Special effects and finishing boutique Arsenal FX has brought senior VFX artist Terry Silberman and CG lead Eli Guerron on board. They join a roster that also consists of owner/artist Mark Leiss, and Joseph Grosso, who’s been promoted to senior Flame artist.
A 20-year industry vet, Silberman was previously on staff at Solid. His credits span such clients as Honda (the “Eyes” spot for agency RPA), Monster.com (“Slots” directed by Frank Budgen of Gorgeous Enterprises and Anonymous Content for BBDO New York), Nike (“Spider” for Wieden+Kennedy, Tokyo), K-Swiss (for agency The Gale Group) and Mitsubishi (BBDO L.A.).
Silberman is adept on Autodesk platforms. His expertise spans Flint, Flame, Inferno, Smoke, Combustion, Nuke, PC, Mac, Photoshop and even Jaleo.
Guerron
While he briefly attended El Camino College in Torrance, Calif., Guerron found the VFX program lacking so he hoped for on-the-job experience. He went the internship route and apprenticed for established artists. This approach paid off as Guerron worked his way up the industry ladder, eventually becoming a CG lead and associate creative director at Blissium in Santa Monica, working on campaigns for SpikeTV and TV series such as CSI. Working alongside director Eric Bute and exec producer Jim Rutherford, Guerron oversaw the launch of SpikeTV Original TV’s series Blade and The Killpoint.
After two years with Blissium, Guerron gained broad experience freelancing for Transistor, Logan, Psyop, Imaginary Forces, and Yu+Co, among others. He had some of his most notable collaborations with directors (Frank Budgen, Lance Acord) while freelancing at a52.
Arsenal exec producer Ashley Hydrick said that Guerron’s hire allows the company to pursue more work in modeling, texture, lighting, titles and 3D.
At Arsenal, Guerron has wrapped Cadillac’s “Gallery,” a Yoplait spot directed by Ronnie Koff at Imaginary Forces, and a project for an undisclosed client entailing a collaboration with Richard Taylor, VFX supervisor on the original Tron film.
Google Opens Its Defense In Antitrust Case Alleging Monopoly Over Online Ad Technology
Google opened its defense against allegations that it holds an illegal monopoly on online advertising technology Friday with witness testimony saying the industry is vastly more complex and competitive than portrayed by the federal government.
"The industry has been exceptionally fluid over the last 18 years," said Scott Sheffer, a vice president for global partnerships at Google, the company's first witness at its antitrust trial in federal court in Alexandria.
The Justice Department and a coalition of states contend that Google built and maintained an illegal monopoly over the technology that facilitates the buying and selling of online ads seen by consumers.
Google counters that the government's case improperly focuses on a narrow type of online ads — essentially the rectangular ones that appear on the top and on the right-hand side of a webpage. In its opening statement, Google's lawyers said the Supreme Court has warned judges against taking action when dealing with rapidly emerging technology like what Sheffer described because of the risk of error or unintended consequences.
Google says defining the market so narrowly ignores the competition it faces from social media companies, Amazon, streaming TV providers and others who offer advertisers the means to reach online consumers.
Justice Department lawyers called witnesses to testify for two weeks before resting their case Friday afternoon, detailing the ways that automated ad exchanges conduct auctions in a matter of milliseconds to determine which ads are placed in front of which consumers and how much they cost.
The department contends the auctions are finessed in subtle ways that benefit Google to the exclusion of would-be competitors and in ways that prevent... Read More