Alex Funke (born October 12, 1944 in Santa Barbara, California) is a special effects photographer.
He worked with Charles and Ray Eames for eleven years, a period he deemed important to his career success. His first Oscar was a shared one for Total Recall . [1] Funke became noted as an expert on miniatures [2] and was brought to New Zealand for work on The Lord of the Rings film trilogy. [3] At the 75th and 76th Academy Awards, he won Best Visual Effects for his work on The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King , respectively. He shared both wins with Jim Rygiel, Joe Letteri and Randall William Cook.
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers is a 2002 epic high fantasy adventure film directed by Peter Jackson from a screenplay by Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, Stephen Sinclair, and Jackson, based on 1954's The Two Towers, the second volume of the novel The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien. The sequel to 2001's The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, the film is the second instalment in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. It features an ensemble cast including Elijah Wood, Ian McKellen, Liv Tyler, Viggo Mortensen, Sean Astin, Cate Blanchett, John Rhys-Davies, Bernard Hill, Christopher Lee, Billy Boyd, Dominic Monaghan, Orlando Bloom, Hugo Weaving, Miranda Otto, David Wenham, Brad Dourif, Karl Urban, and Andy Serkis.
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King is a 2003 epic high fantasy adventure film directed by Peter Jackson from a screenplay by Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, and Jackson. It is based on 1955's The Return of the King, the third volume of the novel The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien. The sequel to 2002's The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, the film is the third and final instalment in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. It features an ensemble cast including Elijah Wood, Ian McKellen, Liv Tyler, Viggo Mortensen, Sean Astin, Cate Blanchett, John Rhys-Davies, Bernard Hill, Billy Boyd, Dominic Monaghan, Orlando Bloom, Hugo Weaving, Miranda Otto, David Wenham, Karl Urban, John Noble, Andy Serkis, Ian Holm, and Sean Bean. Continuing the plot of the previous film, Frodo, Sam and Gollum make their final way toward Mount Doom to destroy the One Ring, unaware of Gollum's true intentions, while Merry, Pippin, Gandalf, Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli and their allies join forces against Sauron and his legions from Mordor.
Among the motion pictures of Middle-earth in various formats, The Lord of the Rings is a trilogy of epic fantasy adventure films directed by Peter Jackson, based on the novel The Lord of the Rings by English author J. R. R. Tolkien. The films are titled identically to the three volumes of the novel: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001), The Two Towers (2002), and The Return of the King (2003). Produced and distributed by New Line Cinema with the co-production of WingNut Films, the films feature an ensemble cast including Elijah Wood, Ian McKellen, Liv Tyler, Viggo Mortensen, Sean Astin, Cate Blanchett, John Rhys-Davies, Christopher Lee, Billy Boyd, Dominic Monaghan, Orlando Bloom, Hugo Weaving, Andy Serkis, and Sean Bean.
Dame Frances Rosemary Walsh is a New Zealand screenwriter and film producer.
The Lawnmower Man is a 1992 science fiction horror film directed by Brett Leonard, written by Leonard and Gimel Everett, and starring Jeff Fahey as Jobe Smith, an intellectually disabled gardener, and Pierce Brosnan as Dr. Lawrence "Larry" Angelo, a scientist who decides to experiment on him in an effort to give him greater intelligence by stimulating his brain using nootropic drugs and virtual reality computer simulations. The experiments give Jobe superhuman abilities, but also increase his aggression, turning him into a man obsessed with evolving into a digital being.
Richard Baneham is an Irish animator and visual effects supervisor, who has worked on several film series, including The Lord of the Rings film trilogy, the Chronicles of Narnia films and the Avatar franchise. Amongst other awards, Baneham has received a BAFTA Award for Best Special Visual Effects and an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects in 2009, both for his work on Avatar, and a further Academy Award in 2023, for visual effects on Avatar: The Way of Water.
Robin R. Bottin is an American special make-up effects creator. Known for his collaborations with directors John Carpenter, Paul Verhoeven and David Fincher, Bottin worked with Carpenter on both The Fog and The Thing, with Verhoeven on RoboCop, Total Recall and Basic Instinct, and with Fincher on Se7en and Fight Club. His many other film credits include The Howling, Legend, Innerspace and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
The Visual Effects Society (VES) is an entertainment industry organization representing visual effects practitioners including artists, animators, technologists, model makers, educators, studio leaders, supervisors, PR/marketing specialists and producers in film, television, commercials, music videos, and video games. It has about 4,000 members in 42 countries. Since 2002 it has produced the Visual Effects Society Awards which honor the best work of the previous year in various categories.
Sir Peter Robert Jackson is a New Zealand filmmaker. He is best known as the director, writer and producer of the Lord of the Rings trilogy (2001–2003) and the Hobbit trilogy (2012–2014), both of which are adapted from the novels of the same name by J. R. R. Tolkien. Other notable films include the critically lauded drama Heavenly Creatures (1994), the horror comedy The Frighteners (1996), the epic monster remake film King Kong (2005), the World War I documentary film They Shall Not Grow Old (2018) and the documentary The Beatles: Get Back (2021). He is the fifth-highest-grossing film director of all-time, his films having made over $6.5 billion worldwide.
Dean Wright is a film director and visual effects supervisor, best known for his work on The Lord of the Rings film trilogy and The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.
Eric Brevig is an American film director and visual effects supervisor known for his work in several major theatrical films and television shows. He was Visual Effects Supervisor and Second Unit Director on the 2001 Jerry Bruckheimer/Michael Bay action drama Pearl Harbor, for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects.
Joseph Bruce Letteri is a senior visual effects artist, winner of five Academy Awards, four BAFTA awards and four VES awards. He is the current Senior Visual Effects Supervisor of the Academy Award-winning Wētā FX having joined the company in 2001. He has received several awards and nominations as visual effects supervisor, the latest being Avatar: The Way of Water, and previously for War for the Planet of the Apes. He attended Center High School (Pennsylvania) in 1975 and graduated from the University of California, Berkeley in 1981. He gave the keynote address at UC Berkeley's December Convocation on 19 December 2010.
Dan Lemmon is a New Zealand visual effects supervisor. In 2012, he was nominated for an Academy Award for the movie Rise of the Planet of the Apes. This was in the category of Academy Award for Best Visual Effects, his nomination was shared with Daniel Barrett, Joe Letteri and R. Christopher White.
Brian Van't Hul is a visual effects artist. He won the Academy Award during the 78th Academy Awards for the film King Kong in the category of Best Visual Effects. He shared his win with Joe Letteri, Christian Rivers and Richard Taylor.
Steve Preeg is an American Academy Award-winning special effects artist.
Ben Snow is a special effects artist who has been nominated four times at the Academy Awards. He works at Industrial Light & Magic.
Randall William Cook is an American special effects artist and Film Actor, Voice Actor most known for The Lord of the Rings trilogy. He worked on Ghostbusters, as designer, sculptor and animator of the 'Terror Dogs'; The Gate, as visual effects designer and director; King Kong as second unit director. He currently works as a consultant and is preparing several personal properties for production.
Mark Stetson is a visual effects artist, specializing in miniature effects.
Scott Ray Fisher is an American visual effects supervisor.