Motion graphics/ visual effects/live-action production studio The Flux Group has secured director Simon D. Holden for spot representation. Holden’s joining the Chicago shop marks his return to commercial directing. He has spent recent years as a visual effects supervisor and artist on commercials (for such clients as Dodge, Pontiac, Bally Total Fitness and Warner Bros. Home Video), feature films and episodic TV.
Maggie Magee, president of The Flux Group, said she has been familiar with Holden’s visual effects work for some time, but only recently became aware of his desire to resume his directing career. She was informed of this by Bob Coleman, whose Santa Monica-based company, Digital Artists Agency, provides Holden with career management services. "There are just not a lot of directors out there with Simon’s talent," rela-ted Magee, citing his ability to mesh live action and visual effects.
A native of Lancashire, England, Holden began his career in London as an animator. He star-ted directing in the early 1980s, and formed his own production firm, The Holden Film Company, specializing in effects-oriented commercials. He directed spots for such London agencies as J. Walter Thompson, Saatchi & Saatchi, McCann-Erickson and Publicis; and for such accounts as Renault, Fiat and British Airways.
Transitioning to postprodu-ction, Holden became visual effects director at The Frame Store, London, before moving to Los Angeles in 1989. He worked as a freelancer on both feature film and television projects, including Contact, Dante’s Peak, Face/Off, The X-Files and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. In ’96, he accepted a post as senior visual effects supervisor at Click 3X, Los Angeles, where he primarily worked on commercials. In ’99, he formed his own visual effects consulting firm, Zzink.
For the past 12 months, Holden has worked as lead compositor on Moulin Rouge, director Baz Luhrman’s film musical about Henri de Toulouse Lautrec, starring Ewan McGregor, Nicole Kidman and John Leguizamo. Holden’s last commercial credit came as a freelance visual effects supervisor on the Dodge spots "Shadow," "Pictures," "Puzzle," "Play," "Birds" and "Signs"—all part of the "Different" campaign from BBDO Detroit (now PentaMark), Southfield, Mich. For "Pictures," Holden helped to create the illusion of a minivan driving through a series of framed photographs resting on a mantle.
Holden is experienced as a compositor and digital matte painter on different high-end visual effects platforms including Henry, Flame and Inferno, and often performs hands-on work for projects he has supervised. He has also supervised numerous projects involving motion control cinematography, blue and green screen matting, models, miniatures and 3-D computer animation.
For his part, Holden said that the opportunity to return to directing through Flux was too good to pass up. He was drawn to the company by Magee, whom he described as being "smart and pragmatic … She is committed to nurturing talent and to helping creative people realize their dreams and ambitions."
new Insights
Holden feels that his sabbatical in the world of visual effects has given him detailed insights into processes and decision making which many directors do not see. While he will focus on directing via Flux, Holden noted, "I continue to enjoy working with other directors to bring their visions alive because I love the collaborative nature of this business … I use my personal experience and understanding of production to help directors through the often confusing matrix of visual effects solutions. Sitting down with agency creatives, clients and production company people, I feel I’m in a unique position to draw together all the threads that make a successful visual effects spot."
Holden rounds out a Flux team headed by creative director Joseph Kiely and including designer Joon Park, art director Mike Czerniuk, designer/photographer Christopher Strong and Web designer Dave Parsons. Kathy Casey is the company’s executive producer. Formed last October, Flux is a sister company to live-action productionhouse Spoke Film, which has offices in Chicago and Los Angeles. Magee is a principal in Spoke, as well as in Chicago-based postproduction facility Superior Street.
