Matthew Hackett is an American computer graphics animator. [1] In 2008, Hackett was nominated for a Visual Effects Society Award in the category of Outstanding Animated Character in a Live Action Broadcast Program or Commercial (shared with Jeff Willette, Sean Andrew Faden, and actor Denis Gauthier. [2] Hackett is featured within the 2001 documentary short The Making of Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. [3]
Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within is a 2001 adult animated science fiction film directed by Hironobu Sakaguchi, creator of the Final Fantasy franchise. It was the first photorealistic computer-animated feature film and the most expensive video game-inspired film until the release of Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time in 2010. The film stars the voices of Ming-Na Wen, Alec Baldwin, Donald Sutherland, James Woods, Ving Rhames, Peri Gilpin, and Steve Buscemi, and follows scientists Aki Ross and Doctor Sid in their efforts to free a post-apocalyptic Earth from the Phantoms, a mysterious, deadly alien race who has driven the remnants of humanity into "barrier cities". Aki and Sid must fight against General Hein, who wants to use more violent means to end the conflict.
Raymond Frederick Harryhausen was an American-British animator and special effects creator who created a form of stop motion model animation known as "Dynamation". His works include the animation for Mighty Joe Young (1949) with his mentor Willis H. O'Brien ; his first color film, The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958); and Jason and the Argonauts (1963), which featured a sword fight with seven skeleton warriors. His last film was Clash of the Titans (1981), after which he retired.
Madhouse, Inc. is a Japanese animation studio founded in 1972 by ex–Mushi Pro staff, including Masao Maruyama, Osamu Dezaki, and Yoshiaki Kawajiri.
Jeffrey Ford is an American writer in the fantastic genre tradition, although his works have spanned genres including fantasy, science fiction and mystery. His work is characterized by a sweeping imaginative power, humor, literary allusion, and a fascination with tales told within tales. He is a graduate of Binghamton University, where he studied with the novelist John Gardner.
Peter de Sève is an American artist who has worked in the illustration and animation fields. He has drawn many covers for the magazine The New Yorker. As a character designer, he worked on the characters of A Bug's Life, Finding Nemo, Robots, the Ice Age franchise, and on the main animal character E.B. in the 2011 Easter themed comedy film Hop. Most recently, he designed the characters for Arthur Christmas, for which he was nominated for Annie Award. He received the National Cartoonists Society Magazine Illustration Award for 2000. He is also a recipient of the Hamilton King Award from the Society of Illustrators, a Clio Award for a Nike television commercial, and a Visual Effects Society Award nomination for outstanding animated character design for Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs. Peter was honored with an Emmy Award for Outstanding Character design for his work on Sesame Street's Abby Cadabby's Flying Fairy School. He is part of the Directors Collective Hornet Incorporated company.
Patrick Tatopoulos is a Greek-French production designer and director who lives and works in the United States. His designs have appeared in numerous motion pictures, including Pitch Black, Underworld, I, Robot, The Chronicles of Riddick, Independence Day, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Stargate, Spawn, Godzilla, Stuart Little, 300, I Am Legend, Man of Steel, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, Justice League, 10,000 BC and Live Free or Die Hard.
Emily Roya O'Brien is an English three-time Daytime Emmy-nominated actress and writer who is known for her role of Jana Hawkes Fisher on The Young and the Restless from 2006 to 2011. She voiced The Woman in Love, Death and Robots Season 1 episode of The Witness, which won The Emmy for Best Animation. She went on to portray motion capture and the voice of Eve in season 2 of Love, Death and Robots entitled Pop Squad. She also portrayed Julia in the 2014 film Pernicious and provided the voices of Camille and Samira in League of Legends, and Y'shtola in Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn. Emily also voiced Gamora in Guardians of the Galaxy: The Telltale Series and Special Agent Iman Avesta in the 2017 video game Batman: The Enemy Within. In 2018, she became part of the main cast of the animated film Dagon Troll World Chronicles. She also voiced Amelie and young Bridget Strand in the 2019 game Death Stranding. In 2020, O'Brien joined the cast of Days of Our Lives and currently portrays the character Gwen Rizczech, the daughter of Jack Deveraux on the daytime drama. In October 2023, O'Brien took over the role of Theresa Donovan, the daughter of Shane Donovan and Kimberly Brady.
Alexander Christian Irvine is an American fantasy and science fiction author.
Bruce Jurgens is a visual effects producer and writer. Work by Jurgens includes Other work by Jurgens includes X-Men.
James Morris is an American film producer, production executive and visual effects producer. He is currently general manager and president of Pixar. Previously, he held key positions at Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) for 17 years.
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.
Chris Watts, is an American inventor, businessman, filmmaker, and visual effects supervisor.
The Empire Awards was an annual British awards ceremony honouring cinematic achievements in the local and global film industry. Winners were awarded the Empire Award statuette. The awards, first presented in 1996, were presented by the British film magazine Empire with the winners voted by the readers of the magazine.
Nickelodeon Digital, often shortened to Nick Digital and originally known as Nickelodeon Creative Labs, is an American animation studio based in New York City which opened in 1994. It is a division of Nickelodeon Animation Studio. Nickelodeon Digital produces some of Nickelodeon's animated series and creates digital content and motion graphics for the Nickelodeon Group. The company's Burbank, California branch creates CGI and visual effects for Nickelodeon's animated series.
Jeff Willette is an American computer graphics 3D animator. In 2008, Willette was nominated for a Visual Effects Society Award in the category of Outstanding Animated Character in a Live Action Broadcast Program or Commercial (shared with Matthew Hackett, Sean Andrew Faden, and Denis Gauthier; and in 2010 he was nominated for a Visual Effects Society Award in the category of Outstanding Compositing in a Broadcast Program or Commercial.
Sean Andrew Faden is a computer graphics animator. In 2003 he was nominated for a Saturn Award for Best Special Effects for his work on the film xXx, and in 2008, he was nominated for a Visual Effects Society Award in the category of Outstanding Animated Character in a Live Action Broadcast Program or Commercial. In 2021, he was nominated for an Academy Award on VFX work in Mulan.
Steve Preeg is an American Academy Award-winning special effects artist.
Andrew R. Jones is a visual effects artist most known for being part of the Oscar-winning team that did the visuals to Avatar and The Jungle Book.
Carey Villegas is a visual effects artist who was nominated at the 83rd Academy Awards in the category of Best Visual Effects, for the film Alice in Wonderland. His nomination was shared with Sean Phillips, Ken Ralston and David Schaub. Also for Alice in Wonderland, Carey won the 2010 Golden Satellite Award for Best Visual Effects and was nominated for the British Academy Award (BAFTA), Critics Choice Award, Saturn Award, and the Visual Effects Society Award (VES) for "Outstanding Visual Effects in a Visual Effects Driven Motion Picture".
Square Enix Image Studio Division, is a Japan-based CGI animation studio dedicated towards creating video game cut scenes and full-length feature films for Square Enix. Square Enix Image Studio Division was founded as Visual Works as the CGI department for Square and was responsible for creating the pre-rendered CG sequences for the company, starting with Final Fantasy VII in 1997.
Lead Animator - Matthew Hackett