Latest / CinemaHounds - A Lorehounds Podcast / The evolution of practical VFX – An interview w/ Lee Romaire

Transcript

The evolution of practical VFX – An interview w/ Lee Romaire · CinemaHounds - A Lorehounds Podcast

• 0:17
  [SPEAKER_03]: Hello and welcome to the Lower Hounds, I'm Alicia and welcome to this special bonus episode.
• 0:23
  [SPEAKER_03]: With a special conversation, I got to have with practical VFX artist Lee Romair, head of Romair Studios in LA about his work on various films, such as Frankenstein, which of course makes it perfect for this Oscar season.
• 0:39
  [SPEAKER_03]: But also everything, you know, up to an including major animatronics in Disney world.
• 0:46
  [SPEAKER_03]: So we talk about all that.
• 0:48
  [SPEAKER_03]: We talk about why he's known as the dead animal guy.
• 0:51
  [SPEAKER_03]: We talk about the course of his 25-year career in VFX.
• 0:56
  [SPEAKER_03]: How he got into it, how he kept going, all the different directions that he's gone from.
• 1:01
  [SPEAKER_03]: Special effects make up to electronics, including tips for those who are looking to get into or find out more about these fields themselves.
• 1:11
  [SPEAKER_03]: Alright, without any further ado, let's jump into my conversation with Lee Romair.
• 1:18
  [SPEAKER_03]: And I am excited to be here today with Lee Romero of Romero Studios in LA.
• 1:23
  [SPEAKER_03]: Lee, thank you for joining me, and thank you for being so patient while we sorted out some technical difficulties.
• 1:30
  [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, thank you for having me no problem.
• 1:34
  [SPEAKER_03]: So you are a veteran of the special effects industry.
• 1:38
  [SPEAKER_03]: You have been doing this work for 25 years now.
• 1:41
  [SPEAKER_03]: Did I see that?
• 1:42
  [SPEAKER_03]: I saw you were celebrating an anniversary?
• 1:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, 25 years moved to Los Angeles to begin this journey.
• 1:50
  [SPEAKER_03]: Wow.
• 1:51
  [SPEAKER_03]: And so we'll jump back to the beginning in a moment, but you now run your own studio in LA called Remair Studios.
• 1:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 1:59
  [SPEAKER_03]: You want to quickly preview for listeners this the range of projects you do.
• 2:04
  [SPEAKER_03]: I know there's practical effects, puppetry, animatronics.
• 2:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: Sure, we
• 2:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: We do all of the above creature design fabrication.
• 2:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: We primarily work now on live entertainment, which is theme park work, designing, doing a lot of research and development for many of the newest things that you see being advertised by the big theme park companies.
• 2:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: We have had a hand in developing,
• 2:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: production work which means we create the whole figure that is in the park.
• 2:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: We just a new park just opened in Orlando and we created and fabricated and installed 22 different characters
• 2:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: some of the most sophisticated ones in the park actually so we also do we do movie work we do TV work but it's it's a bit more sporadic now than it was before when when when we first started
• 3:12
  [SPEAKER_03]: And we are going to talk a little bit later about Frankenstein is one of the movies that you've worked on recently, but if we jump back to the beginning, what got you into this work was this, were you playing with Tories as a kid thinking about this or as a dance?
• 3:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so I'm from a small town inside the Louisiana.
• 3:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: And when I was a kid, we, so my parents did take me to Walt Disney World as a kid.
• 3:40
  [SPEAKER_01]: I was always fascinated with things that looked real, but weren't real.
• 3:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: And it could be a creature, like from the movies, King Kong, things like that Godzilla, or it could be, you know, a theme of something in a theme park like Pirates of the Caribbean, like it could be a tree, or a rock, as long as it was artificial.
• 4:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: And in that small town, the things that we're surrounded with was taxidermy.
• 4:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: you know, you would go to someone's house and there was a deer head on the wall or a duck.
• 4:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I would always focus on that and just look at stare at it and someone who worked from my dad had a taxidermy as a hobby and he showed me and I think I was probably eight years old.
• 4:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: He showed me how to mount a little crawfish and he had these
• 4:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: mail order back then, you got things you wrote, you looked in the back of a magazine and got a mail order course or whatever.
• 4:40
  [SPEAKER_01]: So he had these little books that he bought a course, a taxonomy course, and he gave me those.
• 4:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: And you know, I, you know, any years old, I could read.
• 4:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I really basically taught myself how to do that.
• 4:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: And then I, you know, started doing that.
• 4:56
  [SPEAKER_01]: I had a little shop and a little room to do the work in and people would bring me stuff.
• 5:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: the end of high school.
• 5:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: Other people were, you know, playing football.
• 5:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: I was in my shop, you know, creating these things.
• 5:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I was like, you know, a young, little Norman Bates at that point.
• 5:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: And I graduated from LSU and I, excuse me, I went to college.
• 5:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, my parents, do you want the whole, you want all the way up to coming here to Hollywood?
• 5:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's
• 5:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, my parents wanted me to go in business, but I was, you know, had that artistic sort of side.
• 5:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: So we kind of, you know, we made a compromise and I found advertising as a study course in college.
• 5:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: And so I graduated and that worked on, in that for about 10 years.
• 5:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: But I was just kind of unfulfilled, you know, I was kind of searching for what I wanted to do.
• 6:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, one day I just made the decision.
• 6:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know where I came from, but I'm like, you know what, I'm going to be a special effects artist, makeup artist, and Hollywood.
• 6:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: That's what I want to do.
• 6:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: And after that, everything just started falling in a place, like a month later, I was in a bookstore and I found, and I was living in New Orleans at the time, called makeup artist Magazine, and they were having a trade show.
• 6:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: And so I, it was a month later, you know, so I booked a hotel, I booked a ticket and I went to Los Angeles and I went to this trade show and I met a lot of people who, some of which who I still am friends with, and I, but I particularly met a gentleman named Dick Smith who, if you don't know who that is, he's a famous,
• 6:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: make up artist Oscar winning make up artist he's right call the godfather make up he did Marlon brandos make up on the godfather uh he did lendablairs uh exorcist uh okay make up in the exorcist and you know all kind of things like that many many famous makeups and he's he was one of the the best in all is the best art make up artist that has ever lived um but anyway
• 7:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: yes with yes and you know he was retired at the time and but he was teaching people you know had it how to do make up and how to um you know he was mentoring people as well as so you know I showed him this little portfolio that I'd put together and he was like well you know he's very he's very blunt guy or he was and you know he's like well you know you're no
• 7:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: But you have, you have, you know, potential.
• 7:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, go ahead and write to me and we'll we'll talk.
• 7:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: And so I did, and I sent him some more pictures.
• 7:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: And then, you know, he accepted me into his, I guess, training course.
• 8:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: And over the next 18 months, I worked very closely with him very hard to develop my skill as a sculptor.
• 8:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: I started actually sculpting.
• 8:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: uh... for job i started sculpting monograph props uh... for the big monograph companies uh... and at night i would do you know work on prosthetic make ups uh... in my spare bedroom and what year was that the july that was nineteen ninety eight uh... okay okay yeah so you know after about eight months i was like i i think i'm ready to go to Hollywood and he's like
• 8:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: Just trying to discourage me at that point.
• 8:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: He's like, you know, there's a lot more people than there are jobs, and You know, that is a but I'm like, I'm gonna go anyway You know, that's I take that as a challenge.
• 8:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I did I moved there and within a month that was working at Place called Steve Steve Johnson's ex-effects Steve Johnson and another famous make-up artist You know who he did go spusters and
• 9:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: And right night, a lot of the classic eight and eighties make up effects.
• 9:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I've worked with, you know, him and a bunch of other people of their studios for about three years.
• 9:17
  [SPEAKER_03]: And then I started my own and it was fairly early in your career when you were working on six feet under.
• 9:25
  [SPEAKER_03]: And you part of the team that won the prosthetics make up and yeah, yeah.
• 9:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: So that yeah, I went to work at a place called Master's Effects.
• 9:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: Um, it was, you know, it was a stroke of luck.
• 9:40
  [SPEAKER_01]: Honestly, you know, a lot of times here successes, you know, 50% of it is hard work, but 50% is luck.
• 9:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: And so I just happened to be at the right place at the right time.
• 9:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: I, there was a place called Masters of Facts.
• 9:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: And they did six feet under and they had some rather TV shows that they were doing.
• 9:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: And the lead guy, the Todd Masters was in his,
• 10:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: Uh, other top guy were in, I forgot what to show it was that they were working on, um, what's Stargate.
• 10:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: So they were off doing that.
• 10:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I, you know, I was hired in and I got to do the, the lead, you know, prosthetics and body and stuff like that for this one episode, six feet under, uh, on six feet under that actually got an nomination and, you know, one.
• 10:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, um, I think that was also the first or second year with actually,
• 10:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: acknowledged the sculptors of the prosthetics like before it was just to make up artists and then they switched it to the people who actually create the prosthetics as well So, right.
• 10:42
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, so yeah, they divided up for the Emmys now.
• 10:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, right.
• 10:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I got so I got that and you know that You know to get that award was great.
• 10:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's more I would say it's
• 10:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: it interests people who don't live in Hollywood a lot more than it does people who live here you know that counts for more so it's like oh yeah for mom and dad it's great but for here it doesn't really get you your next job I would say it's because what gets you your next job is here is that you're reliable and you're right it's your last job yeah easy to work with you know so anyway yes that's I was on that and it was pretty pretty pretty great pretty
• 11:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: What would you say is your protest achievement for you?
• 11:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: Proudest achievement, wow.
• 11:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I don't know.
• 11:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: Like is there a project?
• 11:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: Well, you know, I think the thing that really kind of
• 11:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, to me, like surviving everything that's happened in the last review of one of my proudest achievement.
• 11:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: But, um, that's an important one.
• 11:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so, I mean, projects that I really liked, um, okay, I, um, so early when I started my,
• 12:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: shop, I started a little shop downtown, and in downtown LA, before it gentrified, it was a little scary there, but I was doing anything I could get my hands on TV shows, commercials, short films, anything, and a friend of mine worked at Disney Imagineering, and they were working on the first sort of iterations of electric actuation for animatronic figures in the parks.
• 12:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: They were working on the heads and hands, heads, particularly, and they called me in to leave where we want to do this character, you know, want you to sculpt the head and want you to finish it and all this stuff.
• 12:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: So in a realistic way.
• 12:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I was helping them with that through the company.
• 12:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: And then that became a project that you wanted to redo the show that is in Disneyland for Abraham Lincoln.
• 13:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: He has his own show.
• 13:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: Abraham Lincoln is the first audio animatronic human that Walt Disney ever attempted and Walt Disney was personally involved in and it was one of his favorite things.
• 13:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: So they had actually the opportunity to resculpe this head or resculpe this figure for Disney.
• 13:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: And I was I'm actually the first person outside of the Disney company who ever got that opportunity.
• 13:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: So it was very exciting.
• 13:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: The work previously done by Blaine Gips, and he's the amazing sculptor, all the characters you see in Disneyland and parts of the Caribbean, a Hona Mansion, most of the presidents he did.
• 13:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I had to honor that and be very mindful of what he was trying to achieve.
• 13:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, I really copied his theatricality of that.
• 14:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: That did, you know, the modern kind of finish that we use in Hollywood now.
• 14:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I saw an opportunity there, that, you know, the theme parks, they all started from studios, movie studios, but they kind of got in a way from that feel, and for the, for the animatronic figures and characters.
• 14:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, I said, okay, there is a, we have a, there's a lot of things that we can bring to this work from the movie business, the realism, the cinema, the cinematic quality.
• 14:40
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, so I've kind of focused on that work and they, you know, they started hiring me to do all kind of things and I've done, you know, we've done pirates and we've done president and we've done aliens and we've done.
• 14:56
  [SPEAKER_01]: teak nerds and country pairs and all this things and then you know from there I was like well you know I've got all these great people that I work with who do animatronic work and mechanical work and puppeteering and so I really pushed for give give me a whole figure to do the whole thing I wanted to it so they did give me they finally uh Mac we as and gave me a whole figure to do and
• 15:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: things that they'd ever done, it was a hand little tiny handheld character, and it took us about three years to work it out and develop it, but we did.
• 15:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: And from there, it just kind of everything kind of snowballed and to different companies and different things.
• 15:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, like I said, that's mostly our focus right now live, work.
• 15:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: I kind of, you know, I kind of,
• 15:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: wanted to veer into that because I knew the movie business, you know, is there's already a lot of people who are good at it that are in it and with digital, it's, I'm not saying it's going away and actually probably improve the practical effects business, but, you know,
• 16:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: to me the theme park work was it's something that nobody wanted to do and but I did so I kind of moved into more of that.
• 16:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: Amy I also saw that you did in 2021 Frank Ocean went to the Met Gala with this animatronic green baby.
• 16:37
  [SPEAKER_03]: That was also you're right.
• 16:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so we we have like really cool projects like that that you know come out of the blue up somebody introduced me to Frank and He had this baby he what he had he was opening a jewelry store and he wanted to have this baby in the window to you know it was he has like his jewelry line has like some butterflies and it's so the baby is supposed to be grabbing for butterflies that were digital on a on a screen and
• 17:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: he also has like a scarf line in it within that luxury brand.
• 17:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: So the baby's one he was made out of the scarf material.
• 17:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: So it was a spanning animatronic little green baby with braces.
• 17:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: It was totally his vision that we, you know, that we created and he called one day and they said we want he wants to walk down the red carpet with this
• 17:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, all the guts, the motors, and the controllers were underneath the stage of the window.
• 17:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: So we had two and within three weeks, we had to take all of that and get it into the baby to figure out how to, you know, how to, how we get him to turn it on and off and all that stuff and say anyway, we figured it out and we got it to him.
• 17:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: uh... basically he would press a little button on the foot and it would you know the baby would come alive and then he would press another button and it would wave and it would you know look it look around uh... what was really great those he would interact with uh... the loop for looped program mm-hmm
• 18:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, it made it look like he, the baby was actually reacting to him and reacting to the crowd.
• 18:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: So it was really cool.
• 18:30
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm really proud of that one too.
• 18:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: That was a really neat project.
• 18:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: So we've done things with the baby and other things for him as well.
• 18:37
  [SPEAKER_03]: There's a YouTube video, I'll say, for, I'll link that in the show notes for anyone who wants to see the baby in action in an interview.
• 18:45
  [SPEAKER_03]: How heavy was the baby with all of the electronic guts inside?
• 18:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, not very heavy.
• 18:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
• 18:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: Less than 10 times.
• 18:53
  [SPEAKER_03]: Like a normal baby, wait.
• 18:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: Probably, I would say, yeah.
• 18:57
  [SPEAKER_03]: Okay, but you, as we've referenced so far, you do also work on the movie side, most recently, you did some work on Frankenstein, you were working with sculptor Mike Hill, and I know you did a lot of the animal effects regarding, I mean, spoiler for, especially this part of Frankenstein, but there's a point where wolves attack first sheep and then humans and then are beaten back by the creature.
• 19:26
  [SPEAKER_03]: Can you tell us a bit more about what exactly you did in that project?
• 19:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so Mike, Mike's a friend, and Mike is like one of the most brilliant sculptors in Hollywood, and creature designers, he was really kind of born to do this project.
• 19:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: He's a friend and colleague of Guillermo, and he worked with Guillermo and the shape of water on the creature, that creature.
• 19:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, Gamble asked him to do this work, and it was a lot of work, you know, lots of dead body parts, lots of dead bodies, lots of animal stuff, and so, you know, Mike reached out to a range of people, maybe one of them, and I guess, you know, I'm the dead animal guy of Hollywood, so that's why.
• 20:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: you know, because of the tax, you know, you get a little bit.
• 20:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, he's like, heck, do these animals and it's, it was sheep and some, some sled dogs and, oh, right, the huskies from the art side.
• 20:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
• 20:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, we, we had to basically
• 20:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: create these animals that were, you know, that they're current day animals, they're 1900s.
• 20:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: So the production did a lot of research and they had found animals similar and then we basically worked with them and copied those animals.
• 20:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: And, you know, then it became like time, like, okay, some of these animals really need to be kind of malled a little bit, what do you want?
• 21:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, so we were suggesting different things to bash in the heads, you know, on one of the hogs, the head is completely turned around to kind of homage to the excess, but, you know, that kind of thing, but, you know, it's like, well, what do you, you know, what is he, what does give him a one in this so, you know, I got it this little sketch, you know, Mike sent a little sketch from Guillermo with it.
• 21:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: of Ashton, Doghead, and I'm like, okay, can we just copy that?
• 21:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's like, I'm not really known for kind of gross or, you know, gory kind of of things.
• 21:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: I have, you know, we do more cute things or, but, you know, we did it.
• 21:42
  [SPEAKER_03]: And it was like, this secret life of pets cats, yeah.
• 21:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's visceral and it's, you know, those things get a reaction when you show them the people,
• 21:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: And it was an honor to be able to work on something with Mike for sure and definitely an honor to work on a Game of Project for sure.
• 22:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: So.
• 22:05
  [SPEAKER_03]: Right.
• 22:06
  [SPEAKER_03]: And how does because I think, I mean, I know that Gamma del Toro has a particular interest in practical effects, which is obviously why he's coming to people like you.
• 22:17
  [SPEAKER_03]: But I know that a lot of the animals were also finished with VFX.
• 22:21
  [SPEAKER_03]: Is, do you have a sense of how those were worked together?
• 22:24
  [SPEAKER_03]: Was there any VFX applied to your work as well?
• 22:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know,
• 22:30
  [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, I mean, CGI, of course, by that, yeah.
• 22:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I mean, I wasn't involved.
• 22:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: I pretty much, like, what I did, we just handed off.
• 22:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: I was super busy working on Epic Universe at that time, so I did offer to come to set, but, you know, we just basically sent everything.
• 22:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I'm not sure, like, how they work interacted with digital.
• 22:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: But I knew everything was in good hands, sending it to Mike, because Mike was going to make everything look great.
• 23:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: Make us look good.
• 23:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, today, when you work with visual effects, people, it's much more a collaboration than what it was before.
• 23:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: It was kind of when visual effects first started.
• 23:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: It was very competitive with practical effects.
• 23:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: And visual effects supervisors would come in and say, that doesn't look good.
• 23:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: We need to replace that today, like visual effects companies
• 23:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: because of competition and because of, you know, the budgets, they are much more open to they understand that they need practical effects to help them get done what they need to.
• 23:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, whenever it involves like something that is very close to a human or a touch or, you know, this or that, you know, they, it's a lot of practical effects.
• 23:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: A lot of time, they're a practical
• 23:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: that the effects are practical and you can't, you don't even know, it's pretty seamless.
• 23:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: And you know, I think also digital, you know, it's a tool.
• 24:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: They're both tools and smart directors know that, you know, you, you don't throw away tools, you use everything you can in your toolbox.
• 24:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: So digital effects were great for some shots and practical effects were great for other
• 24:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: a lot of times it's a combination.
• 24:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: And, you know, smart directors, smart cinematographers, know that and utilize it to its best effect.
• 24:34
  [SPEAKER_03]: What do you think are the biggest changes you've seen over the past 25 years you've been working in this industry in Hollywood?
• 24:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: In the makeup effects business, I mean, silicone had already been, you know, silicone had already been used in movies, and it was, they were going in that direction, but it had been perfected yet, and it's been perfected now, and now makeups are, you know, just the level of quality of makeups are amazing and suits.
• 25:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: as opposed to back in, you know, when I started, it was just kind of being figure.
• 25:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, that was high quality, but it wasn't, you know, not with the silicone.
• 25:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: It wasn't there yet.
• 25:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I have friends that I've met them when they were kids 12 and 13 during the stuff now, or Emmy award-winning makeup artists and Oscar-winning artists, that, you know, utilize the stuff, and it's pretty perfect.
• 25:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, to me, like, one of the best
• 25:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: the ping one makeup on Colin for the ping one.
• 25:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's amazing.
• 25:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, Mike did an amazing job on that makeup and it's it's flawless.
• 26:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, it looks good in every single light.
• 26:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: It looks good in every situation.
• 26:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: There's nothing that points to being fake at all to me.
• 26:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: So it's amazing.
• 26:23
  [SPEAKER_03]: You know where I learned most about Silicon, what little I know about it is that show that used to be on face off the competition show?
• 26:32
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, yeah.
• 26:33
  [SPEAKER_03]: I love to that show.
• 26:34
  [SPEAKER_03]: It's for anyone who doesn't know.
• 26:36
  [SPEAKER_03]: It's yeah, it's a reality competition show for special effects makeup artists, basically.
• 26:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
• 26:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that's a that was a fun show.
• 26:45
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I mean, because I just, I am a film fan, but when it is especially when it comes to that side of things, I know nothing about the technical side of it.
• 26:54
  [SPEAKER_03]: So it's so cool to see people at work and yeah, just learn about the difference, the pros and cons of the different materials that you might use.
• 27:04
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, things like that.
• 27:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I never really got that, you know, I was kind of more out.
• 27:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: Well, so when I first moved to Hollywood, I wanted to be a special effects makeup artist.
• 27:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: And so I started doing that.
• 27:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: I was a lot sculptor from most people.
• 27:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: And then when I went on my own, then I started, you know, being able to apply stuff.
• 27:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: And I learned quickly that I did not enjoy
• 27:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: the process on set of application.
• 27:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: I enjoyed it like and home and do it, but I didn't so you know, I worked for Jim Henson creature shop as well.
• 27:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: And I was I was much more tuned to that kind of thing, the puppets, the animatronics, stuff that like suits.
• 27:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: I didn't mind like, you know, setting people up in a suit, things like that, but
• 27:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: as far as like the application for daily basis is not it's intense now within my personality to do that because you're the first one on set and in your already it's already our early situation but you're the first one there you're watching at the whole day you're taking it off then you're going back to check and make sure that everything is ready for the next day and and plus your
• 28:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: not somebody who likes to be stuck in a situation.
• 28:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: I like to be able to come and go as I want.
• 28:29
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, and later on when I was doing makeups, I would just hire somebody else to do this stuff on set.
• 28:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: But I was much more tuned to puppeteering to the, or excuse me, the puppets, the animatronics, the suits kind of thing.
• 28:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, that's a big lesson.
• 28:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: You have to like kind of shift.
• 28:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: into what you're best at and what your interests where you're interested in because that's going to you're going to sustain the passion to where it's called industry.
• 29:05
  [SPEAKER_03]: two other movies that caught my eye that you worked on was, one was the Steven Spielberg's war of the world, so we're talking not the new one, but the good one.
• 29:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know what that animals, more than animals, more than animals, more than animals.
• 29:19
  [SPEAKER_03]: Okay, and then more recently, five nights of Freddy's, did you work on the animatronics there?
• 29:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: So that was not, I did not work on the movie, I worked on a YouTuber, this is kind of crazy, a YouTuber contacted me, his name is Sox, and famous, if you're into gaming, he's got a, he's a famous YouTuber who does gaming, he wanted to recreate the entire restaurant of
• 29:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: so he did and he wanted to debut it like as soon as the movie came out so so we had about eight weeks to create all the characters for him full suits full animatronic heads well thing and we did it we got it it looked pretty great and you know that that uh YouTube video has gotten about um I guess 4647 million views since then and
• 30:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, I joke with my friends to actually work on the movie because you know, they were working on the same time I was working on it on this and I was like, I, you know, I think more people have seen our And I'm trying to get our figures, then your figures, you know, so I mean believe me, I really do think more people have seen that than that actual movie.
• 30:40
  [SPEAKER_03]: So, um, so yes, I'm going to link it in the show notes also for anyone who's curious.
• 30:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
• 30:47
  [SPEAKER_03]: What would you say is something that you think people misunderstand about your work?
• 30:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: Well, I always get like, wow, it must be so much fun to do that, you know.
• 31:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, and it's like, yes, you know, we enjoy doing the work, but it is, and it's work, it's hard work, it's dirty work.
• 31:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: And I think there's a, I guess there is a
• 31:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: an idea of glamour, and I guess it's associated with entertainment or Hollywood, there's nothing really that glamorous about it, it's just like any other work, but some people or doctors and they have passion about that work and we have passion about our work, but it's definitely not, I don't consider any kind of glamorous occupation or fun hobby type
• 31:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: occupation.
• 31:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's hard work.
• 31:51
  [SPEAKER_03]: Right.
• 31:51
  [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, would you recommend it to someone who is as passionate as you work growing up?
• 31:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: I think that you have to, yes, if you have the desire and the passion for this kind of work, definitely go into it.
• 32:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, I always tell people you have to be a self-starter.
• 32:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I guess you're a method of learning so people will need to be taught the classroom situation is better.
• 32:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: Other people are more self taught.
• 32:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: They teach themselves and this kind of leans themselves towards more self taught people like people who will tinker and figure things out.
• 32:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, now my studio now is comprised like 50%.
• 32:40
  [SPEAKER_01]: I shouldn't say 50%.
• 32:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's a little more, it's still like creative people like artists, designers, fabricators, but we also have a full engineering department because the mechanisms and the robots we create have to last, have to run for 16 hours a day and they have to be, for 20 years, they have to run.
• 33:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: So we're building things that are as practical and resilient as cars.
• 33:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: So that required me to have a whole engineering team.
• 33:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: And that kind of is what separates Romair Studios from the other companies that you know, in movie business, you can create a thing that looks and moves really well.
• 33:29
  [SPEAKER_01]: But it doesn't have to last beyond the production.
• 33:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: days or whatever.
• 33:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: And you have people that are fixing it constantly on set.
• 33:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: Our stuff has to be engineered.
• 33:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: So it's a higher expense and in much more detailed design.
• 33:54
  [UNKNOWN]: Some of the things we take two years to build.
• 33:56
  [SPEAKER_01]: So as opposed to, as opposed to two months,
• 34:02
  [SPEAKER_03]: And if you look back on your career, what's the project of yours that you hope people will still be talking about another 25 years from now?
• 34:11
  [SPEAKER_03]: And what's one that you wish had gotten more attention?
• 34:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, I don't.
• 34:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: I don't need to have a, like, leave a whole legacy.
• 34:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: I don't, you know, I work itself.
• 34:28
  [SPEAKER_03]: It doesn't have to be your name, but there's still, like, that is such a cool piece of work.
• 34:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I mean, you know, I'm glad that the things that we, I mean, everything that we've done, I'm glad that it's still out there.
• 34:40
  [SPEAKER_01]: And there's not one in any particular, oh, there is.
• 34:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: There is a particular thing that I'd like to see continue.
• 34:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: And it's a personal project, my hometown, like a small town in Louisiana, it's known for the capital of the Shrumping industry back in the day, because it's right on the Gulf of Mexico.
• 35:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: So there's actually a Shrumpo that's in the middle of the main street, like up on the neutral ground.
• 35:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: And it's a famous thing in every year they decorated for Christmas.
• 35:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: So it's got Santa and it had rain here and people will go and watch the lights go on.
• 35:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: And it's been a tradition since I guess the early 1950s.
• 35:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I decided and it got really, it started getting pretty decrepit.
• 35:40
  [SPEAKER_01]: not that great and you know that the reindeer not that it was too reindeer so I'm like I am going to donate a new Christmas display to the city my friend was the mayor and so we talked about it and he was all for it and I said and then we started talking about it like let's make it a cage and Christmas display
• 36:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: So instead of I know I saw pictures of this okay, so yes, so instead of we're at since that of reindeer, we create a white Alligators because those white alligators that you see that Lechistic alligators those were discovered very close to my hometown as well, so You know, we we created those and we put crabs on top of their alligators heads for antlers
• 36:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, and that's called a rain gator, that's a creation.
• 36:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, this thing got tension, you know, once it went up, this thing got attention from all over the world.
• 36:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: And it's like there's memes now created around this out-white alligator, this rain gator.
• 36:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, I'm really, really proud of that, and people, kids love it, people love it, and people come from all over the place to go see it.
• 36:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: So that's I would say that's that's one of the things I'm most proud of.
• 37:03
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I looks really cool in the photos.
• 37:05
  [SPEAKER_03]: I'll make sure to share that in the show notes as well.
• 37:08
  [SPEAKER_03]: Okay.
• 37:09
  [SPEAKER_03]: Do you have any favorites of any projects that you look at that your colleagues have done?
• 37:15
  [SPEAKER_03]: And you think that's really cool.
• 37:17
  [SPEAKER_03]: They've really added something to the industry.
• 37:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: I mean my favorite is
• 37:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: my favorite will always be the T-Rat.
• 37:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: Well, jaws, of course, the the shark.
• 37:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: But as a kid, that blew me away, but the T-Rex scene in Jurassic Park or the, you know, all of that is still one of my favorite.
• 37:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: I think it's, you know, it's right when digital effects were coming, you know, they were doing
• 37:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: practical, the mechanical dinosaurs were the height of animatronics at the time, and I think the way that Spielberg blended those two together, it's actually the show is actually much more animatronic based than the digital.
• 38:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know why it's aged so well, I don't know, you know, because the digital effects were so good, the way they felt it, he had all this background in the stop motion, and he knew the weight of how things should move, and all of that, and it just
• 38:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: everything moved well and it was all blended well um it was just a home it was like you know like everybody has like one or two home runs you know usually one and now in their lifetime and I think that was like their home runs and they just killed it on all of it every single thing was great so um that's yeah that's it then that always still blows me away
• 39:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: That's a good question.
• 39:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know.
• 39:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, to me, I'm excited every time we get something interesting.
• 39:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: We actually receive something yesterday that we're going to redo a classic attraction.
• 39:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: And obviously, I can't talk about it.
• 39:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: But yeah, so there's a lot of really fun things.
• 39:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: And I really hope we do that.
• 39:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: a lot of fun things in it, you know, in a couple of years, I'll be able to talk about it better right now, I can't.
• 39:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: But it's something based on a movie from when I was a kid and that I really loved and it's a full redo and I'm looking forward to diving into that.
• 40:07
  [SPEAKER_03]: Okay, siding, exciting.
• 40:10
  [SPEAKER_03]: Is there anything that you want to share, get off your chest about your career, about this type of work in general?
• 40:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: No, just, you know, I would say that I'm just at this point very grateful that I have been able to work with such great people.
• 40:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: but also being able to as a boss now and as a sort of a, I guess I'm sort of the creative director and leader of this team, like I have just an amazing team right now of artists and mechanical designers and engineers and it's so much fun to be able to work with them and collaborate and create the things we do.
• 41:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: Um, so I'm just, uh, I'm just grateful for that and, um, I want to continue it for quite a while.
• 41:17
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
• 41:17
  [SPEAKER_03]: Good.
• 41:18
  [SPEAKER_03]: Uh, be watching what you do next.
• 41:20
  [SPEAKER_03]: Um, I'm going to link your, your website in the show notes also for anyone who, uh, would like to learn more about your work, but do you have any tips for people who would like to learn more about VFX in general?
• 41:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: Again, it's about a self-starter, so there's tons of information now online that you can look at some of which is good somewhere which is bad, but you know if you have an eye I would say like if you want to do something like this find the best person find the person that you want to be like and then try to connect with them and and this probably make me people.
• 42:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: try to connect with them and learn from the best, you know.
• 42:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: Right.
• 42:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: So people are willing to share their time and energy with you.
• 42:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: Don't, you know, I had a choice back.
• 42:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: I remember back in the day.
• 42:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: There was like, okay, I could learn from Dick Smith.
• 42:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: But there's also this course.
• 42:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: It was some makeup school.
• 42:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: And, you know, I looked at the ads and it was like, all the, all the, all the,
• 42:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: make-ups in this school, they looked terrible, but they were, you know, or I could learn from the best, you know, I could learn from the best makeup artist in the world.
• 42:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: Obviously, the choice was obviously there to learn from the best, right?
• 42:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: So that's what I would say, like be very discerning among who's advice you take and who's who you learn from, because you can learn a lot
• 42:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: I would say I'll just don't give up, just keep trying, you have to when you do something the first, I always tell people the first thing you do are going to be terrible and you have to do about 10 shitty things before you can even get to one that's halfway decent.
• 43:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: So you have to work your way through all of that to get to something that's pretty good.
• 43:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: Because that makes sense.
• 43:24
  [SPEAKER_03]: So yeah, we don't know, don't be this good or yeah.
• 43:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, don't be discouraged.
• 43:29
  [SPEAKER_01]: Just keep working at it.
• 43:31
  [SPEAKER_03]: Right.
• 43:32
  [SPEAKER_03]: And if you want to learn makeup tips without without committing to the career, watch something like fake face off.
• 43:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: Sure, absolutely.
• 43:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: Or there's like a stand Winston school.
• 43:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: They have video courses.
• 43:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: You can sit there and watch.
• 43:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: They have so many different top people teaching.
• 43:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: uh the on these videos and you can just um you know just get that and watch them and it's really neat.
• 43:58
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah yeah it's really I'm I'm so glad also that um we live in an age where we're getting more attention paid to the craftsmanship that goes on.
• 44:10
  [SPEAKER_03]: behind camera or behind the scenes at an amusement park.
• 44:16
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, just that there is the appreciation and having the appreciation for these skills also allows people to, yeah, learn them and pass them on and then iterate new versions.
• 44:30
  [SPEAKER_01]: Right, right, exactly.
• 44:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: There's always some kid out there that, you know, just blows your way, how good they are.
• 44:40
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, this comes out of nowhere, you know, yeah, and it's great to see also in general that it does seem I know that there's still a lot of emphasis on CGI, but you hear a lot of top directors like Guillermo del Toro Robert Egerzo, the like who are emphasizing the practical effects, and I know it's a constant discussion on the Laura Hound's network that people notice the difference.
• 45:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: Well, there's something about practical, there's something about, you know, like our performance, you know, that sometimes the mistakes are the best part of a performance.
• 45:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: Right.
• 45:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: Like I did a short film, you know, 12 or 15 years ago.
• 45:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: And, you know, the things that come out of that, like improvisation at the moment, like,
• 45:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: that happen, that makes that whole scene better.
• 45:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: And that's what you get from live practical effects.
• 45:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: Like there's a move or a visceral that or that, that just make it.
• 45:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: And when you're dealing with digital, everything is fine with the fine tooth comb.
• 45:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: And it's all a very planned and deliberate.
• 46:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: And it's really hard to get that.
• 46:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: improvisational feel.
• 46:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: To me, this is my opinion.
• 46:11
  [SPEAKER_03]: It's too perfect often.
• 46:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's too perfect.
• 46:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's to, you know, it just, there's no way to have that happy accident.
• 46:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know what I mean?
• 46:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: Right.
• 46:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, and, and, you know, digital people might disagree with me, but that's just my feeling.
• 46:29
  [SPEAKER_01]: Now, you know, when they do vocab.
• 46:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: I guess with performances, they can get some of that.
• 46:35
  [SPEAKER_03]: Well, I think I think it's, I have also someone who has spoken on this network before Hildi Hjalmerson, he's a director of animation at the Blender Institute, and he, he'll always talk about that the mocap suits, they,
• 46:56
  [SPEAKER_03]: You know, they give you good information, good reference information, but it really takes the human touch to go in, you know, he talks about how he often has to distort the digital image so that it's not, um, so that it's slightly unnatural because making it slightly unnatural makes it look more natural.
• 47:14
  [SPEAKER_03]: Right.
• 47:15
  [SPEAKER_03]: And also just adding that like snappiness to the movements and things like that where it can be very floaty with mocap.
• 47:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: Right.
• 47:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: And, you know, we kind of deal with that too.
• 47:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: animatronic figures this you know one kind of one company that really does like very floaty you know kind of it's it's very smooth and everybody thinks that's oh that's really cool but you know try to you have to try to put some of that jerkyness back into it because you know we snap around a lot so you know I I
• 47:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: that kind of animation, if we actually are doing the animation.
• 47:58
  [SPEAKER_03]: Right.
• 47:59
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I think the people often strive for perfection, and you made a really good point that what makes a performance industry interesting is the imperfections.
• 48:12
  [SPEAKER_03]: Right.
• 48:13
  [SPEAKER_03]: The humanity, the least for them.
• 48:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, exactly, because it reveals a little truth.
• 48:18
  [SPEAKER_03]: Right, yeah, absolutely.
• 48:21
  [SPEAKER_03]: Well, thank you so much for this excellent interesting discussion and for walking us through your career and your industry and giving us all that insight.
• 48:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, great.
• 48:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you.
• 48:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: It was a lot of fun.
• 48:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you for asking me.
• 48:35
  [SPEAKER_03]: Thank you again to leave a mare for all your many insights from a very very career and practical effects.
• 48:42
  [SPEAKER_03]: I hope that you listeners enjoy that conversation as much as I did.
• 48:47
  [SPEAKER_03]: I'll keep this ultra short, but next up in the Oscar series, Brandon from Short Stick blog and podcast will be joining me for a dive into the three short film categories.
• 49:00
  [SPEAKER_03]: Followed shortly thereafter by an episode with our own Lisa aka Red Zippy, who is bringing her theatrical background to play to talk to me about the production design costume and hair and makeup categories, which are actually the thing are some of the most exciting categories this year.
• 49:17
  [SPEAKER_03]: Poor one out though for Wicked for Goodwill definitely bring that up as well in a few other misses.
• 49:23
  [SPEAKER_03]: If you haven't yet, check out the Oscar nomination reactions episode that David and I did recently.
• 49:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: In addition to giving you the whole lay of the land for the nominees this season, at the end of that, I also laid out the rest of that series.
• 49:36
  [SPEAKER_03]: And of course, we have going on right now, weekly dips of toes into the pit.
• 49:43
  [SPEAKER_03]: We've got a cross-feed bananza going on for a night of the seven kingdoms, which you
• 49:52
  [SPEAKER_03]: and radioactive ramlings are covering fallout.
• 49:57
  [SPEAKER_03]: Never mind the music is always like clockwork, keeping their psychology meets music episodes coming out.
• 50:04
  [SPEAKER_03]: You can find all of those through the link tree in the show noted and explore the other podcasts on the network, including my own wool shift dust and the Star Wars Cannon Timeline podcast.
• 50:15
  [SPEAKER_03]: Laura Hound's feeds supercast and Patreon subscribers.
• 50:19
  [SPEAKER_03]: You just got an episode for the January cold comfort cinema month about Fargo.
• 50:24
  [SPEAKER_03]: And coming up shortly after this, you'll get another episode with David Bryan and Lisa doing a deep dive into Diane Keaton's filmography ending and our selecting the movies that are up for vote for next month's eleventhsies for Diane Keaton Month.
• 50:41
  [SPEAKER_03]: If you are interested in finding out more about these bonus episodes, plus how you can get ad free access to all of our episodes, then you can find the supercast and Patreon links also in the link tree, and also you can find links to the Discord where we would love for you to join us in conversations on all of these topics and more.
• 51:02
  [SPEAKER_03]: Or please send any thoughts or feedback you have to lower hounds at the lowerhounds.com.
• 51:07
  [SPEAKER_03]: You'll find that link to the show notes.
• 51:10
  [SPEAKER_03]: Just thank you all so much for listening.
• 51:12
  [SPEAKER_03]: If you enjoyed this episode, please do share it with anyone else.
• 51:16
  [SPEAKER_03]: Who do you think might enjoy these insights as well?
• 51:18
  [SPEAKER_03]: If you'd like to leave a nice rating and review, wherever you're listening, that would be a huge help as well.
• 51:24
  [SPEAKER_03]: But just thank you in general for listening.
• 51:27
  [SPEAKER_03]: We are happy to have you with us.
• 51:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: As always, of course, we have to close out with our special thank yous, thank you to our Discord server boosters, Aaron K. Teller the Thriller Duke 71, Athena Agilea, Lestu, Nancy M. Ghost to Partition, Radioactive Richard and Andreon.
• 51:43
  [SPEAKER_03]: Thank you to all of our listeners, but especially to our subscribers who keep this show going.
• 51:47
  [SPEAKER_03]: Most of all to our highest tier, the loremasters, Samarche and Michael G. Michelle E. S. C. Peter O'H.
• 51:53
  [SPEAKER_03]: Nancy M. Dube 71, Brian 863, Frederick H. Sarah L. Garzzi, Andreby Kwangu, Nathan T. Sub-Zero, Aaron K. Dallie V, Mothership 61, Naurals, Kathy W. Listou, Jeffrey B. Alisa U.
• 52:08
  [SPEAKER_03]: Ben B. Scott F. Steven N. Julia F. Kolly S. Umariel Paul K. Rocky Zim Jessica A.
• 52:15
  [SPEAKER_03]: Red Zippy, the TCS Dopamine E. Catch it.
• 52:19
  [SPEAKER_03]: Eleanor Mrs. Tennant AC Wilson E. L. I. W. Cassie K. Chummerini, Katilla Josh Liu, Payton P. D. X. Corey G. And Always Last, Adrienne.
• 52:33
  [SPEAKER_03]: Thank you.
• 52:33
  [SPEAKER_03]: Thank you all.
• 52:35
  [SPEAKER_03]: Talk to you again soon.
• 52:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: The Lower Hound's podcast is produced in published by the Lower Hounds.
• 52:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: You can send questions and feedback and voicemails at the Lower Hound's.com slash contact.
• 52:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: Get early and add free access to all Lower Hound's podcasts at patreon.com slash the Lower Hounds.
• 52:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: Any opinions stated are ours personally and do not reflect the opinion of or belong to any employers or other entities.
• 52:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thanks for listening.