đ§ How a Childhood Visit to 7-Eleven Led to a VFX Starâs Passion
Emmy nominee Everett Burrell (âUmbrella Academyâ) talks art and AI with moderator Rob Legato, ASC, VES
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When visual effects supervisor Everett Burrell was a kid growing up in Orange County, he would go into his grandmotherâs bedroom to watch her old black-and-white television. It was during that time that three movies struck his fancy: 1933âs King Kong, 1959âs The Killer Shrews and 1962âs The Brain That Wouldnât Die.
âI was off to the races,â Burrell says of seeing the creature features as a young boy.
But the inspiration for the Emmy-winning Burrell (Babylon 5), a nominee again this year for Netflixâs The Umbrella Academy, didnât stop there. As Burrell tells moderator Rob Legato, ASC, VES, and an Oscar and Emmy winner, during the Art & Crafts podcast recorded live at the American Society of Cinematographersâ Clubhouse in Los Angeles on Aug. 7, the idea that he could conjure the Hollywood magic he fell in love with as a child didnât connect until a little later.
âThere was a magazine called Famous Monsters of Filmland that they used to sell at a 7-Eleven near my familyâs house. And one day, I looked in the back of it, and there was a photo of them putting a man into the Godzilla suit. And I went, âOh, wow, itâs a suit. Somebody makes this stuff,ââ Burrell says. âAnd that was totally the rocket ship in my brain to want to do this.â
Based on the comic book series of the same name, The Umbrella Academy is about a dysfunctional family of superheroes who, in the showâs final season, must reckon with a looming threat called the Cleanse, a massive creature that threatens to destroy the world.
To create the massive creature, Burrell used a variety of tools, including an âAI generative tool.â
The program helped âgenerate textures and looks on our initial 3-D model. And that blew my mind as a tool,â Burrell says. âI think itâs absolutely fantastic, and it made me think in ways I donât think I would ever have thought.â
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Says Legato, a legend in the field of visual effects and three-time Oscar winner (for Titanic, Hugo and The Jungle Book), âAI is usually a little more demonized when people speak of it. And I remember this one quote that Ted Sarandos said, which I sort of agree with: âAI is not going to take your job, but somebody who knows how to use it will.ââ
On The Umbrella Academy, Burrell says AI became a âfantastic toolâ for helping expand upon the visual effects teamâs original model and work.
âIt would create such a weird variety of things that to me was eye-opening. It was still our model, our design, but the textures and the vibe and the just things going on inside the creature were things I would have never thought of,â Burrell says.
Burrell is a seven-time Emmy nominee for his work as a visual effects artist, so heâs come a long way from watching that old TV in his grandmotherâs room.
âMy parents really didnât understand what I wanted to do. No one thought I could make a living. I still donât know if I can make a living,â he says. âBut I remember we had a family friend who worked at MGM Studios way back in the early â80s, and I was able to go with them one day to the set of Buckaroo Banzai, which is one of the first sets I ever worked on. They were an apprentice sign painter heading towards the studio. They made a left into a bar called the Cozy Inn, sat there and drank for two hours before going to work. So I was like, âThis must be Hollywood, huh?ââ
Listen to earlier conversations from our live Art & Crafts event focused on cinematography, editing and production design.