Joint, a creative post production company, has hired Nirad “Bugs” Russell as an executive producer.
Russell is relocating to Portland from New York City where he most recently freelanced as a senior VFX producer at The Mill.
Originally from South Africa, Russell first fell in love with VFX and postproduction during a stint at The Mill London beginning in 2002. Since that time, he’s done work at Absolute Post in London and New York; and later, worked as an executive producer in the New York office of Mass Market until 2015.
In that time, Russell has worked with a number of notable directors on lauded campaigns such as the AT&T “It Can Wait” PSA campaign, “Close to Home,” directed by Frederic Planchon and the Hennessy spot, “The Piccards,” directed by Daniel Wolfe, both of which were shortlisted for best VFX honors in multiple shows. Other noteworthy VFX campaigns produced by Russell include PlayStation’s “Skyrim” and Adidas’ “Never Finish.”
Patty Brebner, director of Joint and W+K Studios, said of Russell, “His passion for creative storytelling and pedigree collaborating with the best VFX artists and directors in the industry made him an obvious choice to lead this team and grow our capabilities.”
Russell will oversee a team of visual effects supervisors and artists (including CG and animation) and color talent.
From Restoring To Hopefully Preserving Multi-Camera Categories At The Emmys
When Gary Baum, ASC won his fourth career Emmy Award earlier this month, it was especially gratifying in that the honor came in a category--Outstanding Cinematography for a Multi-Camera Half-Hour Series--that had been restored thanks in part to a grass-roots initiative among cinematographers to drum up entries. Last year the category fell by the wayside when not enough multi-camera entries materialized.
In his acceptance speech, Baum appealed to the Television Academy to keep multi-camera categories alive. He later noted to SHOOT that editors also got their multi-camera recognition back in the Emmy competition this year. Baum hopes that after resurrecting multi-camera categories in 2024, such recognition will be preserved for 2025 and beyond.
A major factor in the decline of multi-camera submissions in 2023 was the move of certain children’s and family programming from the primetime Emmy competition to the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences’ (NATAS) Emmy ceremony. For DPs this meant that multi-camera programs last year were reduced to vying for just one primetime nomination slot in the more general Outstanding Cinematography for a Series (Half-Hour) category. It turned out that this single slot was filled in ‘23 by a Baum-lensed episode of How I Met Your Father (Hulu).
Fast forward to this year’s competition and Baum won for another installment of How I Met Your Father--”Okay Fine, It’s A Hurricane,” which turned out to be the series finale. Two of Baum’s Emmy wins over the years have been for How I Met Your Father, and there’s a certain symmetry to them. His initial win for How I Met Your Father was for the pilot in 2022. So he won Emmys for the very first and last... Read More