcast: Eighty-one eleven. Matt is a visual effects artist and VCUarts Professor, who worked for many years at ILM. Each episode of 8111is a conversation with a guest who worked at Industrial Light and Magic during its 40+ year history. Guests discuss their journeys and career paths, and how working at ILM changed them.
As discussed in this week’s VFX Show episode, Jason and Mike, joined fxphd co-founder John Montgomery, to film at 32Ten in California, at the original Kerner Optical offices for an fxphd course.
On hand was a huge array of talented VFX and practical effects experts including VFX supervisor Scott Squires, who is also mentioned in this week’s episode.
Below is the fxguideTV from that week of shooting.
This is in regards to your comments about not seeing anyone use a DINOSAUR/Digital Input Device (D.I.D.) after Jurassic Park. Phil Tippett’s crew at Tippett Studios used a DID on Starship Troopers. I recall an interview with Tippett saying they needed to hire stop motion animators because computer animators at that time basically didn’t have enough experience animating creatures.