fxphd: The Role of the Optical Printer

We have just announced the new term at fxphd.com. More on that below, but to give you a sample of what is on offer we have decided to provide a free class from last term. This video was part of last term at fxphd.com

With each membership of fxphd you get to pick three courses – such as Nuke, AE, Maya, etc — and you also receive a bonus free weekly course called Background Fundamentals. In this course we provide a magazine style show that covers a new topic each week that focuses more on the business, history and technology behind the industry. “BKD” covers new tech from shows like SIGGRAPH but also historical perspectives and key industry background knowledge that makes your professional life richer.

With help from our good friends at ILM, especially Compositing Supervisor Jon Alexander and also from Stu Maschwitz, Director and owner of prolost.com, we produced this class for last term’s fxphd Background Fundamentals course. Enjoy!

ILM and the Optical Printer

One of the most important pieces of kit in the history of visual effects was the optical printer. In an age before computers it was the center of the effects universe. Almost every major effects film and most title work was done with an optical printer. Some the finest work was done at ILM, who had several optical printers and used them to make Luke fight his father, Roger chase Jessica and Indy discover strange new corners of the world. While the optical printer was still in commission, Stu Maschwitz was working at ILM in the Rebel Mac unit, but he had so much respect for the optical team that he sat down one day and worked out how to replicate the optical printer in After Effects. Here is both a review of the optical printer and that re-creation of it in After Effects.

ILM’s Greg Grusby hit the ILM archives to find us these historical images of the optical printer and some of the great team that worked on them exclusively for fxguide. We thank him, Jon Alexander and especially the original optical department of ILM for such a wealth of talented filmmaking that truly the rest of the industry is built on today.

ILM Optical department circa 1982. From back row: Ed Jones, Marc Vargo, Dave Berry, Ralph Gordon, Dave Hanies, Peter Almlandson, James Lim, John Ellis, Chris Rand, Michael Moore, Tom Rosseter, Phil Barberio, Duncan Myers, Mike Shannon, Mary Walter, Bruce Nicholson, Peg Hunter.

Once at ILM, the optical department constantly upgraded the hardware including commissioning optics guru David Grafton to design and build a series of special lenses that would help ILM set the standard for film composites for years to come.

ILM’s famed Anderson optical printer, seen above right, was originally purchased from Paramount Pictures in 1975. Built by Howard Anderson at Paramount for the 1956 Cecil B. De Mille film “The Ten Commandments,” the Anderson had been used on Alfred Hitchcock’s “North By Northwest.

Ken Smith composites a shot on ILM’s Quad Printer. Originally designed for “The Empire Strike Back” by Richard Edlund.

Tom Rosseter works on an element “line-up” prior to tuning over the film and detailed instruction assembly list to the optical compositor.

A number of ILM staff continued to contribute their expertise to the system including: George Randle, camera and projector movements; David Grafton, optics; Jerry Jeffress and Michael MacKenzie, electronics interface system. Bruce Nicholson also provided his expertise to the system.

One of ILM’s Oxberry animation stands in action.

Optical Dog’ Ken Smith adjusts settings on the ‘Work Horse’ printer.

Prior to Episode VI, “Return of the Jedi” ILM dismantled the Quad printer and two of its projectors were used to build the Work Horse which was driven by a highly sophisticated, custom engineered computerized control system which sped up the arduous process substantially.