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A love of computing, music, and cinema has propelled Jeff Kleiser’s career from the earliest days of VFX on movies including Tron, Flight of the Navigator, Stargate, Judge Dredd, Surrogates, and many more. Along the way, he’s helped the late, great Doug Trumbull create eye-popping film-based projects for Luxor hotels and Radio City’s 3D Christmas movie.
Jeff talks through his career, and how he’s seen the industry evolve from optical printers and really slow computers to today’s AI and CG tech, which are making it easier to create low-budget movies that look like blockbusters. He also talks about his fascinating upcoming movie with his brother, Grease director Randal Kleiser, which tells a remarkable true tale of heroic teenage girls in wartorn Amsterdam.
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0:06:34 Why Doug Trumbull moved to Massachusetts
0:11:54 Projects for Luxor hotels
0:14:54 Radio City Christmas 3D experience
0:18:38 Doug's passion for high-quality imagery
0:23:49 Stargate and morphing
0:27:34 Colgate University
0:31:39 Getting into the VFX industry via "Tron"
0:34:34 Tron and Flight of the Navigator
0:40:07 The horror of optical printers
0:42:51 How the industry has changed
0:46:45 Working on his bro's movies: "Grease," "Flight of the Navigator"
0:51:14 How does AI fit into the world of VFX
0:55:05 "Godzilla: Year Zero" and a VFX revolution
0:57:13 Living between LA and Massachusetts