Waist Deep in the Media Swamp

For many years one of the worst kept secrets in the film industry was where the army of talented artists of George Lucas’ Industrial Light and Magic did their work. In an industrial section of San Rafael, California, a sign outside a  group of non-descript warehouses read The Kerner Optical Company while inside some of the best people from the world of physical and digital special effects were hard at work on not only his films, but hundreds of other films and commercials.

After Lucas moved the offices to new digs in San Francisco at the Presidio, he sold off the studios and model shop to the existing management team who kept the name Kerner. They are now led by CEO entrepreneur Eric Edmeades.

I had visited ILM a few times, most notably when I was working with a team of independent special effects artists on the film Spawn and we were invited in for a special screening, but I had not been there in years.

A few days ago, Kerner held an industry open house to show off a special new dual-camera 3D video rig they had build for a client. I was there to help my friends Andy Neddemeyer and Elaine Trotter of InVision Productions demonstrate their new QTAKE HD video assist system, which is the first unit of its kind to have 3D stereoscopic capabilities. The folks at Kerner allowed us to hook it up to their rig, thus presenting a full production package.

They had 2D & 3D pancakes (waffles) to celebrate their rig. And the rig was impressive, as were the results. I can’t post a 3D picture of how it looked or how the images looked onscreen, but here are some other pics:

Kerner 3D Rig

2D & 3D Pancakes

Andy Neddermeyer (left) demonstrates the QTAKE video assist system