Industrial Light & Magic

Type	Division
Industry	Visual effects, computer-generated imagery
Founded	May 1975
Headquarters	Letterman Digital Arts Center, Presidio of San Francisco, California, United States
Key people	George Lucas Dennis Muren John Knoll Lynwen Brennan
Owner(s)	The Walt Disney Company
Parent	Lucasfilm Limited
Website	ILM.com

Industrial Light & Magic original logo, designed by Drew Struzan

Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) is an American Academy Award-winning motion picture visual effects company that was founded in May 1975 by George Lucas. It is a division of the film production company, Lucasfilm, which Lucas founded, and was created when Lucas began production of the film Star Wars. ILM originated in Van Nuys, California, then later moved to San Rafael in 1978, and since 2005 it has been based at the Letterman Digital Arts Center in the Presidio of San Francisco. Lynwen Brennan, who joined the company in 1999, currently serves as ILM's President and General Manager.^[1] In 2012, The Walt Disney Company acquired ILM as part of its purchase of Lucasfilm.^[2]

History [edit]

Lucas wanted his 1977 film Star Wars to include visual effects that had never been seen on film before. After discovering that the in-house effects department at 20th Century Fox was no longer operational, Lucas approached Douglas Trumbull, famous for the effects on 2001: A Space Odyssey. Trumbull declined as he was already committed to working on Steven Spielberg's film Close Encounters of the Third Kind, but suggested his assistant John Dykstra to Lucas. Dykstra brought together a small team of college students, artists and engineers who became the Special Visual Effects department on Star Wars. Alongside Dykstra, other leading members of the original ILM team were Ken Ralston, Richard Edlund, Dennis Muren, Joe Johnston, Phil Tippett, Steve Gawley, Lorne Peterson and Paul Huston.

In late 1978, when in pre-production for The Empire Strikes Back, Lucas reformed most of the team into Industrial Light & Magic in Marin County, California. From here on, the company expanded and has since gone on to produce special effects for nearly three hundred films, including the entire Star Wars saga, the Indiana Jones series, the Harry Potter series, the Jurassic Park series, the Back to the Future trilogy, many of the Star Trek films, Ghostbusters II, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, the Pirates of the Caribbean series, the Terminator sequels, the Transformers films, the Men in Black series, Wild Wild West, most of the Mission: Impossible films, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, *batteries not included, The Abyss, Flubber, and also provided work for Avatar, alongside Weta Digital.

In addition to their work for George Lucas, ILM also collaborates with Steven Spielberg on most films that he directs, and for many that he produces as well. Dennis Muren has acted as Visual Effects Supervisor on many of these films.

Apart from flashy special effects, the company also works on more subtle effects - such as widening streets, digitally adding more extras to a shot, and inserting the film's actors into preexisting footage - in films including Schindler's List, Forrest Gump, Snow Falling on Cedars, Magnolia, and several Woody Allen films.

ILM began creating computer-generated imagery when they hired Edwin Catmull from NYIT in 1979. John Lasseter worked on computer animation as part of ILM's contribution to Young Sherlock Holmes. The Graphics Group was later sold to Steve Jobs, named Pixar and created the first CG animated feature, Toy Story.

In 2000, ILM created the OpenEXR format for High Dynamic Range Imaging.^[3]

ILM operated from an inconspicuous property in San Rafael, California until 2005. The company was known to locals as The Kerner Company. In 2005, when Lucas decided to move locations to The Presidio of San Francisco and focus on digital effects, a management-led team bought the five physical and practical effects divisions and formed a new company that included the George Lucas Theater, retained the "Kerner" name as Kerner Technologies, Inc. and provided physical effects for major motion pictures, often working with ILM, until its Chapter 7 bankruptcy in 2011.

In 2005, ILM extended its operations to Lucasfilm Singapore, which also includes the Singapore arm of Lucasfilm Animation. In 2011, it was announced the company was considering a project-based facility in Vancouver.^[4]

In 2006, ILM invented IMoCap (Image Based Motion Capture Technology).

As of 2009^[update], ILM has received 15 Best Visual Effects Oscars and 23 additional nominations. It has also received 24 Scientific and Technical Awards from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

In 2012, Disney bought ILM's parent company, Lucasfilm, and acquired ILM in the process. Disney has stated that it has no immediate plans to change ILM's operations,^[5] but had begun to lay off employees by April of the next year.^[6]

ILM is currently the largest visual effects vendor in the motion picture industry, with regards to workforce, with more than 500 artists. It has one of the largest renderfarms currently available with more than 7500 nodes. Following the closure of LucasArts by Disney in 2013, ILM was left overstaffed and the faculty was reduced to serve only ILM's visual effects department.^[7]

Milestones [edit]

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (September 2012)

• 1975: Resurrected the use of VistaVision; first use of a motion control camera (Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope)
• 1982: First completely computer-generated sequence (the "Genesis sequence" in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan)
• 1985: First completely computer-generated character, the "stained glass man" in Young Sherlock Holmes
• 1988: First morphing sequence, in Willow
• 1988: Integrating 2D animated characters with live-action footage in Who Framed Roger Rabbit
• 1989: First computer-generated 3-D character, the pseudopod in The Abyss
• 1991: First partially computer-generated main character, the T-1000 in Terminator 2: Judgment Day
• 1992: First time the texture of human skin was computer generated, in Death Becomes Her
• 1993: First time digital technology used to create a complete and detailed living creature, the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park, which earned ILM its thirteenth Oscar
• 1995: First fully synthetic speaking computer-generated character, with a distinct personality and emotion, to take a leading role in Casper
• 1995: First computer-generated photo-realistic hair and fur (used for the digital lion and monkeys) in Jumanji
• 1996: First completely computer-generated main character, Draco in Dragonheart
• 1999: First computer generated character to have a full human anatomy, Imhotep in The Mummy
• 2000: Creates OpenEXR imaging format.^[3]
• 2006: Develops iMocap system, which uses computer vision techniques to track live-action performers on set. Used in the creation of Davy Jones and ship's crew in the film Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
• 2011: First animated feature produced by ILM, Rango

ILM selected filmography [edit]

Future releases:

• Now You See Me (2013)^[10]
• The Lone Ranger (2013)^[9][10]
• Pacific Rim (2013)^[9][10]
• Noah (2014)^[10]
• Transformers 4 (2014)
• Jurassic Park IV (2014)^[10]
• Star Wars Episode VII (2015)
• The Fantastic Four (2015)
• Untitled Avengers sequel (2015)

Notable employees and clients [edit]

Photoshop was first used at the Industrial Light & Magic studios as an image-processing program. Photoshop was created by ILM Visual Effects Supervisor John Knoll and his brother Thomas as a summer project. It was used on The Abyss. The Knoll brothers sold the program to Adobe shortly before the film's release.

Adam Savage, Grant Imahara and Tory Belleci of MythBusters fame have all worked at Industrial Light & Magic.

Industrial Light & Magic is also famous for their commercial work. Their clients include Energizer Holdings, Nike, Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Budweiser, Nickelodeon and other companies.

Actor Masi Oka worked on several major ILM productions as a programmer, including Revenge of the Sith, before joining the cast of the NBC show Heroes as Hiro Nakamura. Oka still works at ILM.^[12]

American film director David Fincher worked at ILM for four years in the early 1980s.

Film director Joe Johnston was a Visual effects artist and an Art Director.

References [edit]

• "Industrial Light & Magic: History". StarWars.com. LucasFilm. July 15, 1999. Retrieved 2011-02-01. 

External links [edit]

• Official ILM website (with detailed information in PDF format)
• Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) at the Internet Movie Database
• Alternative credits list from the Unofficial ILM site
• Small entry at Lucasfilm's site

v t e George Lucas Filmography Films directed Feature THX 1138 (1971) American Graffiti (1973) Star Wars (1977) Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999) Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones (2002) Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (2005) Short Look at Life (1965) Herbie (1966) Freiheit (1966) 1:42.08 (1966) Electronic Labyrinth: THX 1138 4EB (1967) Anyone Lived in a Pretty How Town (1967) The Emperor (1967) 6-18-67 (1967) Filmmaker (1968) Films written Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980) Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (1983) Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) Willow (1988) Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989) Radioland Murders (1994) Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008) Television The Star Wars Holiday Special (1978; uncredited writer) The Ewok Adventure (1984) Droids (1985) Ewoks (1985) Ewoks: The Battle for Endor (1985) The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles (1992) Star Wars: Clone Wars (2003) Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) Star Wars live-action TV series (TBA) Related American Zoetrope Lucasfilm ILM LucasArts Lucasfilm Animation Skywalker Sound Pixar Skywalker Ranch The Star Wars Corporation THX Edutopia

v t e Cinema of the United States Films A–Z of films Films by year Film series Silent films Personnel Actors Animators Cinematographers Critics Directors Editors Producers Score composers Screenwriters Stunt performers Awards and events Academy Awards Directors Guild of America Awards Writers Guild of America Awards Golden Globe Awards Screen Actors Guild Awards Festivals Theaters Movie theater chains Industry by state Alaska Connecticut Florida Georgia Hawaii Louisiana Michigan North Carolina New Hampshire New Mexico Ohio Oregon Pennsylvania Puerto Rico Virginia Industry by city Atlanta Chicago Cleveland Hollywood Jacksonville Kansas City New York San Diego Miscellaneous Box office Hollywood Production companies AFI's 100 Years... National Film Registry Classical Hollywood cinema New Hollywood