By JEREMY LEHRER
CG supervisor Bruce Gionet has joined New York-based Black Logic, part of The Tape House family of companies. Gionet comes to Black Logic following an eight-year tenure as head of the CG department at New York-based Cyclotron, a division of Post Perfect, New York. Gionet’s arrival at Black Logic comes on the heels of the company signing director Mark Voelpel, formerly of R/Greenberg Associates (SHOOT, 11/26, p. 1).
Karen Stewart, VP/executive producer at Black Logic, said that Gionet would be a valuable player in Black Logic’s attempt to become what she described as the "preeminent CG company on the East Coast."
Stewart said that Gionet’s role at Black Logic would be multifaceted: "Bruce’s role here is to manage and direct our team of animators; to advise on technical issues such as software and hardware implementation; to be a direct [supervisor] to the animators; and to be a key go-to [guy] in terms of getting us projects." She added that Gionet’s familiarity with research and development initiatives would enable him to keep the company up to date with new equipment and software.
Gionet said he was attracted to Black Logic because he felt the company had a unique opportunity to build a CG entity based on the cumulative experience of its key personnel, which includes Stewart, Voelpel and VP/creative director/director Michel Suissa.
"Mark [Voelpel] and I got together with Karen [Stewart] about creating a CG studio that would be the premiere studio … and there is a very big commitment on the part of The Tape House companies to see that happen," Gionet said. "There’s an opportunity to build it in a way that makes it flexible, but at the same time grounded enough to be able to serve a number of different markets."
Gionet said his role was to "lead and inspire a group of really talented and productive animators, technical directors and artists from a wide range of backgrounds. I try to help them achieve the best possible work by coming up with … technical approaches that make sense, that are efficient and that give our clients the ability to make their vision a reality."
Gionet’s experience includes working on opening title sequences as well as effects for television programs. He was CG supervisor and technical director for the opening sequence for The Late Show with David Letterman. In the visual effects arena, Gionet was CG supervisor and effects technical director for the television program Now and Again. His spot credits include Lotrimin’s "Foot Expert" via Vidal Reynardus & Moya Advertising, New York, for which he was CG supervisor and effects animator.
In ’97 and ’98, Gionet taught a class in visual effects at the New York-based School of Visual Art’s graduate computer art program. While he said he would like to continue teaching, he has no concrete academic plans at the moment. "My primary responsibility right now is getting this thing going," he said. "I want to teach, but I don’t want to shortchange the students by not giving them the attention they deserve."
Ivan Molomut is national head of sales for Black Logic. Alfie Schloss, the company’s VP/director of marketing, also handles sales. Black Logic is currently in discussions to shift responsibility for its Midwest and West Coast sales to independent representation.
Tim Burton Discusses His Dread Of AI As An Exhibition of His Work Opens In London
The imagination of Tim Burton has produced ghosts and ghouls, Martians, monsters and misfits — all on display at an exhibition that is opening in London just in time for Halloween.
But you know what really scares him? Artificial intelligence.
Burton said Wednesday that seeing a website that had used AI to blend his drawings with Disney characters "really disturbed me."
"It wasn't an intellectual thought — it was just an internal, visceral feeling," Burton told reporters during a preview of "The World of Tim Burton" exhibition at London's Design Museum. "I looked at those things and I thought, 'Some of these are pretty good.' … (But) it gave me a weird sort of scary feeling inside."
Burton said he thinks AI is unstoppable, because "once you can do it, people will do it." But he scoffed when asked if he'd use the technology in this work.
"To take over the world?" he laughed.
The exhibition reveals Burton to be an analogue artist, who started off as a child in the 1960s experimenting with paints and colored pencils in his suburban Californian home.
"I wasn't, early on, a very verbal person," Burton said. "Drawing was a way of expressing myself."
Decades later, after films including "Edward Scissorhands," "Batman," "The Nightmare Before Christmas" and "Beetlejuice," his ideas still begin with drawing. The exhibition includes 600 items from movie studio collections and Burton's personal archive, and traces those ideas as they advance from sketches through collaboration with set, production and costume designers on the way to the big screen.
London is the exhibition's final stop on a decade-long tour of 14 cities in 11 countries. It has been reconfigured and expanded with 90 new objects for its run in... Read More