Production house Mothership, a sister company to Digital Domain, has signed director Grzegorz Jonkajtys (Greg) for commercial and music video work in the U.S. He is perhaps best known as the writer/director behind the CG animated short Ark which earned a Golden Palm nomination at the Cannes Film Festival, Best in Show honors at the 2007 SIGGRAPH Computer Animation Festival, and an Award of Distinction at Prix Ars Electronica.
The story Ark relates is of an unknown virus that wipes out the human population. It heads a list of Greg-directed short films that includes Mantis, Legacy and The 3rd Letter, which has been making the rounds on the festival circuit. Greg, who graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw, Poland, in 1995 and lives in San Francisco, is currently writing the feature screenplay for his next project, Snow King. As a VFX artist and animation lead for Platige Image, Digital Kitchen, CafeFX, The Syndicate, and in his current post at Industrial Light + Magic, Greg has contributed to such films as Sin City, Hellboy, Blade III, Pan’s Labyrinth, Mist and Terminator Salvation.
During his 12-year career working in feature film and advertising, the Warsaw-born Greg has established himself as a filmmaker with a distinctive aesthetic and point of view. His work has been described as dark, full of texture with dramatic character design and compelling storylines, and often combines CG techniques with shot practical miniatures and other handmade elements that heighten the otherworldly aspect of his films.
Ed Ulbrich, president of Mothership, credited agent Bryan Besser at Verve with introducing the company to Greg’s work.
Greg in turn was favorably impressed with Mothership. “Despite my obsession with animation and visual effects, I actually take a fairly classic approach to moviemaking,” said the director. “I love almost autographic framing, inward dollies; I want to immerse the viewer into my world. Mothership was the ideal production studio for me to spread these wings and the exciting things they’re doing in the transmedia space enables its directors to be involved in extending their storytelling experiences even further.”
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