Meet Sean Broughton - Flame Artist and Creative Director Extraordinaire..
Award-winning visual FX and post house Smoke & Mirrors (www.smoke-mirrors.com) co-founder Sean Broughton is widely regarded as one of the most sought-after Flame artists in the industry. That‘s in part because of the extreme visual and organizational talent he brings to his job, but also because of the pioneering work he did with Discreet Logic, collaborating closely on the program‘s development while it was in its infancy. As a result, Broughton represents one of the most knowledgeable and articulate resources available on Flame, as well as on the past, present and future evolution of post production.
Below is a short Q+A as Sean talks about his work.
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MEET SEAN BROUGHTON
When the compositing and visual FX program known as Flame first appeared on the post-production scene in 1992, it was unprecedented.
Today, it‘s simply indispensable: uniquely flexible, Autodesk‘s Flame is an essential creative tool for HD and SD commercials, films and videos - a visual powerhouse in the hands of those who can use it to its fullest.
It isn‘t just an opinion that Sean Broughton, Co-Founder/Creative Director of Smoke & Mirrors, knows Flame as well as anyone on the planet: that‘s a well-documented fact. Flame‘s original developer, Discreet Logic, and Broughton discovered each other when the system was in its infancy, and worked closely together to mold it into a world-class application.
Today, Smoke & Mirror‘s clients become the beneficiaries of Broughton‘s Flame mastery as soon as their projects enter his turbocharged NYC suite.
Q: There are thousands of Flame operators today, but only a small handful can match your level of hands-on experience - what difference does that make in what you can bring to a project?
A: It‘s certainly a feather in your cap to have that many years of experience with Flame, but ‘Flame Artist‘ is merely a title. If it‘s gone well, you‘ve been on a thousand shoots, been in a thousand
production meetings, and had 100,000 conversations with creative directors. So that‘s what a client gets from me - not just button-pushing, but those thousands of conversations and projects.
It‘s a well of information that doesn‘t just lead to better special FX, it leads to better production, better planning, better creative. That‘s what S&M is about: making a better product.
Q: Do you feel the Flame techniques you‘ve learned in the last 15 years - a lifetime in digital media production - give you an edge in realizing a project‘s full potential?
A: Naturally, but the working nuances you learn after evolving with a program for that long are only a part of the picture. It‘s not necessarily about a skill set: It‘s a work ethic. You don‘t go home
until it looks as good as it can be. You don‘t put the pen down. But that‘s not even something we have to tell people at S&M. You do the job to the best of your ability, or don‘t bother doing it at all.
Q: Why do you still love working with Flame?
A: It‘s exciting when you have a creative conversation with someone and you posses the vocabulary to explain the visuals. What you need is a tool that will match that vocabulary. That‘s Flame. And when a brand new client walks in and sees me do something that they thought was completely impossible, well, that‘s what really makes me smile.
Media contact: Kevin Fetterplace at Mojo Working International.
Kevin@Mojoworking.com
(001) 646 359 3961
