CG Garage

With digital humans and deepfakes becoming increasingly prevalent in both traditional and social media, the law surrounding virtual humans has become more complex. Here to save the day is Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, who has served as head lawyer and second-in-command at the Screen Actors Guild - American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) for the past 20 years. Using examples Chri...

This week, Chris meets an old friend and former Digital Domain co-worker Alex Nijmeh — and this joyful podcast is a testament to how much fun they had together on movies such as The Day After Tomorrow and I, Robot . They reminisce about how unfeasibly tight deadlines pushed them to learn software and techniques, as well as the characters they met and funny antics they got up to at DD's studio. Tod...

Like Chris, Juan Gomez worked at Digital Domain on some of the company's biggest and most innovative projects: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo , Maleficent and Tron: Legacy . But Juan has followed a different career path, first into the world of virtual reality at Method and on to Epic Games, where he's spearheaded game-changing real-time virtual production for movies. This podcast offers a compre...

Digital humans are playing an increasingly important role in our day-to-day lives. CG replicas of people dominate entertainment, from epic movies such as The Irishman to simple YouTube videos. Interacting with AI assistants has become second nature. And social media and news headlines are dominated by the issues surrounding deepfakes. Joining Chris for this week's podcast is Koki Nagano, who has b...

Want to learn how to do 3D in motion graphics? EJ Hassenfratz is your man. After landing on his feet in motion graphics for NBC, PBS and ABC, EJ wound up giving a presentation for Cinema 4D company Maxon, which inspired him to learn more about the software and start creating tutorials. Today, EJ works as a freelance motion designer while crafting courses for the renowned online learning platform,...

"Deepfake" videos have become hugely popular online — for better or worse. This AI-powered technology results in hilarious celebrity head swaps but, as Jordan Peele demonstrated with his manipulation of Barack Obama's speech, they could play a more disturbing role in online misinformation. Computer vision scientist Wael AbdAlmageed's mission is to develop tools that can quickly detect deepfakes wi...

Originally, Olcun Tan wanted to be a car designer — but seeing Jurassic Park ignited a passion for VFX. Today, he runs Gradient Effects, a global studio that has provided effects for Game of Thrones , Watchmen and Stranger Things . Olcun's career has been defined by finding his own solutions to problems — whether it's creating procedural effects in Maya, using forbidden programming languages at an...

It's been five years since VR director Justin Denton last joined Chris on the CG Garage Podcast, and in that time he has truly pushed the boundaries of the medium. He's produced jaw-dropping tie-in experiences for Ghost in the Shell , Mr. Robot and Legion . And he's indulged his passion for Dickens' A Christmas Carol via Chained: A Victorian Nightmare , which uses techniques from games and immersi...

This week's podcast is something a little different — the first-ever CG Garage podcast "takeover." Helming the mic are three talented, funny and smart employees of cutting edge experience studio, Magnopus. Between them, Sally Slade, Kat Harris and Emily Van Belleghem have sent Hololenses to the International Space Station, filed patents, started non-profit organizations and pioneered software deve...

Andrea Blasich's love of sculpting began on the beaches of southern Italy and it's taken him all the way to Hollywood, where his talents have been put to use on movies including Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse , Brave and Ice Age 2: The Meltdown . In this podcast, recorded at THU, he explains why time-honored techniques are still relevant in digital pipelines. Andrea sheds light on his working p...

Much has changed in the three years since director Tim Miller recorded a the 100th episode of the CG Garage podcast. After the runaway success of Deadpool , he returned to the big screen with Terminator: Dark Fate . At the same time, his Heavy Metal -inspired anthology series Love, Death & Robots busted boundaries via Netflix. In this podcast, he reveals the pressure of directing the $200-million-...

At Total Chaos 2019, we launched a competition with an amazing prize for one budding CG artist: A "Golden Ticket" to the THU conference in Malta. All the entrants had to do was impress our judges with their story, via text, imagery or video. After poring over the entries there was one clear winner: Ivona Alexandrova, whose positive outlook and artistic skill shone through her work. Part of the pri...

At age 12, Vicki Dobbs Beck started her own business with her mom, selling flowers at Seattle market — and she's been combining creativity with commerce ever since. After leaving Stanford University Graduate School of Business, she got a job at Industrial Light and Magic and became Executive in Charge of ILMxLAB in 2016. In this podcast, recorded at THU, Vicki tells Chris about the incredible virt...

Hailing from Sao Paolo, Brazil, Pedro Conti has created some truly impressive work. As well as contributing to Disney's Moana as a VFX artist, he created hilarious short "One More Beer," and directed the touching music video for Ron Artis II's song "In My Heart." But it hasn't always been smooth sailing for Pedro — this sensitive soul has faced some challenging moments. In this podcast, recorded a...

Over the past few years, the John Wick movies have breathed new life into action filmmaking, marrying balletic big-screen violence with the intricate world-building and compulsive storylines of a quality TV series. Joining Chris this week are returning podcast guests Alex Nice (concept artist) and Robert Nederhorst (VFX supervisor), who talk about their work on John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum ....

In light of the unexpected passing of our beloved colleague Jaroslav Křivánek on Sunday, today's podcast is one from the archives. Episode #176 was recorded in Sofia, Bulgaria, in May 2018, as a discussion about the Corona and Chaos family. Talking alongside founding partner and main developer Ondřej Karlík, Jaroslav Křivánek talks in detail about the technology that makes Corona fast and efficien...

A passion for animation and computing landed Andrew Gordon a job at Pixar just after the release of Toy Story , the first of many mega-hits for the studio. From here, he helped bring some of the studio's most famous characters to life: Toy Story 2's Prospector, Mike from Monsters, Inc. and Edna Mode, The Incredibles' fashion designer. Today, Andrew has taken his experience from Pixar to DNEG, wher...

Recorded at the American Society of Architectural Illustrators' "Architecture in Perspective" event, this week's podcast is a panel discussion on architecture and imagined environments. Taking part are The Lion King and AR Wall CG Art Director Joy Lea, 3Marks and KitBash3d's Mike Golden, Luxigon founder Eric de Broche des Combes, Star Wars: The Force Awakens concept artist Nick Hiatt, Architectura...

User experience is an under-appreciated but crucial aspect of modern technology and software — particularly in the field of video games, which have to introduce complex ideas without intimidating players. In this week's podcast, Chris is joined by UX Director, Celia Hodent, who put her PhD in psychology, specialized in cognitive development, to good use in helping create Fortnite .  Celia explains...

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse was a critical and box office success on its release last year, garnering critical praise and even an Oscar for its vivid, touching and inventive take on Spidey's origin story. In this podcast, co-director Peter Ramsey tells his own tale of going from a humble, blue-collar upbringing in South Los Angeles to co-creating one of the best-animated movies of all time....

To say John Chalfant could turn his hand to anything would be an understatement. Over the past 20 years, this multi-talented creative has served as a 3D artist, director of photography, game developer, VFX supervisor and art director on movies and games including The Day After Tomorrow , Diablo II , Warcraft III , Nosgoth , Batman: Arkham City , Wolfenstein , Hellgate: London and Final Fantasy . ...

After dabbling with acting and music, Greg Downing found his true calling in all things photography related — and the world is a better place for it. His passion for the medium took him from home experiments with plaster casts and turntables to create panoramas of European landmarks to building a new HDRI camera for effects house Rhythm & Hues. At the same time, Greg has indulged his passion for d...

A lot has changed in Joy Lea's life since she last appeared on the CG Garage podcast in 2016. The former games environment designer was hired by MPC LA as an artist on Disney's The Lion King , which broke new ground in terms of virtual production pipelines. Continuing the trend, Joy has taken on another game-changing role: CG Art Director at augmented reality virtual production company ARwall. As...

Despite an original desire to be an architect, Arutyun Artur "Art" Sayan has pursued a career in VFX — and the industry's all the better for it. Art has contributed incredible work to movies including Oblivion , Tomorrowland , as well as the TV series Supergirl and Love, Death and Robots . In this podcast, Art talks about some of the shots he's helped create — including a complex 417-frame, all-CG...

Chris's guest this week is Neil Huxley, a director whose story is worthy of its own movie. Early exposure to The Terminator inspired Neil to follow a career in the film industry but fighting back against bullies at his South London school almost lead him off the rails, until his bouncer-artist dad intervened. In a spectacular comeback, Neil studied multimedia at university and graduated with a fir...