Markus Schmidt
Character Supervisor, Global Head of Department
Character Supervisor / 23 yrs
London, United Kingdom
Hire Me
I specialize in everything related to digital character and creature creation - be it Digital Avatars, DigitalDoubles, fantastical creatures and animals. I cover the entire development cycle from design, to creation and in shot use-cases with a special emphasis on facial and body performance. I am especially passionate about facial deformation and specialize in facial setups for hyperreal Digital Doubles to photoreal creatures and cartoon characters in animated feature films.
As Global Head of Creatures I am currently responsible for anything creature related from project supervision to company wide planning and strategy development as well as recruitment and bidding as it relates to character work. This includes project supervision with teams of up to 50+ artists for each show as well as department related responsibilities for all build teams involved in character & creature work (modeling, rigging, texturing etc.) I am also responsible for streamlining the character creation process and make it as efficient as possible while increasing the artistic quality of our work.
I have an extensive background working hands-on on some of the most well known Digital Creatures and characters from blockbuster movies such as War of the Planet of the Apes, Hulk from Avengers: Age of Ultron and Avengers: Endgame to smaller but beloved aliens like Paul from the same movie and the character ensemble from Disney's John Carter (I still have a soft spot for that film :)
Specialties:
• Project based team supervision especially for character & creature heavy shows
• Company wide strategic resource planning and multi departmental supervision
• Scouting & Recruiting as well as scenario planning together with Recruitment team and other HODs
• Bidding - both pre and post show award
• Facial shapes as well as body shapes (multi stage muscle tension shapes, breathing shapes, etc.)
• Anatomy in motion i.e. Shotsculpt to enhance the existing deformation & silhouette
• Facial sculpting as well as design of efficient, rigging friendly body & face topology
• Extensive knowledge of ZBrush (12+years) along with profound knowledge of human anatomy
• HighRes Texturing either painted by hand or based on photo projectionsCharacter Su
Work History
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Facial Modeler
Wētā FX
April 2015 - May 2017
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Lead Modeler
Industrial Light & Magic
August 2014 - March 2015
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Senior Modeler
Industrial Light & Magic
May 2014 - August 2014
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Creature Supervisor
Double Negative
April 2013 - May 2014
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Lead Modeller
Double Negative
January 2012 - March 2013
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Modelling Supervisor
Double Negative
July 2010 - December 2011
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Lead Modeller
Double Negative
July 2009 - April 2010
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Senior Modeller
Double Negative
February 2009 - June 2009
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3D Modeller
Double Negative
April 2007 - January 2009
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Education
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Online Course
Scott Eaton - Portraiture & Facial Anatomy
November 2014 - November 2014 -
Online Course
Scott Eaton - Digital Figure Sculpting Course
November 2011 - November 2011 -
Clay Portraiture Workshop
LARA - London Atelier of Representational Art
November 2011 - November 2011 -
Online Course
Scott Eaton - Online Anatomy Course
November 2009 - November 2009 -
Diploma in Film And Media
Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg
November 2001 - November 2006 -
exchange program
Gobelins: L'école de l'image
November 2003 - November 2004 -
Computer Science (unfinished)
Hochschule Furtwangen University
November 1997 - November 1998 -
High School
Wilhelms-Gymnasium School
November 1987 - November 1996