Episode 20 features Visual effects wizard Kevin Lingenfelser, who has worked on such titles as Demolition Man, Waterworld, Preacher, Agents of SHIELD, The Orville, and many many more.
We discuss his origins and then dive into what goes into visual effects, where the industry is going, and glance at what could be a limitless future.
During the episode we cover:
- The films that started his passion
- The Kubert School
- A portfolio of 35mm Slides
- Connections A ILM
- Cold Calling
- Cinesite
- Make-up Fixes
- His first composite on Waterworld
- Practical vs. Digital effects
- The myth of No CGI films
- Working on effects on Preacher
- Going with his gut
- Godzilla
- Unreal Engine
- Gamechanger films
- Bad effects
- And much more…
Mentioned and Helpful Links from This Episode
Kevin Lingenfelser’s Episodic Demo Reel – 2019
Other Links
Have you heard of Preacher? This is how I came to know Reverend Jesse Custer
Music created and provided by Henno Heitur of Monkey Tongue Productions.
–End Show Notes Transmission–
–Begin Transcription–
00:00:00:01 – 00:00:22:38
Agent Palmer
Previously on Agent Palmer dot com, a book about lighthouses called Sea Shake and Houses, a suggestion for supporting the content creators who you enjoy even if you don’t have the money. And I’m still taking what the universe is giving me. This is The Palmer Files episode 20 with visual effects wizard Kevin Lingenfelser, who has worked on such titles as Demolition Man, Waterworld, preacher, agents of Shield, The Orville, and many, many more.
00:00:22:43 – 00:01:05:17
Agent Palmer
We discuss his origins and then dive into what goes into visual effects, where the industry is going, and glance at what could be a limitless future. Are you ready? Because this is happening. Let’s do the show.
00:01:05:21 – 00:01:34:23
Agent Palmer
Hello, and welcome to the Palmer Files. I’m your host, Jason Stershic. Also known as Agent Palmer. And on this 20th episode is visual effects wizard Kevin Link and Meltzer as a visual effects supervisor. Kevin has a portfolio that includes work on such films as Demolition Man, Waterworld, outbreak, Armageddon, Spider-Man three, Pirates of the Caribbean At World’s End, Thor, Transformers Dark of the moon, Real Steel, and television series such as Daredevil, American Gods, Runaways, preacher, The Orville, and Agents of Shield.
00:01:34:27 – 00:01:57:00
Agent Palmer
And those are just some highlights I selected out. His IMDb includes over 90 visual effects credits. I first met, or should I say, interacted with Kevin online through Bill Sweeney’s side project The Preacher versus Preacher Companion Comparison podcast. Yes, it’s a very long title because not only did Kevin work on the series preacher, and we speak to that during the episode.
00:01:57:03 – 00:02:20:46
Agent Palmer
He’s also a fan of the original comics, which is what the podcast was about. It was a companion comparison podcast. From there, I only knew some of his credits, but he was always willing to chime in on preacher discussions, whether it be a behind the scenes tidbit or a fellow fan’s perspective. So of course, he was the person I wanted to have on to talk about visual effects because I know what they look like, especially the ones he’s done.
00:02:20:46 – 00:02:42:50
Agent Palmer
But that is only the tip of the iceberg, and I was interested in what layers underneath creative the effects we see. What’s the process and how did he get into the industry and inspired in the first place? All of this is covered in much, much more, including where we’ve been with visual effects and where we may be heading to a place of infinite or limitless possibilities.
00:02:42:55 – 00:03:06:12
Agent Palmer
It may be coming soon, just not tomorrow. So if you want to discuss the episode as you listen or after, you can tweet me at Agent Palmer. You can tweet the show at the Palmer Files, and you can tweet Kevin at Fuchipatas. That’s f u c H i p a t a s. You can see his career credits on IMDb or his demo reel, which are both linked in the show notes.
00:03:06:17 – 00:03:30:14
Agent Palmer
Don’t forget, you can see all of my writings and rantings on Agent palmer.com. And again, if you want to see Kevin’s demo reel or his list of works, you just have to click the link that I have curated for you in the show notes, all of them in the show notes. So without further ado, let’s get into it.
00:03:30:19 – 00:03:54:06
Agent Palmer
All right, Kevin, it really boils down to this. You’re a visual effects guy, and I don’t want to start at the very, very beginning, but I have to like, what was the movie that set you on this path? Because in all of the behind the scenes things I’ve ever seen, whether it’s a director, an actor or someone in visual effects, it’s always like one movie that’s like, that’s what I want to do.
00:03:54:11 – 00:03:54:23
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah.
00:03:54:25 – 00:03:56:12
Agent Palmer
Do you have that movie?
00:03:56:17 – 00:04:27:40
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah, yeah. And it’s, it’s almost cliche, but undoubtedly it’s the original Star Wars A new Hope, because I was seven when I saw that, actually, not even because, yeah, it came out in May, so I was six when I saw that. So absolutely that but I actually have two. And then alien has, you know, the 1979 Ridley Scott film has had a huge impact on my desire to go into film.
00:04:27:45 – 00:04:31:13
Kevin Lingenfelser
But those two movies. But it did start with Star Wars and, you know.
00:04:31:26 – 00:04:40:04
Agent Palmer
So it starts there. Yes. As like interest in film. Was it any interest in film or was it like, no, I want to make shit blow up on screen.
00:04:40:13 – 00:05:07:06
Kevin Lingenfelser
It took a little while for me. What kind of started with watching those films? And then I’m a huge fan of Godzilla. You know, I grew up watching all the Toho films, all the Godzilla films, and then I started to draw in. You know, back in the 70s, there wasn’t a lot of resources available for people wanting to learn how visual effects were done that just wasn’t there.
00:05:07:11 – 00:05:32:35
Kevin Lingenfelser
So I had to, you know, look into it. And I subscribe to, like, Star Wars official fan club received there. I think it was quarterly newsletter, you know, for any insight. So that’s how I got introduced to Ralph McQuarrie and his paintings and just matte painting in general. And so it’s just trying to absorb as much as I could about the filmmaking process.
00:05:32:36 – 00:05:50:13
Kevin Lingenfelser
You know, reading Star Log magazine, that was a big part of my probably ten years, more than anything, thank Gloria, things like that. So it was just all trying to learn what I could just from, reading whatever I could and absorb as much as I could.
00:05:50:28 – 00:05:59:55
Agent Palmer
And from there. Do you go to school for it? Is it, you know, like, what’s the process from? This is what I want to do to getting there.
00:06:00:00 – 00:06:25:06
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah, it’s what I think. When you talk to anyone in this field or industry or just film in general, I think the journey is very different and very individual for each person. For me, I was also huge into comic books. You know, at the same time. And so I was still drawing. And in high school I took a lot of I was fortunate to go to a high school, and I’m from Michigan.
00:06:25:06 – 00:06:58:30
Kevin Lingenfelser
So it was a huge, huge high school. And they offer quite a robust curriculum in terms of art and stuff like that. So I was able to take graphic art, figure drawing, things like that in high school. So from there I kind of thought, okay, maybe I want to be a comic book artist. And I started researching schools and things like that, things like art and stuff and but oddly enough, I remember finding it sounds kind of cheesy, but I think there was an ad in the back of a comic book for a school in new Jersey called the Joe Kubert School cartoon in graphic art.
00:06:58:35 – 00:07:19:47
Kevin Lingenfelser
And Joe Cuba is this famous comic book artist. You know, he’d worked on Sergeant Rock and a lot of other things, and he has a very famous, you know, son as well. And Adam. So I was like, okay, I’m going to look into this. And I did. And I found out that anyone except like, I think at the time it was like 300 students a year and you had.
00:07:19:52 – 00:07:29:54
Agent Palmer
To very small. Yes. Well, I presume it’s also very small class sizes too. So it’s like that, like a personal. Yeah. Okay.
00:07:29:54 – 00:07:52:52
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah, exactly. So I researched it and found out that, you know, they wanted a portfolio. So I assembled portfolio. And at the time, I think part of that submission process was, you know, this was before you were able to, you know, JPEGs and anything like that. So I had to submit my artwork on just like 35 millimeter slides, you know.
00:07:52:57 – 00:08:22:48
Kevin Lingenfelser
And so I think I sent about 20, 25 different pieces of varying degrees. And at the time I was pretty proficient with pencils and shading. So that was kind of like my my forte in it. So long story short, I was accepted. It was a three year program. And so classes included things like figure drawing, lettering. There was also graphic art, composition, storyboarding and animation.
00:08:22:48 – 00:08:48:51
Kevin Lingenfelser
So I graduated high school in 88 and then went to Jersey, Dover, new Jersey for the school for three years. So I graduated in 91. And then, from there, it was kind of like, I, I came back home to Michigan, and I remember doing that, and I got an art job at all things, this, this kind of like sportswear company that made clothing, collegiate, clothing.
00:08:48:51 – 00:09:12:53
Kevin Lingenfelser
So, you know, it was just designing all these different sweatshirts and shirts and everything for things like, you know, every collegiate mascot and, you know, whether it was primarily football, though. So I did that and had to do that through using, Photoshop, just, you know, in terms of. So that was helpful because learned composition and was just.
00:09:13:05 – 00:09:18:06
Agent Palmer
The first Photoshop. I mean, I’m putting it in time. Like, that’s got to be.
00:09:18:11 – 00:09:44:33
Kevin Lingenfelser
Pretty early because I was using like an Apple or was it, oh my God, what was it back then. Like it to something or I forget what it was. But yeah, it was pretty early. But we also did things by hand to using vellum and things like that. And it was kind of like the final proof that went to the printers for the apparel was done in Photoshop, but a lot of the early work was done still by hand.
00:09:44:39 – 00:10:14:46
Kevin Lingenfelser
So I did that. And then, as with a lot of people, you know, connections can occur and I found out randomly that I had this cousin who lived in, Sausalito, California, and she knew someone at Industrial Magic. So I’m like, okay, I might, you know, my interest was peaked. So I started just cold calling, which, you know, a lot of people will tell you, don’t do that.
00:10:14:46 – 00:10:35:21
Kevin Lingenfelser
Don’t do that. But, you know, my whole thing has been, you know, you just everything that I’ve really wanted to get in my life, I’ve, I’ve done through just perseverance and just, you know, just hammering at it until, you know, until I got it. So this was something very much early on that I knew I wanted. So started making these calls.
00:10:35:23 – 00:10:51:28
Kevin Lingenfelser
Found out, oddly enough, though, that the name I’d been given was the gentleman he worked on Who Framed Roger Rabbit and Backdraft. But he was leaving Ireland to start a company in Los Angeles for Kodak called sensei.
00:10:51:32 – 00:10:52:16
Agent Palmer
Okay?
00:10:52:21 – 00:11:21:44
Kevin Lingenfelser
And I’m like, okay, so I got to number two since I started calling them and found out that, yep, they were starting the studio to send us a digital film studios. And the very first project they were going to do was the 4K restoration of Snow White and Seven Dwarves. So and what that entailed was basically just there was the first time this had been done scanning the entire film in 4K, and at the time no one else had done this.
00:11:21:49 – 00:11:48:58
Kevin Lingenfelser
And the idea was basically just frame by frame, you know, 24 frames per second. So you can imagine, I forget what the number of frames it was finally. But and going through cleaning all the, the dust and dirt from each frame. Because when you do a traditional anime film, it’s shot on a what they call a down shooter type camera, and there’s a piece of glass that’s lowered over the image and it’s shot.
00:11:49:03 – 00:12:03:30
Kevin Lingenfelser
But what happens with that piece of glass is you can capture dirt and dust and all sorts of stuff. So that’s then captured on film. So we had to clean all of that. We had to make all those images look pristine. All those frames.
00:12:03:30 – 00:12:13:34
Agent Palmer
Are you just cleaning it, cleaning it, or are you also touching it up like, all right, there’s this line is not as full as it should be for some reason. So are you touching up the art, too?
00:12:13:43 – 00:12:40:05
Kevin Lingenfelser
Only in extreme cases. We were doing color balancing and things like that too, but only in extreme cases of like whether there was like the, what’s it called, the RGB separation. Sometimes there would be, chromatic aberrations or things like that in the image. So we had to realign each layer, the red channel, the green channel, the blue channel, things like that.
00:12:40:05 – 00:13:07:38
Kevin Lingenfelser
But for the most part, we kind of left the artwork alone. It was just about cleaning it up. And we did it with a very rudimentary paint program. It was called spice. I forget it was an acronym, okay, but basically it was a very tedious process, and you basically would load a frame one frame at a time and you’d go through in quarters, you know, top left, top right, bottom right, bottom left or whatever order you wanted.
00:13:07:38 – 00:13:15:18
Kevin Lingenfelser
And just look for dirt and then just manually paint that dirt out. There was no procedural way to really do it at the time.
00:13:15:27 – 00:13:22:59
Agent Palmer
Is there a time frame like or I mean, obviously it’s not just you. It would take you a year forever.
00:13:23:04 – 00:13:49:07
Kevin Lingenfelser
It was a small army of people in the studio at the time, and then we ended up going to night shifts as well. So it turned into this 24 hour process to get it done. I started there in February of 93, and we finished it. I want to say I think it was like September of, 93. And that was after ramping up and getting more people on it.
00:13:49:12 – 00:13:50:10
Kevin Lingenfelser
So we did that.
00:13:50:13 – 00:13:58:19
Agent Palmer
Hold on. I want to go back real quick. How long were you cold calling, whether it was ILM or Cindy’s site, like, I mean, that that it was.
00:13:58:21 – 00:14:09:22
Kevin Lingenfelser
It was probably a good month or two and probably about I would probably wait. It was probably about ten, ten, 15 calls, tops in that time. You know.
00:14:09:30 – 00:14:15:29
Agent Palmer
I got like so not, you know, every hour on the hour, you know, call it a couple of days, call a couple.
00:14:15:29 – 00:14:27:05
Kevin Lingenfelser
Days. I knew enough not to be naggy or, you know, your classic thing where if you if you call too much, you’re just going to, you know, whether or not it’s just going to work against you.
00:14:27:05 – 00:14:49:49
Agent Palmer
And this is the early 90s. So it’s distance two, right? Like it’s not it’s not cheap. It’s not like unlimited cell phone stuff. So like you’re invested in how can I keep calling without bankrupting myself and being annoying and just exactly that’s a that’s not only persistence. Like there’s a balance. Like a soft touch.
00:14:49:54 – 00:14:52:53
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah. Okay. Oh, very true, very true.
00:14:52:59 – 00:15:02:04
Agent Palmer
So 93 we’re we’re back to Snow White’s done. Yeah. What’s the first, like Midi project that you get your hands on?
00:15:02:14 – 00:15:23:29
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah. I still remember to this day, in between the time we did several tests for, like, hey, let’s restore Ben-Hur and things like that. So we did sort of test for that. But then probably in fall 93, we had several films in. We, you know, laugh. Let’s see, we got Super Mario Brothers with John Leguizamo.
00:15:23:33 – 00:15:34:47
Kevin Lingenfelser
Okay. And that had a lot of different visual effects in it. And then we also got, the Saturday Night Live crew film Coneheads.
00:15:34:58 – 00:15:35:42
Agent Palmer
Okay.
00:15:35:47 – 00:15:57:45
Kevin Lingenfelser
And that was mainly because the makeup on the Coneheads needed serious cleanup. Okay. We see blending issues with the makeup to the human skin. So we had to go in and I forget how many shots we ended up doing for that film. But after shortly after that, though, Demolition Man came in.
00:15:57:46 – 00:16:03:42
Agent Palmer
One of my favorite movies, like I just there is something about that film I absolutely love.
00:16:03:44 – 00:16:06:41
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah, that’s crazy.
00:16:06:46 – 00:16:15:21
Agent Palmer
So at this point, what are you doing? Like, because obviously the touch up stuff and you know, but like the Coneheads sounds more like touch up. I mean, it.
00:16:15:22 – 00:16:18:47
Kevin Lingenfelser
Just makeup fixes what we call it, things like that. Exactly.
00:16:18:47 – 00:16:23:51
Agent Palmer
But for like Demolition Man. Yeah. I’m like, what are you actually doing?
00:16:23:56 – 00:16:49:52
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah, that was the first kind of transition into, like, doing what we call wire removals and cable removals and rig removals for for stunt work. Okay, so there was a lot of that. Then there was also things like, very simple 2D animation, things like where an eyeball is needed for an ID scan. So we had to create the actual scanning line for that.
00:16:49:52 – 00:17:20:38
Kevin Lingenfelser
And the actual, you know, just the CGI. Yeah, exactly. But it wasn’t really there wasn’t anything we didn’t really do anything 3D or CGI. Yeah, it was pretty much just 2D at that time. And then one of the other things we we also did some work on was the, the at the end where, you know, he’s able to freeze, Wesley Snipes character that we did we did some tests.
00:17:20:38 – 00:17:34:58
Kevin Lingenfelser
There’s a couple quick shots where we just did a very simple, you know, we inverted the image, you know, so a lot of times that that all automatically kind of gets you partway there to kind of like a cold or frozen.
00:17:34:58 – 00:17:36:15
Agent Palmer
Look I gotcha. Sure.
00:17:36:15 – 00:17:50:59
Kevin Lingenfelser
And then we belched on top of that. And then there were a couple large explosions at the end that were also added into the, into the film. And those were practical explosions on top of like a miniature model of a building.
00:17:51:04 – 00:18:05:13
Agent Palmer
So Demolition Man sounds like it gets you, like, out of the gate when you finally get your your feet wet. Yeah. You’re into Star Wars stuff, like you’re working with miniatures, you’re working with explosions. You’re like, you’re you’re there.
00:18:05:18 – 00:18:39:15
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah, exactly. It was. And what’s funny is, thank God I work this way is since it was only supposed to be a film restoration company, but the gentleman that, get the phone number from Ed Jones, he wanted to transition into this visual effects house. And so it just kind of rolled from there. And we started out mostly doing paint type work, you know, the type of stuff I told you where okay, well, remove removal makeup fixes, things like that, small simple comps.
00:18:39:15 – 00:19:05:47
Kevin Lingenfelser
And we were working with a proprietary software package called simian, okay. It was developed by Kodak. It was pretty powerful. And this was the heyday of if you’re familiar with you know, SGI was huge back in those days. All the computers were SGI. There were no apples or, you know, PCs. It was all high end, several different flavors of QGis.
00:19:05:51 – 00:19:07:38
Kevin Lingenfelser
It was a very expensive process.
00:19:07:38 – 00:19:10:50
Agent Palmer
And that was if I, Silicon Graphics. Right?
00:19:10:50 – 00:19:34:44
Kevin Lingenfelser
Correct. So back in 93, 94, 95, you know, it was very expensive, you know, a wire removal, you know, simple makeup fixes back then were like several grand, you know, if not more. We did a lot of trailer work to where we came in and helped just do wire removals or clean up on trailers like, the Rock.
00:19:34:44 – 00:19:58:53
Kevin Lingenfelser
I remember that specifically Crimson Tide. We had some cleanup work on that real quick. But over, over the years, you know, by 95, that’s when our stride hit and we go three movies at the same time that were pretty big for the time. We got, dark Territory under siege to which was a Steven Seagal movie on a train.
00:19:58:53 – 00:20:06:19
Kevin Lingenfelser
So all the train windows were green screen. And then we also got Waterworld, which was massive.
00:20:06:19 – 00:20:20:17
Agent Palmer
Yeah. That kid. That can’t be easy because, I mean, there are two projects that seem the same though, right? Like it’s a lot of, we filmed in this 20 by 20 space. Yeah, the rest is green screen. Here you go. Fill it in.
00:20:20:17 – 00:20:41:24
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yes. The water world was definitely. And then the other one was actually, you know, that Free Willy two, where we had to do, a lot of makeup fixes on and on. The animatronic whales, there were seams and things like that in. Yeah, from the molding of the of the animatronic whales that we had to get rid of.
00:20:41:29 – 00:21:09:39
Kevin Lingenfelser
Then we did the classic jump over the kid to. That was a shot that was done. CG but Waterworld was definitely the most intensive one because we were also for the first time utilizing CG water, and we were working with a company called at the time, Air Tay. So they were pretty much just known for creating, you know, very authentic, very realistic looking ocean surfaces.
00:21:09:39 – 00:21:31:37
Kevin Lingenfelser
So I think like the whole third act, which takes place on the, you know, the DS, the defunct kind of Valdez, the Exxon Valdez, you know, the ship from the infamous oil spill that was shot in. I think they had that set in the city of Industry and the ship had to be towed. We didn’t have because it was so large.
00:21:31:51 – 00:22:11:01
Kevin Lingenfelser
The set that they built, they couldn’t put green screens around everything. So we did a lot of roto in that. And then the ocean surface had to be put out there. There was a lot of wire work in there, and then one of the big shots that I was able to finally transition, kind of like from paint work to compositing, which was the next level, the next step when you’re combining multiple elements to form a final image, was the shot where Dennis Hopper’s character, the deacon, gets in a plane and he tries to take off from the deck of the DS, and he goes over the Mariner, Kevin Costner’s head.
00:22:11:01 – 00:22:31:13
Kevin Lingenfelser
And the Mariners got this kind of like, grappling hook type thing and uses it to hook it. So I had worked on, I think the shot name, where I still remember it was the 74 D for DS, so that was a big deal because it was a big moment in the show. When I worked on that shot for like weeks.
00:22:31:13 – 00:22:47:25
Kevin Lingenfelser
I remember, you know, just, you know, fine tuning it, getting the balance right between the, model plane and the actual live action footage of Costner on the deck and things like that, and just making it look like the plane was actually on the deck was also. That was probably the hardest thing.
00:22:47:30 – 00:22:57:09
Agent Palmer
So it sounds to me like anything, it’s an iceberg. We don’t. We only see the little top. We don’t see everything else underneath. You know, you.
00:22:57:14 – 00:22:57:28
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah.
00:22:57:30 – 00:23:05:07
Agent Palmer
Do you, when you’re watching movies, like first of all, can you watch movies like or is it or do you have like this.
00:23:05:07 – 00:23:13:41
Kevin Lingenfelser
No, no no no, that’s that’s fair. Yes. And I actually do love watching it. And I watch them for reference purposes to.
00:23:13:47 – 00:23:14:23
Agent Palmer
Okay.
00:23:14:28 – 00:23:45:32
Kevin Lingenfelser
Like, case in point, like last night I watched underwater because it had creature work in it, and I wanted to see what it looked like. Did it work and just get a feel for, you know, how things have progressed over the years, you know, because it was all entirely all the creature work was entirely CG. So which is, you know, a lot of people have issues with that, but there’s there are certain things that you can do with CG that you just can’t do practically and to a certain extent vice versa.
00:23:45:36 – 00:24:00:41
Kevin Lingenfelser
And I now have kind of learned that I kind of prefer working with practical and kind of augmenting it. The CG that to me is kind of like the best of both worlds. And I find a lot of directors nowadays respond well to that.
00:24:00:41 – 00:24:25:46
Agent Palmer
So as a as an effects guy and as a Star Wars guy, when J.J. said before it was Force Awakens, you know, episode seven is going to have practical effects. We’re going back to practical effects. Yeah. Were you excited or was it like, all right, what does this mean for the industry? If the, you know, if Star Wars is going back to practical like because as a fan, you know, I’m here going like, all right.
00:24:25:46 – 00:24:52:49
Agent Palmer
Yeah practical effects. This is great. But you’re in the industry so. Right. It’s it it’s not a major change. I don’t think practical effects really went anywhere, but having a major Star Wars film go like, no, we’re going back to practical effects as much as possible. Right? It it tweaks the industry a little bit. So like do you are you conflicted a little bit when when you hear like things like that or are you just like, well, let’s see where it goes.
00:24:52:53 – 00:25:12:20
Kevin Lingenfelser
No not really. I’ve kind of learned to develop like a thick skin for it. Probably something that like in the case of that, I was like, okay, and they’re right. They’re claiming, okay, they’re going to do a lot of practical effects. Okay, let’s see. Let’s see how that goes. And I felt after seeing the film that yeah, they had some success with it.
00:25:12:31 – 00:25:48:20
Kevin Lingenfelser
You know, some of the creatures to me looked practical and kind of took me out of the film, but others did not, you know, and that kind of is par for the course. I think the bigger issue for me, with what I do are things where, you know, after a film is completed and it’s obviously a visual effects film, the director or the studio goes on this whole silence of like, oh, there were hardly any CG used in this, you know, and not I’m only bringing this one particular film up, his one.
00:25:48:20 – 00:26:18:53
Kevin Lingenfelser
I adore it, but two, it was probably one of the worst cases of this ever was mad Max Fury Road. You know, George Miller, every interview? No, there’s hardly any visual effects. There’s no visual effects. There’s no not right. That movie had over 2000 visual effects shows over it, probably closer to 3000. Every edit in that film, at the bare minimum, had what we call a time remapping, where the frame rate was altered for some purpose.
00:26:18:58 – 00:26:50:12
Kevin Lingenfelser
That’s a that’s like one of the simplest visual effects. Sometimes they’re able to do that in the editorial process. Other times when they’re ramping, let’s say they shot something at 96 frames or in which was, you know, 74 times normal. What they would do sometimes is the first half of it would be at 96 frames. And then if it’s like a fight sequence and they want a punch or something or a sword strike or just some kind of weapon hit to have impact, they’ll snap to 24 frames per second.
00:26:50:17 – 00:27:14:35
Kevin Lingenfelser
Okay, that’s usually done by us because there’s finessing that’s involved. To get that. So it doesn’t just look like a hard cut from 96 to 24. It’s got to be ramped in gently. So it’s those kinds of things. You know, I think the new Netflix, dark Crystal series made the same claim. Meanwhile, the visual effects studio had done CG creatures for that series.
00:27:14:37 – 00:27:23:28
Agent Palmer
Is there, like within the industry? Is there, you know, is it like a badge of honor? Like, hey, we we didn’t use any like. Like what?
00:27:23:33 – 00:27:34:58
Kevin Lingenfelser
It is weirdly so. Yeah, it’s it is this weird, really unofficial badge of honor. Like, hey, we didn’t use any CG, you know? I mean, it’s all real.
00:27:35:05 – 00:27:57:01
Agent Palmer
I guess, because to me, like The Force Awakens being the example, like, we know it wasn’t all practical effects. They didn’t build the planet like, oh, okay. A complete, you know, like there are certain things, but I look at your work on preacher, I, I can suspend my disbelief, but I, you know, when somebody’s falling out of a plane, I believe they’re falling out of a plane.
00:27:57:01 – 00:28:19:31
Agent Palmer
I don’t need to know whether it was visual or otherwise. And I think that’s one of the weird disconnects, is that people in the industry are like, you know, hey, we didn’t use any visual effects. And as fans, we sometimes hate on visual effects, because we’ve seen bad visual effects. Yes. But, you know.
00:28:19:32 – 00:28:20:13
Kevin Lingenfelser
There’s.
00:28:20:18 – 00:28:26:15
Agent Palmer
But but at the same time, when we don’t notice them, which is when they’re good.
00:28:26:20 – 00:28:26:43
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yes.
00:28:26:58 – 00:28:47:46
Agent Palmer
We don’t we don’t say anything like it’s so like it should be. Hey, can you spot the visual effects? Like they’re good. And, you know, it’s not because I’ve come to know you via Twitter. It’s in general, it’s weird to me because I know, you know, my my filmography goes back and I’m in love with the Bakshi stuff.
00:28:47:51 – 00:29:08:52
Agent Palmer
So the the the like the the godfather of rotoscoping. So I understand the work that’s involved just on that animation level. Right. So to make something look real, like, I get it, there’s a lot of work. And I always wonder, like why I absolutely if it’s if it’s a crappy visual effect, you know, call somebody out on it.
00:29:08:52 – 00:29:26:01
Agent Palmer
But if I can’t tell what what like I never understood and I, I feel for you because, like, that’s your livelihood. That’s right. It’s your job. So when somebody is like, oh, there are none. Even if there are like other people go, oh, I guess we don’t need it.
00:29:26:06 – 00:29:59:58
Kevin Lingenfelser
Right? Yeah. I mean, don’t get me wrong, the compliment I always strive for whenever I do a new show or a new project is for someone to not notice the visual effects, you know, except, you know, there are going to be instances. And preacher was a good example where you know, we had a, a pretty awesome blending of things that were visual effects and could only be done by, you know, CG and stuff that we did also in CG that people might have thought were practical, you know.
00:29:59:58 – 00:30:28:30
Kevin Lingenfelser
And so ultimately, my goal is for no one to be taken out by anything that I do. So if people come away thinking there were any visual effects in it, I’m actually okay with it. It’s the whole fight of practical versus, you know what I do that can be a little grating at times, but, you know, things like, a good example of an all CG shot that we did was at the end of the first season with the All Saints Church.
00:30:28:35 – 00:30:54:27
Kevin Lingenfelser
We blew that thing up. That was all CG. We talked about doing it practically, but the thing with doing a practical explosion, and they actually had a church built. It was only the production designer. Gate blast did a great job of building that thing, him and his crew, but they only built the two sides of it, the front facade and the screen left side.
00:30:54:32 – 00:30:55:55
Agent Palmer
Oh, for shooting purposes?
00:30:55:55 – 00:31:18:12
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yes. Correct. So they didn’t have to build it. And this was all shot in Albuquerque. So the advantage of doing it CG because we knew we could do it using software like 2D and things like that is you get to tweak it as you go along, meaning you can embellish and add to it. Whereas if you shoot that practically, you get one shot and that’s it.
00:31:18:16 – 00:31:37:52
Kevin Lingenfelser
You know, there weren’t any extras or there wasn’t a second version of the church ready to go. It was just one shot, one shot only. So they had to weigh that in advance, you know? And so we knew we could and and it was a particular type of explosion to it was this massive underground explosion, you know, occurred.
00:31:37:52 – 00:31:56:40
Kevin Lingenfelser
And they wanted it to have this kind of nuclear, shockwave effect to it, which normal pyro wasn’t going to give you because normal pyro usually is. It’s just that there’s a lot of pyro involved with it. And this was more of a concussive, massive thing that wiped out the church. So that was the other reason.
00:31:56:47 – 00:32:27:36
Agent Palmer
Over your career, you have melded real pyro with. Yes. You know, visual effects. Are you on set for the real pyro or is it just here’s the material, because obviously there are there’s only so much coverage. I mean, you can put 100 cameras at it and still not get it right. Like, yes. So how much input do you guys have with the pyro team so that you, you can work with the proper stuff instead of just being like, oh well, we have to redo this.
00:32:27:46 – 00:32:28:30
Agent Palmer
Well, it was preacher.
00:32:28:30 – 00:32:55:50
Kevin Lingenfelser
No, I was on set for that. So I had some, input on that. Obviously. That’s why I’m there. I’m there for several reasons to help the director answer any questions or concerns that they may have, but also make sure that I’m getting everything I need from the day, from the shoot for what we need to do when we when I go back to the office and finish the work.
00:32:55:55 – 00:33:17:30
Kevin Lingenfelser
Those are the primary concerns that I have first and foremost, though, it is to make sure that the director and the crew are comfortable in shooting anything related to visual effects, because a lot of times it can become this kind of tense situation on set, you know, because a lot of directors just don’t want to deal with that aspect of it.
00:33:17:35 – 00:33:42:51
Kevin Lingenfelser
But my my job is to educate them and make them feel comfortable using it. So I try to be there when I can, sometimes will work on a show where there’s already a production supervisor attached. So we’re kind of, for lack of a better word, we’re at their mercy of how they they decided to shoot the elements, and then we get the elements, and then we put them together to the best of our ability.
00:33:42:51 – 00:33:58:48
Kevin Lingenfelser
Sometimes we have to augment them. We come back and tell them that as well. This this explosion is not going to work because it doesn’t quite match the angle or perspective for what’s needed versus the foreground plate. Things like that can occur. But that’s all part of, you know what I do.
00:33:59:00 – 00:34:01:35
Agent Palmer
We spent a lot of time talking about explosions.
00:34:01:40 – 00:34:01:58
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yes.
00:34:02:05 – 00:34:18:07
Agent Palmer
What is your favorite visual effect to do? I mean, obviously they’re all unique and it’s all dependent of like what you’re working on, but like, what’s your favorite? Like, you know, somebody who’s like, all right, Kevin, this is what we’re doing. And you’re like, yes. Or is it all like that?
00:34:18:15 – 00:34:38:14
Kevin Lingenfelser
I can be that. That was the nice thing about working on preacher is it was kind of all that, you know, over the course of the three seasons that we worked on the show, you know, we got to blow up this church. We got to do a lot of crazy core type work, you know, whether it be headshots and just blood and the fight.
00:34:38:14 – 00:35:02:46
Kevin Lingenfelser
I mean, I’m really proud of the pilot episode of preacher because it had everything in it. You know, the introduction of each of the main characters were big set pieces. You know, Cassie was fighting in a Learjet. All the blood in that fight was added by us. There was no practical blood. The day. Okay. Yeah. And all the weapons that were thrown, those were, those were CG.
00:35:02:50 – 00:35:24:56
Kevin Lingenfelser
So things like that was great. The two ops intro sequence in the cornfield, went out to this, try and remember the city way out there on the border of Nevada and California to shoot in the cornfield. And so we shot plates and, you know, so that was a lot of green screen work and plate work. And then we did a map painting of Russia for one of the sequences in the film.
00:35:24:56 – 00:35:49:09
Kevin Lingenfelser
And it was just a lot of and over the course of season one, you know, doing, you know, Cassidy burning when it comes out into the sun. That was fun CG work, you know, once again, working with Houdini and the artists in that and creating that kind of nasty look. So I really enjoyed those types of shows that give me kind of a good variety of effects to work on, rather than it just being a one trick pony.
00:35:49:12 – 00:36:06:58
Kevin Lingenfelser
Gotcha. Or just like a character all the times. Don’t get me wrong, CG characters are great. I had a great time working on Jack the Giant Killer, you know, with those massive CG giants, you know, and so that was that was a very fun and fulfilling film to work on for me.
00:36:07:13 – 00:36:30:26
Agent Palmer
So I’ve been through your IMDb a few times, and one of the things that strikes me is because you considered comic books as a potential career. But you’ve worked on all these comic book type shows. I mean, whether it’s Preacher or Agents of Shield, and you worked on a Spider-Man movie like you’ve done all these things. Is this it?
00:36:30:26 – 00:36:51:15
Agent Palmer
Like, this is your career, is there anything? And you did The Orville so well, while you haven’t done Star Wars, you’ve done some good space. You know space, right? Like, is there any, I don’t know, genre or like peace outside of maybe it because I’m gonna guess this like a Godzilla movie, that you would like still to do.
00:36:51:20 – 00:37:17:10
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah. I mean, ultimately, it’s funny you asked that. Yeah. Because, you know, for me, and it’s probably just because of when I was born and it’s my age, you know, I would have told you probably ten years ago, I wanted to work on a Star Wars film, or I want to work on an alien film, you know, those two and Godzilla to a lesser extent, because they’ve only really done two new films more recently.
00:37:17:15 – 00:37:44:48
Kevin Lingenfelser
But with Star Wars and Alien both, they’ve kind of drifted from what I liked about them. Okay, so, you know, I haven’t felt like I missed out because I didn’t work on episodes, you know, one, 2 or 3 or 7 or 8 or nine, to be quite honest. Good friend of my work. He was supervisor on seven, eight, nine, and I loved the work in it, but the films just don’t resonate with me the way episodes four, five and six did.
00:37:44:48 – 00:38:14:26
Kevin Lingenfelser
Same with the alien films, you know, Covenant and Prometheus. So I think I’ve been fortunate where I had opportunities early on and to work on that. Roland Emmerich Godzilla film. You know, I went in and interviewed for it, you know, it’s going to be a supervisor on it. And then, and, get me in trouble. But I remember seeing the mCAT, I forget what scale was, but they had marketed the actual Godzilla that they were doing CG for the film.
00:38:14:35 – 00:38:32:08
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah. And it my gut reaction to it was not good. You know, I don’t even know if I had a poker face at that moment when they showed it to me, because I just I was looking at an oversize iguana. And so that kind of was like, okay, no, I can’t, you know.
00:38:32:13 – 00:38:44:57
Agent Palmer
That’s yeah, that’s that to me. Like, I, I haven’t appreciation for that film because it, it’s it. But but Godzilla is like not even part of it. Like for me. Yeah. That movie is Independence Day meets Jurassic Park. Yeah.
00:38:44:57 – 00:38:46:07
Kevin Lingenfelser
It’s a monster.
00:38:46:07 – 00:39:11:21
Agent Palmer
And and in that way, I feel like it’s great to watch, like it’s it’s exactly the popcorn that you want it to be. All right. But as a Godzilla film, you know it. Like, if if that was, I feel like that movie would have done so much better if it wasn’t named Godzilla. I agree, because there were so many purists that were like and rightly so, but there were so many purists that were like, oh, this is not good.
00:39:11:21 – 00:39:26:08
Agent Palmer
And it just, so I, I get what you’re saying, because if they show you like, like if, if they didn’t tell you it was a Godzilla film and they showed you that figure, you would have been like, well, that looks cool.
00:39:26:13 – 00:39:47:56
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah, yeah, I would have been exactly. You know, because, you know, like I said, I grew up with it. So. Exactly. You have this and then to your point or give me wrong, they took risks, you know, they they took a calculated risk going going the way that they did. And I, I respect that sometimes, you know, it’s like okay, I see what you’re doing.
00:39:47:57 – 00:40:08:07
Kevin Lingenfelser
You don’t want to just kind of like copy paste reuse kind of thing, you know? I mean, so I understood what they were trying to do in terms of trying to make it fresh. And you’re right. I mean, I don’t consider myself. But there there are a lot to even to this day with the new Godzilla film purists out there that, I’m a fan.
00:40:08:07 – 00:40:38:05
Kevin Lingenfelser
I don’t consider myself a purist. Okay. But, just something about it. I, I rely on my gut for a lot of the choices that I do, and a lot of the kind of getting back to your question about if there’s a genre or if there’s something out there and I want to work on right now, what we’re seeing is we’re seeing you know, we went through so many years, beginning with 1993 and Super Mario Brothers, we’re seeing video game movies make their way into cinema, and they’re just starting to be done at a higher level.
00:40:38:05 – 00:41:04:40
Kevin Lingenfelser
And it’s not just enough about Polish, but also good stories. Sure, there’s numerous video game properties in the work in terms of even episodic series that I’m interested in, and films as well, things like Metal Gear Solid, just going right now, things like that. And I’m also attracted to certain types of directors. You know, for me, I would love to work on a Christopher Nolan film.
00:41:04:53 – 00:41:26:20
Kevin Lingenfelser
I have great respect for him and just the way he thinks, he’s another director that does like to shoot as much as you can. And camera, once again, I have deep respect for that. But he does utilize CG, you know, I mean, huge fan of the John Wick films. You know, in the last film, Parabellum had copious amounts of visual effects in them.
00:41:26:33 – 00:41:54:48
Kevin Lingenfelser
They don’t talk about it. You know, digital doubles are very popular now and now with the advent of things like The Irishman and we’re still trying to get to that, trying to beat the uncanny valley where the the digital creation just still has this kind of look to it that isn’t quite right, isn’t quite human. But we are getting there and I think in particular video game technology, you know, Unreal Engine, if you’re familiar with that.
00:41:54:48 – 00:42:29:54
Kevin Lingenfelser
They just they just unveiled their, Unreal Engine five and it’s just stunning what is achievable. And that Unreal Engine four is being used to create backgrounds and assets for The Mandalorian, which is fantastic, you know, and it’s going to cut down once it gets to a point where that can be mass produced. It’s going to cut down on production time, you know, which is going to help immensely, you know, and it also solve issues of like, okay, do we need to travel to Africa or Russia to get this?
00:42:30:00 – 00:42:43:05
Kevin Lingenfelser
Now we can create the assets inside Unreal Engine four, have them ready, bring the actors on the light stage and shoot them with those assets and make lighting changes on the fly. It’s just remarkable what’s being done nowadays.
00:42:43:05 – 00:43:07:49
Agent Palmer
So with where we are, I’m not necessarily the most inside cinephile, so I know that as an example, Lord of the rings changed everything for visual effects. But is there something else that you, as someone in the industry, is there another film or franchise like Lord of the rings, either before or after it that really, like changed the game?
00:43:07:49 – 00:43:34:03
Agent Palmer
Because I remember and Peter Jackson was, you know, the first to say, like, we’re utilizing visual effects like as much as we can. And that’s probably one of the reasons I know how extensive the visual effects were on those things. And I also know that, you know, everybody took Jackson’s talking points and then started talking to other people and other directors who were like, yeah, no, they’re changing the game.
00:43:34:08 – 00:43:41:25
Agent Palmer
Is there something else that, like you know, within the industry was like a game changer that like, we wouldn’t know?
00:43:41:30 – 00:43:45:32
Kevin Lingenfelser
Oh, I don’t know. No, I don’t want him to think.
00:43:45:36 – 00:43:56:52
Agent Palmer
Or is it when those things happen like, no, like the director or the head of visual. Like they know to like put this in the PR packet and like, it’s just out there to everybody.
00:43:56:52 – 00:44:23:35
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah. A good example of that is, you know, for a while there in the 90s, visual effects wise, there weren’t a lot of like, you know, fantastic visual effects films, to be quite honest. You know, it wasn’t until well, I’d rather actually I’d probably say late 80s, early 90s. It wasn’t until 93 when Jurassic Park came out and when not even the Brachiosaurus.
00:44:23:35 – 00:44:46:07
Kevin Lingenfelser
It wasn’t until the T-Rex shot that I knew, oh my God. Okay, we’re seeing a new level. We’re seeing, you know, not the death of stop motion animation, but we’re, you know. Yeah. Because that was a fight, the the inner turmoil to make that movie. I mean, that was going to be Phil Tippett’s film and, you know, it was all going to be Star motion, you know?
00:44:46:07 – 00:45:15:17
Kevin Lingenfelser
And don’t get me wrong, I adore Phil Tippett in the Work Done and Dragonslayer and The Empire Strikes Back and all that stuff, just to this day still blows my mind. But when the T-Rex breaks out of his pad, it in that shot, that was that was a game changer. Another one for me that people I feel don’t talk about enough, because I feel it’s an even more authentic and more realistic looking character than even Gollum was.
00:45:15:17 – 00:45:43:27
Kevin Lingenfelser
David Jones in Pirates of the Caribbean two okay, yeah, Davy Jones was groundbreaking. I mean, that was just like, oh my God, that’s awesome. I remember seeing that on the screen for the first time and just being blown away. So to your point, I think when there are big shifts, big changes in the visual effects, know for the most part they do the right thing and they make sure to get that out there, you know, to say, hey, look at this.
00:45:43:27 – 00:46:03:05
Kevin Lingenfelser
You know, case in point, like I spoke about The Mandalorian. You know, they’re talking about not CG characters, but they’re talking about how they’re changing the way things were filmed, you know, which is huge, very different. A lot of times we talk about things like, you know, the T-Rex in Jurassic Park or Davy Jones or going, but it could be a plethora of things.
00:46:03:05 – 00:46:32:06
Kevin Lingenfelser
I mean, I’m, I don’t know when, but with this new technology for Mandalorian, and with looking at Unreal Engine five, we’re going to probably finally see the death of like, blue screen, green screen compositing, because, you know, a lot of that now will be attainable in camera still utilizing visual effects, but you have your foreground actors and whatever other set props you need.
00:46:32:11 – 00:47:01:37
Kevin Lingenfelser
And then the background will be pre-rendered using game engines like unreal five and just offering DPS. And the crew will just limitless opportunities to change things on the fly and record it all in one shot. So there’s a lot of just interesting stuff on the horizon. And, you know, digital humans are advancing, you know? Another good one to talk about briefly was Gemini Man was a film.
00:47:01:42 – 00:47:30:26
Kevin Lingenfelser
It didn’t do well at the box office, but that was a film that had been percolating in the industry for. I remember first hearing about that in the mid 90s and talking about Mel Gibson, Harrison Ford, but the tech wasn’t there. It just wasn’t there just wasn’t there. Couldn’t do it. We couldn’t de-age that person. You know, they talked about doing it to the traditional makeup, but it wasn’t going to be enough because you also had seen the actor out in a lot of instances and things like that.
00:47:30:26 – 00:47:52:19
Kevin Lingenfelser
And change the bone structure and the way the skin, you know. So Gemini Man’s, for example, of something that, you know, took decades to get it to that point, you know, and that’s just going to be the kind of thing that’s just going to keep going. So it’s going to be interesting to see what what’s on the horizon for films and TV series, you know, coming down in the years ahead.
00:47:52:32 – 00:48:08:00
Agent Palmer
So are we at a point where Gemini Man will never have to wait another decade? Like, are we at a point now where we’re at that? I don’t want to say limitless, but that’s what I mean. Like, we’re at that limitless, like, all right, here’s my movie pitch.
00:48:08:05 – 00:48:08:49
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah.
00:48:08:54 – 00:48:15:41
Agent Palmer
We can do it like there is no where. Maybe the technology is not there. Like, how have we arrived? Are we close?
00:48:15:45 – 00:48:29:20
Kevin Lingenfelser
We’re close. Okay. Yeah. I don’t think we’re. I don’t think you go in a studio and pitch an all CG digital human film versus actors at this point, yet I think the only person that can do that is James Cameron.
00:48:29:29 – 00:48:30:07
Agent Palmer
Okay.
00:48:30:12 – 00:49:09:01
Kevin Lingenfelser
Doing it. I mean, the whole, you know, avatar sequels, it’s a whole it’s going to be a whole plethora of technology that we haven’t even seen yet that’s going to be unveiled when those films finally debut. So I think he’s the rare exception, you know, but I think by and large, we’re still quite not there, yet, because case in point, I just read an article about George Miller speaking of mad Max, where his next film after that, I think the one he’s doing was going to be the Furiosa film, and he thought about using Charlize again and then just de-aging her.
00:49:09:06 – 00:49:32:18
Kevin Lingenfelser
But he felt even with seeing The Irishman, that the technology still wasn’t there yet. Okay, so he is actually pursuing casting a different actress to play the role. So it’s very much like I said, depending on the director’s point of view of it and studios as well, because right now it’s still an expensive process to undertake.
00:49:32:23 – 00:50:01:52
Agent Palmer
Is that the other shoe to drop is once we get this technology, like any other technology, it does come down. I mean, Silicon Graphics back in the day, were it and then it wasn’t until jobs comes around, with whatever he created, I, I’m blanking on the name, that he sold to Pixar. Yes. As machines that were not Silicon Graphics.
00:50:01:56 – 00:50:29:06
Agent Palmer
And then those started to come down in price. So I guess like where and it’ll never be like a $50 like program. Like I understand that, but at a certain point, you know, maybe in two decades, I will be able to reasonably say, all right, I could spend a couple grand, not 100,000, about a couple grand on getting that kind of Unreal Engine software.
00:50:29:11 – 00:51:00:45
Agent Palmer
And independent movies will get a shot in the arm. As far as visual effects. Yeah, because I don’t know. For me, independent movie means it was all shot that that’s. And maybe the child’s my head, but for the most part, independent movies, you know, maybe they get, visual effects. Right? One. So so we’ll start seeing probably better quality or more or just more visual effects, independent film going forward.
00:51:00:50 – 00:51:30:00
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah, I think so. I mean, it’s to the point now, even your, your most basic rom com has some visual effects on it. You know, even television series, you know, have visual effects on it, you know, driving comps or staple, you know, so it is the kind of thing that it’s frustrating. No. Because one of the things that has happened lately is, you know, I was talking about like back in 93, 94, a wire removal was a cost, like five, six, seven grand.
00:51:30:05 – 00:52:05:23
Kevin Lingenfelser
Now you won’t get the work unless your wire removal is like 500 bucks. Okay. And that has more deeper and lasting impacts, with what I do. And, you know, when a movie is done, except for films like Star Wars, you know, where or Lord of the rings, where, you know, visual effects associated with those films, you know, you know, I was going to work on Star Wars, but even I when you look at the credits of the recent films, there’s about three or 4 or 5 other facilities underneath them.
00:52:05:32 – 00:52:21:06
Kevin Lingenfelser
Sure. And everything’s done through a bidding process. So you have to be not always, but a lot of times you have to come in under, the theme that’s killing us right now or all these incentives that other countries are giving, you know, go to Canada and you get 25%.
00:52:21:11 – 00:52:39:46
Agent Palmer
You know, it’s it’s so films have become the space agency, the NASA right. Like it’s that great quote from, the right stuff, like where I think it’s the right stuff. You know, where we’re sitting on a rocket built by the lowest bidder. Yeah. Right. Yeah. So, so is that that that’s movies now.
00:52:39:51 – 00:52:52:39
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah. And it’s tough too, because the other thing that I don’t want to get too deep into it, but, you know, I think we’re one of the only, you know, departments or disciplines in the film industry that isn’t unionized, you know, is.
00:52:52:39 – 00:52:53:41
Agent Palmer
That something.
00:52:53:45 – 00:53:11:14
Kevin Lingenfelser
We’ve talked about and talked about it? It seems weird that visual effects artists as a as a group, you know, in, in numerous nation would not be able to make this happen. But it’s just it’s just weird how it hasn’t, you know, but it hasn’t. And people talk about and talk about and talk about it, but there’s just no action.
00:53:11:17 – 00:53:35:56
Kevin Lingenfelser
I don’t see it happening anytime soon. So that’s also a part of our struggle to maintain our bottom lines and try to be profitable in this industry. You know, I like my job, but there are plenty of people who are owners of visual effects facilities. I would never, never want to own a visual effects facility because it’s just really hard to maintain it.
00:53:35:56 – 00:53:49:42
Kevin Lingenfelser
And especially when you have an army of people that you’re responsible for, it’s so difficult because you have to be cutthroat. And, it’s just it’s it’s really harder than it should be.
00:53:49:46 – 00:54:08:15
Agent Palmer
All right. So we’ve gone through the whole process. We’ve talked about your origins, what movies like are your faves, right. Like what are your you know, they don’t even have to have visual effects just right. You know, you want to watch a movie. Like what are your go tos?
00:54:08:19 – 00:54:32:29
Kevin Lingenfelser
Oh yeah. Let’s see. I’d have to say oh, I can watch every Christmas. I watch Die Hard. So that would be, the original. I love a lot of the early material and stuff, you know, predator on Friday, October, I am into the genre type stuff, you know, I can tell you I like the John Wick series, but I like a movie.
00:54:32:29 – 00:54:58:05
Kevin Lingenfelser
Like it’s just on the other day on TVs or something. The Shawshank Redemption, I’ll stop, watch that and just, you know, fascinating film. Anything from out of all of Nolan’s films, I don’t know what it is. I’m most struck by inception. Okay? I love that film. I love all his films, but I love that one in particular.
00:54:58:10 – 00:55:05:47
Kevin Lingenfelser
I’m trying to think of some other good ones that, you know, it’s funny, as soon as I hang up, I’ll remember.
00:55:05:52 – 00:55:07:35
Agent Palmer
That. I mean, that’s how it works.
00:55:07:40 – 00:55:28:34
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah. Totally. Totally. But no, they don’t have to be visual effects driven, you know, to get me to watch them. I’m a big fan. I like The Godfather. I like the original jaws. Oh, Raiders of the Lost Ark. Huge fan of that film. Not so much of it. The other films, but,
00:55:28:39 – 00:55:47:22
Agent Palmer
Is there like, do you, when you’re watching for research versus just watching for pleasure? Is it a different kind of viewing? Like, you know what I mean? Like if I said, okay, watch Raiders of the Lost Ark for for inspiration. Like, are you watching it differently than it’s on? And I want to enjoy a movie.
00:55:47:30 – 00:56:13:10
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah, sometimes it is, because sometimes it’ll be things like, looking at, okay, why did they choose that camera angle? Why did they go with, you know, Dali, you know, why is it locked off wise and the camera moving? So in that case, what will happen is my brain will just concentrate on that. And I won’t necessarily pay attention to the actors or what’s, you know, what’s being said or you know, what have you.
00:56:13:14 – 00:56:33:27
Kevin Lingenfelser
But usually I’m doing that with films I’ve already seen, you know, underwater, like I said, that one I hadn’t seen, but I went in and I was able to appreciate multiple aspects of the film. You know, production design was really solid. I’m not a fan of Christmas, Stuart, per se, but, you know, she didn’t take me out of the film at all.
00:56:33:32 – 00:56:52:41
Kevin Lingenfelser
And I was mostly there for the creature work. But that didn’t come until the end of the film. So I got to watch other aspects of it. Okay. And I’ve watched it. The other day, I watched a really bad film, Shark Attack three. Horrible John Barrowman I highly recommend it if you want it. If you want a good laugh.
00:56:52:50 – 00:57:14:15
Kevin Lingenfelser
Shark three megalodon. Because what was interesting about that watching that is I was having a good time watching how bad it was, but I just couldn’t say that everything was shot as close ups, you know? So just close ups on every actress thing and just normally I wouldn’t be looking for it, but it was so obtrusive. It was just, it was impossible to avoid.
00:57:14:15 – 00:57:41:55
Kevin Lingenfelser
But I got a kick out of that. So I’m able to turn it off, you know, until I see something that just. Whoa, I wasn’t expecting. But it took me out. Case in point a movie. One of my favorites that I adore I didn’t mention was Logan. Flawless work, flawless work in that film up to the point where they’re in, professor X, Logan and the girl are in a car and just the car comes.
00:57:42:02 – 00:58:07:53
Kevin Lingenfelser
I just immediately just I was totally invested in the film. And then we get to the car, comes in in broad daylight in rural countryside, and it just kind of struck me as off, you know, and unfortunately, those are the kinds of things that usually get me in because, you know, we talked about bad visual face a lot of times it’s not the artist’s fault.
00:58:07:58 – 00:58:30:34
Kevin Lingenfelser
A lot of times it’s a studio mandate or it’s a director mandate where in this case the car comes, the best car comes to me. You know, if you’re just real quick, if you’re shooting inside a car, you’re exposing the film for the car in the interior, which means anything outside of the car is going to be brighter than normal.
00:58:30:39 – 00:58:49:00
Kevin Lingenfelser
Okay. But a lot of times will happen is that’s just basic film, you know, whether it’s Bill or moving. But a lot of times what will happen is a director or a studio head will be like, oh, wait a minute, that we’re paying for that background outside that window. We want to see that and say, well, it’s there.
00:58:49:05 – 00:59:05:22
Kevin Lingenfelser
It’s just you want it to work. You want them to look integrated. You want to look like you were shot in camera. If you you know, otherwise you you don’t do that. Or a lot of times you don’t want blur or motion blur on it. Yeah. So it’s things like that. It seems very simple. Car comp sounds very.
00:59:05:27 – 00:59:25:18
Kevin Lingenfelser
You know, what we call a overby? It is. But you’d be amazed at how a movie that you see, man, that had really bad visual effects. You’d be surprised how many times the visual effects were actually were driven that way. You know, it isn’t always oh my God, we ran out of time or oh my God, we ran out of money.
00:59:25:23 – 00:59:33:51
Kevin Lingenfelser
Sometimes it’s honestly just being pushed that way by the powers that be. So.
00:59:33:56 – 00:59:37:06
Agent Palmer
You.
00:59:37:11 – 01:00:01:33
Agent Palmer
So there’s a quote from Futurama that keeps being relevant in and around myself and those I know from Futurama fourth season episode eight, titled God, fellas, Bender is talking to the God entity when the entity states, when you do things right, people won’t be sure you’ve done anything at all. That quote is relevant to almost every aspect of our lives in some capacity.
01:00:01:33 – 01:00:23:30
Agent Palmer
But when Kevin and I were discussing the idea that most people notice only bad visual effects more than the good, that quote came back to me. Another thing of note is that we spoke at length of Unreal Engine and what it can do for video games, which is almost everything, and what it might mean for visual effects, which could very well mean everything.
01:00:23:35 – 01:00:50:03
Agent Palmer
What this means. Well, we touched on some possibilities, but truly no one really knows it until it happens. Use cases for technology when it seems unlimited tend to be more running first and walking second. Very. Let’s see what this thing can do mentality at the very forefront of all technologies. And this is just one example. So I guess we’ll we’ll wait and see.
01:00:50:08 – 01:01:14:52
Agent Palmer
But what I find most impressive and I’m in a bit all of Kevin is two things really. First, that the cold calling didn’t dissuade him from going after what he wanted and that he didn’t overdo it either. And second, he went for what he wanted. It’s easy in hindsight to say, good job, Kev, you made it. But his story rings true to most people who are doing what they want to be doing.
01:01:14:57 – 01:01:36:48
Agent Palmer
They had to go for it. You might fall into something different side, an industry here or there, but you have to take the shot. Cliche as it is, you really do miss all of the shots you don’t take. So what is it you are looking to avoid? What shots are you not taking? And if I can be of any help, you know where to reach me.
01:01:36:53 – 01:01:57:09
Agent Palmer
Thanks for listening to The Polymer Files episode 20. As a reminder, all links are available in the show notes. And now for the official business. The Palmer Files releases every two weeks on Tuesdays. If you’re still listening, I encourage you to join the discussion. You can tweet me at Agent Palmer. You can tweet the show at the Palmer Files, and you can tweet Kevin at Fuchipatas.
01:01:57:18 – 01:02:22:43
Agent Palmer
That’s if you ship Atmos. You can see his complete career credits on IMDb or his demo reel, which are both linked in the show notes. Plus, as always, don’t forget you can see all of my writings and rantings on Agent palmer.com email can be sent to the show at the Palmer Files at gmail.com. If you have any feedback on this or any previous episode, or if there’s a topic or guest you’d like me to consider, you can also hear more of me in the meantime.
01:02:22:43 – 01:02:41:39
Agent Palmer
On our liner notes, a musical conversation podcast with host Chris Maier and my other gig as co-host of the podcast digest with Dan Lizette.
01:02:41:44 – 01:03:11:52
Agent Palmer
Radio.
01:03:11:57 – 01:03:17:01
Agent Palmer
We all right? Kevin, do you have one final question for me?
01:03:17:13 – 01:03:23:55
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yes. What if you have one visual effects film that you really like? What? What would that film be?
01:03:24:00 – 01:03:42:08
Agent Palmer
I feel like I’ve used this as an answer for a lot of favorites for myself, but I almost feel like I have to go with, like, wizards. Oh, by Ralph Bakshi, because there is some. First of all, that is probably one of my. It’s easily one of my top five favorite films of all time.
01:03:42:20 – 01:03:43:02
Kevin Lingenfelser
Okay, yeah.
01:03:43:16 – 01:04:07:13
Agent Palmer
But there’s something about the. And I feel like, I’m beating a dead horse. There’s something about the authentic nature by which the. Or like the classic rotoscoping is done. It’s it’s wizards. It’s back. She’s Lord of the rings. It’s like the original Snow White that you worked like. Like that kind of stuff. Like there’s something authentic about it.
01:04:07:13 – 01:04:33:01
Agent Palmer
And I feel like it’s the maybe for me, it’s the imperfections. I mean, I, I’m a, I’m a child that grew up in the 80s and into the 90s. So the cartoons I grew up with were all hand-drawn animation. So that original rotoscoping being hand-drawn and just growing up on, you know, ThunderCats and He-Man and Transformers like that were, not perfect.
01:04:33:01 – 01:04:58:57
Agent Palmer
You know, they were they weren’t crisp, you know, 90 degree angles on stuff. And, you know, swords came to a point, kind of. So, like, I go back to, like, wizards and like that for me is like a comfort film that like, I will always go to for not only inspiration, but it’s just I look at it as like it’s perfect in its imperfection, like it’s artistic.
01:04:59:02 – 01:05:05:27
Agent Palmer
Yes. It’s not an art film, but yeah, it’s artistic. And that’s to me, that’s the one.
01:05:05:32 – 01:05:23:28
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah. No, that makes sense. I respect that. Yeah, absolutely. It’s amazing how we yeah, we’ve gotten away from that. But there was that heyday of those types of films and that type of look that was just really unique and really iconic. And it’s a shame that you don’t really you don’t really see that anymore.
01:05:23:33 – 01:05:49:41
Agent Palmer
No. The what the closest thing would have been, undone. Yeah. Amazon, which as great as that was like it felt polished like I mean, it just it is still rotoscoping, but it’s not. It felt like computer rotoscoping. Like, they like they just ran a filter over everything. And I know that’s not necessarily what they did, but it just it wasn’t in perfect enough.
01:05:49:41 – 01:05:50:57
Agent Palmer
I guess.
01:05:51:02 – 01:05:55:17
Kevin Lingenfelser
Yeah. Very true. Yeah. No that’s good then.
–End Transcription–
This transcription was processed by PalmerTech 3.1 and may contain errors for HUMINT (human intelligence).