Neverland
This story actually begins with the origin story of Knoll Light Factory. ILM Visual Effects Supervisor John Knoll knew they needed a solution to create Tinkerbell for Hook and while observing practical flares through the camera lens he thought he could recreate these artifacts within the computer. John was able to reproduce all of the primitives giving them full control during compositing and post production allowing them to achieve a photo-real look. Some time after Hook was released Knoll began to sell his plugins to the public through a company called Puffin Designs.
Puffin designed and developed software for visual effects, rotoscoping, and offered VHS video courses teaching the fundamentals of the art and science behind visual effects and the post production process. Ron Brinkmann, creator of Shake, and Matt Silverman, rotoscoping guru, were a few of the veterans Puffin contracted to create these videos. Matt has posted some of them here. I personally learned a wealth of information from watching these videos as I transitioned from a graphic designer to a digital compositor.
Knoll’s lens flare technology was ported to Photoshop, After Effects, ElectricImage, and Flame. Lens flares became mainstream in compositing and motion graphics, and other companies like The Foundry and GenArts started offering their take on lens flare plugins. However, even with the new competition, Knoll dominated the scene for over 15 years. In the mid to late 90s I had the chance to see first hand a key element from the film that inspired the creation of this digital lens flare tool.
The Kerner Company
During the mid to late 90s my friend and I decided we wanted to see if we could find the elusive ILM. We were out in San Francisco for a design conference and ended up putting over 700 miles on the rental before week’s end touring Cali. Before ILM we had a quick detour in Carmel. We stopped by Clint Eastwood’s ranch for a bite. When I was walking around the grounds I saw an old truck with Kincaid Photography printed on it. My buddy told me Clint used his own truck when they filmed The Bridges of Madison County. Not a bad meal, but after three nights there still no Clint, just his golfing buddies. So on to Marin County we ventured.
We were well on our way to our destination but we were missing one vital piece of info: ILM’s address. Luckily these were the days of pay phones along the highway so we stopped, and my friend sweet-talked the operator to give us the address since it wasn’t listed in the phone book. Something about us having a meeting with one of their engineers. He got the guy’s name out of a Post magazine ad for Blade servers. Before I knew it we were parked in front of the Kerner Company, Optical Reseach Lab, not ILM. It was a front. Had to be. So off we went though the front door, into the lobby, and what did we see? The original matte painting on glass from Hook (see below) and a Stormtrooper down the hallway. We hung out for a bit and then we chatted with some engineers at lunch about hardware, etc. at the sandwich shop next door. We never got a tour, but seeing that matte painting was enough for me.