We have a stellar lineup of judges for 2015. Each judge has an impressive resume and are industry connections you want on Linkedin.
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Weta Digital, Senior Visual Effects Supervisor
Joe Letteri's pioneering work on digital visual effects has earned him four Academy Awards® for Best Visual Effects on Avatar, The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King and King Kong. He has also received the Academy’s Technical Achievement Award for co-developing the subsurface scattering technique that brought Gollum to life.
Joe joined Weta Digital as Visual Effects Supervisor on The Two Towers and over the last eleven years he has led Weta Digital to become one of the worlds premiere visual effects studios.
Joe has developed many techniques that have become standards for bringing photographic quality to digital visual effects. He specializes in the creation of compellingly realistic creatures, from the dinosaurs of Jurassic Park, to Gollum in The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, the 25ft gorilla in King Kong, the Na'vi in Avatar, and Caesar in Rise of the Planet of the Apes.
As Senior Visual Effects Supervisor on Avatar, Joe oversaw a programme of research and development over four years that produced shots larger and more complex than ever attempted before. This involved shooting on a virtual stage with a new camera system, along with the development a full pipeline of tools effectively launching a new approach to filmmaking called virtual production.
Last year, Joe led the Weta Digital team back into Middle-earth to bring to life the third film of Peter Jackson’s much-anticipated trilogy The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies, as well as completing work on the summer blockbuster Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. He is currently working on Superman v Batman: Dawn of Justice; The Fantastic Four; The Maze Runner: Scorch Trials, and several unannounced projects.
Weta Digital, Makeup and Creature Effects Art Director
In 1998, Makeup and Creature Effects Art Director Gino Acevedo was asked by Richard Taylor to join Weta Workshop to supervise the special makeup effects and color designs of the creatures for Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy. Prior to this, Gino had been working in the Los Angeles film industry for more than 10 years.
During the filming of The Two Towers, Gino was approached by Weta Digital’s Visual Effects Supervisor, Joe Letteri, who was intrigued by the way Gino had made the skin colouration of a physical silicone puppet of the dead Boromir so believable. Joe then asked if Gino would be interested in texture painting on Gollum.
Although he saw himself as computer illiterate, Gino grasped the new digital challenges, becoming the Art Director for the digital creatures and the liaison between Weta Workshop and Weta Digital. Thus, allowing for a continuous design vision from initial illustrative designs through to the final digital effects shots shown onscreen.
Gino's work at Weta Digital includes HOD of the textures department and is also the creative art director. On King Kong and The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep, Gino along with Richard Taylor supervised the sculpting of the maquettes for digital scanning, and making the physical silicone puppets used for environment and actor interaction. These were later replaced with the digital creature that is seen on screen.
As Creature Art Director on Avatar, Gino oversaw 52 Weta Digital texture artists. They used innovative techniques of life casting, to achieve details such as minute skin pores which were cast in silicone and scanned. They were then applied to the digital models, breathing life and colour in to the world of Pandora.
Gino has recently finished work on last year’s critically acclaimed summer blockbuster Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, and the final film in Peter Jackson’s epic Hobbit trilogy, The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies.
Rising Sun Pictures, Head of Lighting
Shane is currently Head of Lighting at Rising Sun Pictures. Prior to settling down in sunny Adelaide, Shane was Lighting Lead on the Lego Movie at Animal Logic and Look Development Lead on Elysium at Image Engine in Vancouver.
Over the last 10 years Shane's other films have included "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows (part 1 & 2)", "Happy Feet", "Green Zone", "The Ant Bully", "GI Joe: Rise of Cobra" and "The Tale of Despereaux". He also worked on "Twilight: Breaking Dawn - Part 1", but strongly denies any involvement, in front of his friends.
Despite numerous attempts over many years trying to explain his job, his mother still has no idea what he actually does.
Monolith Productions,Director of Technical Art
Matthew Allen is a 19-year game industry vet, who recently shipped the award-winning game Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor. Originally hired as a concept artist for Monolith’s first 3D game, Shogo: Mobile Armor Division, he has spent the last two decades blurring the lines between art, engineering, sound design, and production, wearing any hat needed to get the job done.
The Mill, Lighting and Rendering Supervisor
Amaan is a lighting and rendering supervisor based in The Mill’s London studio. In this role, he helps look after the rendering technology and colour pipeline for 3D projects, aiming to push the levels of realism in CG work to new levels.
He has worked on a number of high profile projects such as the 3 x VES award winning SSE ‘Maya’ in which the team created a 100% photo-real CG ape. He also worked on the critically acclaimed DFT ‘Transparent’, VW ‘Black Beetle’ and Audi ‘Hummingbird.’ Previous to joining The Mill, Amaan worked at MPC as a lighting a lookdev lead, where he worked on the Disney blockbuster Malificent.
Amaan qualified from university with a BA, majoring in computer science with a minor in mathematics.
Weta Digital, Senior Environment Artist
Hamish Beachman has been in the visual effects industry for over ten years. He has worked at National Geographic Magazine, Binary Star, and spent four years as Lead 3D at Yukfoo Animation. Since joining Weta in 2009, he has worked on Avatar, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, The Adventures of Tintin, Avengers, Prometheus, Man of Steel, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey,The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug and The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies. In 2012 he was nominated for a Visual Effects Society award for his environment work on Tintin. Currently he is working at Weta Digital on various projects.
The Mill (Chicago), Head of 3D
Steve Beck, Head of 3D at The Mill in Chicago has been with The Mill for five years. He moves across from Los Angeles where he was Head of Animation. Steve works with some of the industry’s top directors like Brian Beletic, Filip Engstrom and Guy Ritchie. Steve’s body of work includes the CG “Penguin/Giraffe/Elephant” for Marriott, Chevy "Busted-Who Told", Call of Duty "Surprise Eclipse", NBC “Revolution” and California “Milk”. Steve is a VES (Visual Effects Society) Award winner.
Animal Logic, Lead Modelling Artist
Paul Braddock started his VFX career after winning a scholarship at the Sydney Silicon Graphics Centre in 2001. Upon completion, he handed his showreel in at Animal Logic and began working there shortly after.
He has worked on some amazing projects in a variety of roles. His strengths are concept art, look-development work, or leading a team of artists in a specific department. His time at Animal Logic has seen him work on project like Happy Feet, Zack Snyder's 300, 28 Weeks Later, Australia, Legend of the Guardians, Sucker Punch, Lego Star Wars:The Padawan Menace, Walking with Dinosaurs, The Great Gatsby and most recently The Lego Movie.
Recently he's developed a passion for 3D printing, and is enjoying bringing his digital ideas and models into the physical world.
Pixar Animation, Senior Animator
Jude has been an Animator at Pixar Animation Studios since 2010 where she worked on 'Cars 2', 'Brave', 'Monsters University', 'Inside Out', and is currently animating on 'The Good Dinosaur'.
She began her career in London where she animated, supervised, wrote and directed for various children's television projects.
Jude received a Masters and Bachelor of Arts in Computer Animation from Bournemouth University, and also studied at the online animation school, Animation Mentor. She currently teaches at the Animation Collaborative and is an active member of the VES and ASIFA.
Framestore, Head of Rigging
Laurie is the Head of Rigging at Framestore London, where she has worked on many visual effects shows including Paddington, Guardians of the Galaxy and Gravity. Throughout her career she has maintained a special focus on facial rigging and modeling at studios in Los Angeles and London. Prior to visual effects work, Laurie was part of rigging teams for two UK feature animations, The Tale of Despereaux (2008) and Valiant (2005).
This year Laurie was recognized for her work on Rocket Raccoon in Guardians of the Galaxy with a Visual Effects Society nomination for Outstanding Animated Character in a Live Action Feature Motion Picture. She won the award in 2010 for Dobby in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1. Laurie graduated in 2001 from Full Sail University in Orlando Florida, where she was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2011.
Studio Manager & Editor
Lynette Clee is well-known in the art communities for her dedication to and understanding of the CG industry. Having worked in the 3D world for nine years, she has edited and published more than 20 books for 3dtotal.com, each dedicated to celebrating the brightest talents in the CG community and nurturing those looking to break into a career in digital art. She was also News Editor and Acting Editor of 3D Artist magazine between 2010 and 2013, during which time she worked with some of the biggest names in the art world and created a host of high-quality, engaging, and creative content to help establish the title as the UK’s leading magazine for 3D artists.
She is also currently the Studio Manager and Editor of www.3dtotal.com, one of the industry's biggest portals for 3D artists that has been providing free resources and top-quality content for over 15 years. In her spare time, Lynette also volunteers for the Trojan Horse was a Unicorn event, which next takes place in Troia, Portugal, in September 2015.
Weta Digital, Head of the Animation Department
As the Head of the Animation Department, Richard ensures Weta Digital has the best animation tools and the best animators in the world. He is responsible for looking ahead and driving developments that will advance the field of animation and keep Weta Digital amongst the best in the world far into the future.
Richard joined Weta Digital in 2001 to work on The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. Richard began at Weta Digital as a character animator working on Gollum then moving onto the role of senior animator, helping design and create the climactic battle sequence in The Lord of the Rings: the Return of the King. He then continued in this role for King Kong where he led the pre-visualisation and animation of several sequences in the film.
Previously Richard has worked for the Lord of the Rings production company Three Foot Six Ltd as a Pre-vis Artist creating pre-visualisations for The Lord of the Rings Trilogy and as a character animator for New Zealand television productions.
Richard supervised the pre-visualisation and animation for The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep and Abe Lincoln Vampire Hunter, and led the pre-visualisation for Rise of the Planet of the Apes and Peter Jackson’s The Lovely Bones. Richard also worked on The Adventures of Tintin, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey and The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. He has recently finished work driving animation enhancements for Dawn of the Planet of the Apes and The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies.
The Mill (Chicago), Senior Lighting TD
David Hackett, Senior Lighting TD at The Mill, Chicago has been with The Mill for most of the last 4 years. David has worked with clients to produce work for Coca Cola, Blondie, Microsoft, Samsung, Google and more. Previously he spent time working in film visual effects in Los Angeles on projects like Thor, 2012, Hereafter, X-men First Class and others.
Gameloft, Creative Director
Greg has 13 years’ experience in the Video Game industry. Originating from California, Greg began his career in 2001 as a 3D Artist at Solworks. He then moved to Superscape as an earlier adopter of mobile platforms, creating game design and pioneering 3D content on handheld devices. He transferred to the Russian office in 2005 where he worked as Director with Glu Mobile overseeing all creative developments at the studio.
Greg has gained extensive experience in his career so far as Creative Director, Game Designer, UI Designer, Level Designer, Technical Art Director, 3D Artist and Animator on a wide range of platforms including Playstation 2, iOS, Android and feature phones.
His passion for gaming and all aspects of creative development has brought him to New Zealand, where he shares his expertise and is inspired by his talented and hardworking design team.
Sony Imageworks, Texture Paint Supervisor
Justin Holt began his career as a lighting technical director working at Rhythm & Hues Studios on the Academy Award Winning Animated Feature Happy Feet. However, his passion for textures landed him a gig as a texture painter on his second feature film, The Kingdom. From there Justin contributed to the texture work for The Incredible Hulk and then accepted the lead texture painter role at MPC to paint the Owlship in Zack Snyder's Watchman.
After leading texture work at Industrial Light & Magic working on Gore Verbinski's feature animation Rango. Justin then moved up to Vancouver to build a new texture pipeline and oversee the texture work coming out of Image Engine. Most recently Justin has wrapped up as lead texture painter on Chappie and Jurassic World and has now accepted the role as Texture Paint Supervisor with Sony Pictures Imageworks. He currently is in production on Alice in Wonderland: Through the Looking Glass.
Co Founder, CG Student Awards & Tyroe.com
Alwyn has a background in fine arts and has been in the industry for over ten years. He has worked at a number of studios around the world including Sony Imageworks (Los Angeles), The Moving Picture Company (London), Double Negative (London), Animal Logic (Sydney) and Weta Digital (Wellington).
His main film credits include Harry Potter, The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, Watchmen, The Wolfman, Alice in Wonderland, John Carter, Superman: Man of Steel, Ironman 3 and The Hobbit 1, 2 & 3.
Alwyn is also the co-founder of Tyroe.com and the CG Student Awards Pty Ltd.
3D Artist, Editor in Chief
Dan Hutchinson is editor-in-chief at Imagine Publishing’s 3D Artist magazine. Launched in 2009, 3D Artist is now the UK’s leading 3D magazine, and is followed and supported by some of the biggest names in the industry. Dan first began reviewing 3D software back in 1995 with the releases of Poser, Extreme 3D and Form-Z.
Since then Dan has spent nearly 20 years in the video games and technology sectors working across print, digital and online.
Method Studio, Animation Director
Erik-Jan de Boer is an Animation Director working for Method Studios. He started his career at MPC in London in early 1989. In 1993 he became Head of 3D Animation at Method's Rushes Plc and 3 years later he joined Rhythm & Hues where his credits include Academy Award VFX winner "The Golden Compass”, "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe", "Night at the Museum", "The A-Team", "Cats & Dogs", "Stuart Little" and "Babe : Pig in the City".
More recently he directed the character animation for Ang Lee’s "Life of Pi" for which he received an Academy Award for Best Achievement in Visual Effects and The Maze Runner (the amazing Greiver characters were developed under his guidance)
Erik-Jan was born in Amsterdam, the Netherlands and holds a Masters Degree in Image Synthesis and Computer Animation from Middlesex University, England and a Bachelors in Image and Media Technology from the Utrecht School of the Arts (Hogeschool voor de Kunsten Utrecht).
Prime Focus World, Rigging Lead
Jakub started his career in 3d animation in Czech Republic and after specializing on rigging he moved to UK in 2005. He has worked at Axis Animation on Ben Hibon`s Codehunters, a few game cinematics and 3d commercials. After moving to MPC London in 2006 Jakub was a character TD on 10,000 B.C., Chronicles of Narnia 2, Harry Potter series, Clash of Titans and other films.
In 2010 he went to Double Negative to work on John Carter and later Captain America. Next three years he spent at Prime Focus World where he finished as Head of Rigging Department. After the London division closed Jakub worked as lead rigger on Tarzan at MPC and now he is back working in the same role for Prime Focus on an unannounced project.
VFX Supervisor, MPC
Anders began his career at MPC London in 2003 as a shader writer. In the intervening years he held many positions including R&D Lead, Head of Lighting and CG Supervisor, during which time he helped develop MPC's physically based lighting and shading workflow and toolset.
Most recently, he was VFX Supervisor for X-Men: Days of Future Past.
Creative Director and Head of 3D, The Mill - Los Angeles
Leonti graduated Kingston University with a degree in Illustration and Graphic Design before spending 12 years at MPC where he trained as a 3D Supervisor. After joining The Mill in London in 2007, Leonti moved to The Mill in Los Angeles to become Head of 3D alongside Robert Sethi. His body of award-winning work includes Titanfall 'Life is Better with a Titan', AMF 'Caterpillar', Sony PS3 'Michael' and Verizon 'Towers'. Leonti has worked with leading directors such as Wayne McClammy, Filip Engstrom and Tom Kuntz on work that has received awards from VES, CLIOS and Ciclope.
CG Supervisor, Framestore
JP joined Framestore in 2001 after graduating from Bournemouth University to work on well known BBC TV series. He then transitioned to film bringing his skills in lighting and look development, and since then credits include X-Men, Avatar, Golden Compass, Quantum of Solace, numerous Narina's and Harry Potter's as a Lead Technical Director, and more recently Robocop and Edge of Tomorrow as a supervisor in Montreal, Canada, where he moved to in 2013 to supervise projects as Framestore’s new facility expanded.
He’s being encouraging students with collaborations at Escape Studios, London as well as numerous presentations and talks at various universities and VFX events over the years.
VFX Supervisor, MPC (New York)
Torbjorn started his career as a 3d artist in the late 90′s, working for a small local business while attending high school in the small Swedish town where he grew up in. After finishing school, he spent the next seven years working as a 3d generalist, with focus on lighting, rendering and compositing. Eventually specialising in compositing the past 8 year have been spent mastering the art of comping.
During his career Tobey has worked for numerous renowned studios in both Sweden, UK and the US, on several award winning, nominated, and highly recognized projects. Companies such as Fido, Palladium, Jellyfish Pictures, Psyop, MPC, Nvizible, Nexus, Analog and The Mill, has allowed him to work with a wide range of clients, such as Nike, Heineken, Budweiser, Mercedes, Audi, Honda, Bethesda, Samsonite, Sony, Nokia, BBC, Guinness, and a whole bunch more.
Except for a few TV shows, music videos and short films, Tobey has spent most of his career working on high profile TV commercials. Tobey is a proud member of The Visual Effects Society (VES), ACM Siggraph, British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA, N.Y Chapter), and Swedish Visual Effects Association (S.V.E.A). He currently works as a VFX Supervisor at MPC, New York City.
The Mill (New York), 3D supervisor
Jeff Lopez is a 3D supervisor at The Mill’s New York Studio, where he was the lead on high profile projects such as Bayer Durazone, the award-winning Playstation Greatness Awaits, Chevrolet Stingray, and Norfolk Southern City of Possibilities.
Ninja Theory, Lead Cinematics
Steven has been in the video games industry for around 12 years. Trained in 2D, hand drawn animation he made the move to computers and 3d after graduation and began working in London in various games studios. After some time at Rockstar Vienna and Eurocom he is now the Lead Cinematics Animator at Ninja Theory in Cambridge.
Co-founder CG Student Awards & Tyroe.com
Andrew has a background in industrial design and has been in the digital effects industry for nine years. He has worked at a number of studios including Ambience Entertainment, Animal Logic, and The Moving Picture Company.
His film credits include Happy Feet, Harry Potter 5 and 6, 10,000 BC, Fred Claus, The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, Sweeney Todd, Watchmen, Australia, Knowing, Legend of the Guardians, Suckerpunch, Walking with Dinosaurs 3D (2013) and recently just finished up on Lego The Movie. Andrew is also the co-founder of Tyroe.com and the CG Student Awards.
Double Negative, Senior Modeller
Marco Menco has been working at Weta Digital for the past few years until recently taking a position in Vancouver at Double Negative. He has a background in traditional art and digital art. He has worked on movies such as District 9, Ironman 3, The Hobbit Trilogy and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. Marco is currently working on Alice in Wonderland: Through the Looking Glass.
Ubisoft Montreal, Animation Art Director
Scott has been in the animation industry for 14 years. He got his start in classical animation working contracts for various commercial and television clients such as Disney, Spumco, and Kelloggs. He made the jump into 3D and the gaming world at Ubisoft Montreal in 2004 working on multiple titles such as "Splinter Cell Chaos Theory", Prince of Persia The Two Thrones, and Assassin's Creed II", before directing on a project encompassing another one of his passions, "Shaun White Snowboarding".
A few years later a new opportunity lead him to Bioware (Edmonton Canada), to a Lead Animator position on the critically acclaimed "Mass Effect 3", before re-joining the team at Ubisoft Montreal to direct on direct on Far Cry 4, and now Rainbow Six Siege.
Senior Artist at Phosphor Games
Justin Mohlman is a Chicago-based artist with over a decade of experience in the gaming and educational industries and 20+ game titles under his belt. His area of expertise is creating art for the gaming world, with products from legacy franchises like Tony Hawk, Mortal Kombat and Kingdom Hearts. Throughout these projects, Justin worked with and led teams through planning, modeling, texturing and lighting levels to their final states.
Outside of game development, Justin has been instructing at a number of schools in the Chicago area, specializing in modeling, level design and texture painting. He also serves as a consultant for several studios and educational companies, Cg Cookie and Cg Student Awards among them.
Currently, Justin works for Phosphor Games as a Senior Artist and instructs at Tribeca Flashpoint Academy, Columbia College and the Art Institute of Chicago.
Pixar Animation Studio, Senior Lighting TD
Paul started working at MillFilm as a runner way back in 2000 having no CG experience, armed only with a degree in Fine Arts and a passion for Visual effects. After a brief period of making coffee and asking questions with lots of late night's training himself. He has been a VFX artist for 14 years within most of the top VFX facilities in London as well as Core Feature Animation in Toronto and currently Pixar Animation Studios in California.
Having worked as a Lead Lighting Technical Director, Lead Modeller and Head of Tracking, his experience includes both Animated feature films and Visual effects on over 30 feature films. These include films such as Black Hawk Down, Children of Men, Golden Compass, The tale of Despereaux, Avatar, Cars2, Brave, Monsters University, The Blue Umbrella and also several Harry Potter films.
Rebellion Development, Art Director
Christopher Payton is currently Head of Art at Rebellion, the independent studio behind the No.1 selling title Sniper Elite 3 as well as a host of other titles such as Zombie Army Trilogy. Chris has been making games since 2001 and has contributed to over 20 released titles. Prior to this he studied architecture at Oxford Brookes and Liverpool John Moores Universities. When he’s not making or playing games, Chris is restoring 1970’s Japanese dirt bikes.
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Weta Digital, Lead Texture Artist
Originally from Canada, Yann has spent the past fifteen years working in the VFX industry as a Texture and Look Development artist. The last eight years saw him step up to lead and supervisor roles for studios including Animal Logic and Lucasfilm.
He is currently working at Weta Digital as a Lead Texture Artist where some of his recent credits include The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.
MPC, VFX Supervisor
MPC’s Academy Award winning VFX Supervisor, Guillaume Rocheron began his career in 2000 at BUF in France where he started as a generalist 3D Artist working on The Race, Panic Room and The Matrix Reloaded. During his time at BUF he became one of the most senior members of the studio involved in many of the projects that transformed the company from a small facility to one of the biggest, most successful and renowned studios in France.
Guillaume joined MPC in 2005 as a senior TD in the closing stages of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. After working on a number of projects including Batman Begins, X-Men: Last Stand, Sunshine and The Golden Age as a lead lighting and Lookdev TD, he quickly rose to the role of CG Supervisor on 10,000 BC followed by Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, Shanghai, Night at the Museum 2 and Gi Joe: Rise of the Cobra. In 2010 Guillaume moved up to the role of MPC VFX Supervisor to lead the team working on Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief and since then has supervised the visual effects heavy movie Sucker Punch, Fast & Furious 5, Man of Steel, Godzilla and the critically acclaimed Life of Pi for which he has won an Academy Award, BAFTA, Critics Choice Award and VES award. Guillaume is currently VFX Supervisor on Batman vs Superman.
Freelance, 3D Generalist
Adam Sacco is a 3D Character Artist from Australia who specializes in modeling, textures and materials for animations, films and video games. His work has been featured in numerous magazines and when he is not working he likes to spend his time studying new organic and hard surface techniques to use in his work.
The Mill (New York), 3D Supervisor
Wyatt Savarese is a 3D supervisor at The Mill's New York studio. Most recently, he was the 3D lead on the award-winning PlayStation Greatness Awaits and Spotify For Music, and he has worked alongside directors Rupert Sanders, Peter Berg and Nicolai Fuglsig.
Creative Director and Head of 3D, The Mill - Los Angeles
Robert Sethi is Creative Director and Head of 3D at The Mill in Los Angeles. Having developed his career as a 3D artist at Visual Art, Scarlet Digital imaging, Double Negative and Brickyard VFX, Sethi became Head of 3D at The Mill in Los Angeles in 2009. Since then, he has led teams on high-profile campaigns including Call of Duty 'Epic Night Out' and 'Surprise', AMF 'Caterpillar' and Verizon 'Towers'. He has also directed OHSU 'One Down: Make Cancer the Victim' and Mattel Hot Wheels 'Immersion'. Sethi has worked with leading industry directors such as Guy Ritchie, Rupert Sanders James Mangold and Noam Murro. His work has received multiple awards from VES, CLIOS, AICP and Ciclope.
Double Negative, Character Rigger
Elliot Stammers is a Character Rigger born and raised in South London. He studied BA Computer Visualisation and Animation at Bournemouth University before applying to the CG Student Awards in 2010. After winning a two month rigging internship at Double Negative, he was subsequently offered a job and has worked on a number of projects since, including Disney's John Carter, Maleficent, Brett Ratner's Hercules (2014) and 300: Rise of an Empire spanning a few months at MPC and 3 years at Double Negative.
Monolith Productions, Director of Art
With experience spanning 21 years, Philip Straub is the Director of Art at Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, and recently shipped the award-winning title Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor. Having helped establish the tone and art direction for countless worlds, his work has been featured in video games, over 30 children’s books, award-winning book covers, feature films, and on licensed products sold around the world. He’s now leading Monolith Productions’ art department, as they march forward into brave new worlds.
Zynga, Senior VFX Artist
After earning his BFA in Computer Art from Savannah College of Art and Design, Ariel started his career at Tippett Studio where he created FX and ROTO artwork for Starship Troopers 2 and Hellboy. In 2005 he entered the game industry as a Technical and VFX Artist, shipping Mercenaries 2: World in flames and Lord of the Rings: Conquest with Pandemic Studios and Tony Hawk: Shred with Robomodo. He went on to lead a team in the development of Fort Courage, a mobile game for iOS and Android, for Human Head Studios. Ariel joined Zynga in 2013 to work on their flagship product, Farmville 2, a live game with over 2 million daily players. He designed the texture optimization pipeline, providing increased stability for the Farmville 2 game engine. In addition to his VFX responsibilities, Ariel provides Art Direction for weekly generated content.
Animal Logic, Lighting Supervisor
Craig has worked in film and television as a Lighting and Visual FX Artist for over fifteen years.
Joining Animal Logic in 1998, Craig worked as a Visual FX Artist on many television commercials, and was part of the VFX team on ‘The Matrix Reloaded’. Craig moved to the USA in 2003 where he was employed as a Lighting Artist for PDI/DreamWorks on ‘Shrek 2’ and ‘Madagascar’. He then went on to Sony Pictures Imageworks in Los Angeles as a Lighting Artist & Technical Director, working on numerous films. His credits there include ‘Monster House’, ‘Surf’s Up’, ‘Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs’, ‘I am Legend’ and ‘Speed Racer’.
Craig returned to Animal Logic in 2008 to build the Lighting and FX Department for ‘Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole' and served as Lighting Supervisor on that film, then filled the same role on ‘The Lego Movie’. Today Craig continues his great work with Animal Logic as Lighting Supervisor on the 'LEGO: Ninjago' and 'LEGO: Batman' movies.
The Mill, CG lead
Jonathan Wood is a CG lead in The Mill’s London studio after joining the 3D VFX team in 2010. He has most recently led projects such as Honda Civic Type R ‘The Other Side’, Virgin Money '40 years', Guinness 'Clock' and McCain ‘Chips for Tea’.
Jonathan has an impressive portfolio across some of the biggest award winning commercial campaigns including, Nike ‘Fuel’, Guardian ‘Three Little Pigs’ and Heineken ‘The Express’ and he has built an impressive reputation over the last 5 years within the team.
Prior to joining The Mill, John graduated from Coventry University where he studied Industrial Design.
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