Animal Logic Visual Effects

Animal Logic is a digital visual effects company that was founded in 1991. Their main studios are located in Sydney, Australia; but they have additional offices in Santa Monica, California. The majority of their business comes in the form of high-end clients looking for TV and commercial work. Recently however, they have been getting work in a number of large budget films such as The Great Gatsby, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, and 300.

Animal Logic's main draw in Santa Monica is the feel of a boutique-sized VFX studio, with the power of over 450+ talented artists back in Sydney. They're able to deliver quality, high-end projects. Since expanding their Santa Monica studio, they were able to grab accounts with Toyota and HBO.

In 2012, they worked with Coca-Cola to design 3 commercials for their Super Bowl campaign... affectionately dubbed the Polar Bowl.



It seems like Animal Logic has been out of the game recently, but that could just mean they're working on bigger and better things to blow the competition out of the water! I'm excited to see what they have to bring to the table for Australia as well as the States!

"The Great Gatsby" Special Effects

The Great Gatsby VFX from Chris Godfrey on Vimeo.

Over the long weekend, I had the pleasure of seeing The Great Gatsby for the first time. I was amazed at the lavish buildings, outfits, and parties that seemed to teem through the entire movie. However, it didn't occur to me at first that a lot of what I was seeing was likely a special effect.

After stumbling across this video, I learned that Chris Godfrey was the visual effects supervisor for the film. He worked with 7 different vendors to complete all the special effects in the movie.

While I was disappointed that Gatby's beautiful house didn't exist somewhere in real life, I did learn that many of the pieces were in fact real, just from different places. For example,

• The gates to Gatsby's mansion where shot in a park near the studios.
• The front facade of Gatsby's mansion was a school with 3d extensions.
• The garden was 3d.
• The hallway, ballroom, organ, stairs, breakfast balcony and dance area was stage 1.
• The wharf was stage 3, 4 and then 2 at various times.
• And Nick's Bungalow next door was stage 3, Centennial Park and Mount Wilson.

Overall, The Great Gatsby includes over 1,500 visually enhanced shots throughout.

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Kurt Halsey

One of my favorite visual artists is Michigan-based painter Kurt Halsey. Halsey earned a bachelor's degree in painting from the Minneapolis College of Art and Design in 2000. His work is largely driven by emotions and typically relates to the topics of love and relationships.

Drawings





Paintings

"Influenced by my hopeless romantic and super sensitive mindset, I pay far too much attention to the little things in life and in the relationship between two people. In constant need of reassurance, explanation, closure, and attention, my paintings are made."

By no means is Halsey a "famous" artist; however, those who follow his work do so in a cult-like fashion. Fans of his work show their appreciation often in the form of tattoos. A quick google search brings up hundreds and hundreds of Kurt Hasley doodles and quotes on the most devout of fans.


In today's society with vast technology, it is all too simple for Halsey to upload his work in droves. Since the early 2000's he has been sharing his work with the world on the internet... and it's hard for even his biggest fans to keep up with all of his work. It seems each time you're looking through collections, you see a piece that is completely new to you. It's a blessing and a curse, never running out of new pieces to see... but always wondering if you've seen them all.

If you want to see more of Kurt Halsey's work, feel free to visit his official website. If you'd like to look though a larger selection of his work, I encourage you to do a google search or look through the tags on tumblr such as #Kurt Halsey or #Kurt Halsey Frederiksen.

Everything's Temporary

Work hard to make something as meaningful and beautiful as you can and when you're done, pack it in and know it was all temporary.

- Yoga Jones, Orange is the New Black