CGI Fridays – A Visual Effects Interview Podcast (Season 2 Coming Soon) - Visual Effects Supervisor Henry LaBounta (Industrial Light & Magic, PDI/DreamWorks, EA Ghost) | CGI Fridays - Episode 4

Visual Effects Supervisor Henry LaBounta (Industrial Light & Magic, PDI/DreamWorks, EA Ghost) | CGI Fridays - Episode 4

07/22/22 • 56 min

CGI Fridays – A Visual Effects Interview Podcast (Season 2 Coming Soon)

Probably the only person at ILM to prefer Star Trek over Star Wars, Visual Effects Supervisor/Senior Art Director) Henry LaBounta shares his incredible career with Ed Kramer on CGI Fridays Episode 4.

The first generation to have been inspired by big screen CGI, Henry LaBounta was working on commercials for Crawford Digital Effects in Atlanta when Robert Patrick’s liquid metal T-1000 in Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991) literally changed his life.

Learn how LaBounta got his start at Industrial Light and Magic, before moving to DreamWorks, and then changing lanes entirely as senior art director at Electronic Arts.

Henry LaBounta's full IMDb profile is:

Need for Speed: Heat (Video Game) (senior art director)

Need for Speed: Payback (Video Game)

Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit (Video Game) (senior art director)

Skate 2 (Video Game)

Burnout Paradise (Video Game)

Skate. (Video Game)

SSX 3 (Video Game) (senior art director)

BraceFace Brandi (Short) (visual effects compositor)

People I Know (visual effects supervisor: PDI/Dreamworks)

Minority Report (visual effects supervisor: PDI/Dreamworks)

A.I. Artificial Intelligence (visual effects supervisor: PDI)

Mission: Impossible II (visual effects supervisor: PDI - as Henry Labounta)

Supernova (digital effects producer: PDI)

Forces of Nature (visual effects supervisor)

The Prince of Egypt (supervising sequence lead: "Red Sea" sequence)

Twister (digital tornado designer)

Casper (senior CG supervisor)

Star Trek: Generations (computer effects artist: ILM)

Baby's Day Out (senior digital artist)

Learn how LaBounta got his start at Industrial Light and Magic, before moving to DreamWorks, and then changing lanes entirely as senior art director at Electronic Arts.

Henry LaBounta's full IMDb profile is:

Need for Speed: Heat (Video Game) (senior art director)

Need for Speed: Payback (Video Game)

Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit (Video Game) (senior art director)

Skate 2 (Video Game)

Burnout Paradise (Video Game)

Skate. (Video Game)

SSX 3 (Video Game) (senior art director)

BraceFace Brandi (Short) (visual effects compositor)

People I Know (visual effects supervisor: PDI/Dreamworks)

Minority Report (visual effects supervisor: PDI/Dreamworks)

A.I. Artificial Intelligence (visual effects supervisor: PDI)

Mission: Impossible II (visual effects supervisor: PDI - as Henry Labounta)

Supernova (digital effects producer: PDI)

Forces of Nature (visual effects supervisor)

The Prince of Egypt (supervising sequence lead: "Red Sea" sequence)

Twister (digital tornado designer)

Casper (senior CG supervisor)

Star Trek: Generations (computer effects artist: ILM)

Baby's Day Out (senior digital artist)

Previous Episode

Research and Development Artist and Programmer Frank Vitz (Kleiser-Walczak Construction, Electronic Arts) | CGI Fridays - Episode 3

From pitching Tron to opening the Stargate, Frank Vitz discusses his career as a Research and Development Artist and Programmer in the new episode of Ed Kramer’s CGI Fridays.

Vitz is best known for his work at animation studio Kleiser-Walczak Construction Co, where – alongside CGI Fridays host Ed Kramer and previous guest Jeff Kleiser – he contributed to the visual effects of the late Doug Trumbull’s multimedia Luxor Las Vegas attraction, and its spiritual successor, Roland Emmerich’s ancient astronaut action movie and accidental franchise-starter, Stargate (1994).

His association with Kleiser goes back further than the company when by eerie coincidence, Vitz – then working for Robert Abel and Associates – found himself at ground zero for the birth of modern CGI: 1982’s Tron.

Frank Vitz currently works as Senior Art Director/CG Supervisor at Electronic Arts.

Frank Vitz's full IMDB profile reads:

How to Boil a Frog (Documentary) (cgi supervisor)

X-Men 2 (visual effects supervisor: Kleiser-Walczak)

Evolution (TV Mini Series documentary) (animator - 7 episodes, 2002) (visual effects supervisor - 7 episodes, 2002)

Corkscrew Hill (Short) (technical supervisor)

X-Men (visual effects supervisor: Kleiser Walczak)

The Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man (Video short) (visual effects)

The Rage: Carrie 2 (visual effects coordinator)

Judge Dredd (head of software: Kleiser-Walczak)

Stargate (software development: Kleiser-Walczak)

In Search of the Obelisk (Short) (head of software: Klesier Walczak)

TRON (systems programmer: Robert Abel and Associates)

Next Episode

Matchmove Artist/Matchmove Lead Alia Agha (Industrial Light & Magic, Digital Domain, Laika) | CGI Fridays - Episode 5

From answering the phones at ILM to previs on The Phantom Menace, Alia Agha tells Ed Kramer how she became a “matchmove master” in CGI Fridays Episode 5. It’s hardly surprising when Ed Kramer introduces us to someone with a hand in one of the landmark visual effects sequences in science fiction cinema. What is surprising is that when it comes to James Cameron’s The Abyss (1989), Alia Agha literally had a hand in the eerie funnel of sentient water.

Alia Agha's full IMDb profile is:

The Quarry (Video Game) (facial integration artist: Digital Domain)

The Captain (digital artist: Whiskytree)

Pacific Rim (digital artist: Industrial Light & Magic)

Battleship (digital artist: Industrial Light & Magic)

Transformers: Dark of the Moon (digital artist: Industrial Light & Magic)

Rango (digital artist)

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (digital artist: ILM)

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (digital artist: ILM)

Iron Man (digital artist: ILM)

Eragon (lead layout artist: ILM)

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (digital artist: ILM)