Allan Gersten
Highly creative, detail oriented Real Time VFX Supervisor
Real Time VFX Supervisor / Lead VFX Artist / 25 yrs
San Francisco, CA, United States
Hire Me
Over the years I have led and collaborated on challenging and fun projects in the visual effects industry that perfectly capture my client’s vision. Because I have worked with so many different studios and in numerous diverse environments, I am flexible and adept at surveying the client and team needs and aligning myself and my team to the task at hand. I always clarify the desired visual and performance needs of my clients and create reasonable and achievable deadlines for myself and my team leading to time tested and proven results.
My unique understanding and insight into production come from the vast diversity in the roles I have held over the years in CG production. I started out as a generalist focusing primarily on character animation and modeling. This quickly led to character rigging with a focus on dynamic rigs for furred and clothed characters. From there it was a natural progression into becoming a simulations TD focusing primarily on cloth, fluids, fur, rigid and soft bodies and particle animation. Looking for new and interesting challenges I decided to transition into the world of real time as a vfx artist, then a vfx technical artist and now as a VFX supervisor. My knowledge of industry standard software is extensive, including familiarity or proficiency with Unity, Unreal, Maya, Houdini, Nuke, Adobe Creative Suite as well as many proprietary software packages providing me with a thorough, layered and diverse background. Thanks for taking the time to read a little about me. I look forward to connecting with you.
Work History
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FX Animator
Walt Disney Animation Studios
March 2012 - October 2012Burbank, CAWorked on Wreck-It Ralph. Fx included rigid body dynamics, implementation of most of the "Glitch" effects. Also respomsible for various other environmental effects, with a range of cartoon to real-world to hyper-real physics.
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Creature TD
Industrial Light & Magic
January 2011 - July 2011San Francisco, CAResponsible for rigid body simulations including robot destruction, large scale building destruction scenes and cg/practical set interactions for Transformers, Dark of the Moon and Transformers, Dark of the Moon ride film for Universal Studios. I worked primarily in Zeno doing rigid body simulations.
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Lead FX Technical Director
Tippett Studio
March 2007 - April 2010Berkeley, CAResponsible for FX animation of fur, cloth, debris, water, smoke, and various other natural phenomenon. Was also responsible for look development of various effects. Projects included The Spiderwick Chronicles, The Golden Compass, Cloverfield, X-Men Origins, Twilight New Moon, Twilight Eclipse.
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VFX Technical Director
Giant Killer Robots
September 2006 - December 2006San Francisco, CAResponsible for fluid effects for Fantastic Four Theatrical Trailer, worked on Johnny Blaze fire effect fluid simulations. Particle effects for Happy Feet, including snow spray and avalanche effects and rigid body simulations.
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VFX Technical Director
Evil Eye Pictures
July 2006 - August 2006San Francisco, CAResponsible for look development and implementation of all particle effects and simulations for 2006, MTV Video of the year, Carrie Underwood - Before He Cheats.
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VFX Technical Director
CafeFX
April 2006 - May 2006Santa Maria, CAResponsible for Dirt Elemental character particle build, fluid simulations, dirt and dust elements. Also worked on look development for The Good Sheppard and Snakes on a Plane. I was also responsible for gaming cinematic effects for the unreleased game Heist.
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FX Technical Director
Blue Sky Studios
November 2005 - February 2006White Plains, NYFX Technical Director on Ice Age 2, The Melt Down. My responsibilities included various water effects animation, including waves, froth, splashes and wakes. I was also responsible for various Maya fluid simulations for smoke effects for the Mini Sloths sequence.
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FX Technical Director
ESC Entertainment
April 2004 - July 2004Alameda, CAFX Technical Director on Catwoman. My responsibilities included creating and animating smoke, dust, debris, explosions, sparks and lighting effects.
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Education
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Pratt Institute
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