Reminder: “Dissecting Horror” Continues TONIGHT at 6 PM (PST) with Facebook-Live Special Effects Panel!
The next installment of the “Dissecting Horror” digital panel series will take place TONIGHT, Wednesday, May 27th at 6 pm (PST) and focus on the effects of some of your favorite horror projects. Panelists include Heath Hood (special effects coordinator for Universal’s Halloween & Halloween Kills), Marcus Taormina (visual effects supervisor for Netflix’s Bright & Bird Box), Jeremy Hays (special effects supervisor for Sony Pictures’ Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood, Warner Bros. Pictures’ Doctor Sleep) and Jason Piccioni (visual effects supervisor for FX’s American Horror Story and Hulu’s Castle Rock). Dread Central co-editor Joshua Millican will be moderating.
Dread Central and Impact24 launched the “Dissecting Horror” digital panel series April 15th with a focus on horror film scores. Panelists included composers Ronen Landa (Dark Sky Film’s 1BR), Devin Burrows (IFC’s The Wretched), Christian Davis (Vertical Entertainment’s Behind You) and Rafaël Leloup (IFC Films’ The Other Lamb). The second installment of the series took place May 6th and spotlighted the stunts of some of your favorite genre projects. Panelists included Emmy-winning stunt coordinator Hiro Koda (Netflix’s Stranger Things), stunt double and coordinator Jahnel Curfman (Netflix’s Bird Box), stunt coordinator Harry Dakanalis (Universal Pictures’ The Invisible Man) and stunt coordinator and double Jennifer Badger (The WB’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer).
Related Article: Dread Central & Impact24’s “Dissecting Horror” Stunt Performer Panel / Virtual Q&A Now Available to Stream
“Dissecting Horror” will be streamed on Dread Central’s Facebook page through Facebook Live (as well as other streaming platforms). The panel will also be made available on our official YouTube channel.
ABOUT THE PANELISTS
Jeremy Hays (Special Effects Supervisor)
With 25 years of experience in live-action special effects, Jeremy Hays has honed his skills as a special effects supervisor. His most recent work includes supervising special effects for 20th Century Studios’ The Call of the Wildstarring Harrison Ford; the famous Leonardo DiCaprio flame thrower scene in Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time… In Hollywood; Netflix’s Dolemite Is My Name, starring Eddie Murphy; and Justin Simien’s 2020 Sundance premiere Bad Hair. He also supervised special effects (additional photography) on Warner Bros.’ Doctor Sleep and has also collaborated with notable directors such as Michael Bay, David Fincher, Damien Chazelle, Gary Marshall, and Antoine Fuqua.
Hays specializes in mechanical, pyrotechnical, and atmospheric special effects. These range from flipping cars and fire explosions to weather effects and making people fly.
In The Call of the Wild, Hays was tasked with creating 1800s, gold rush era, Yukon Canadian winter environments in 90 degree, Southern California desert conditions using real ice and various biodegradable and environmentally safe fake snow products. The film included three large water features: an iced-over river in which a character breaks through the ice; an underwater filming tank with water movement and a ceiling of ice; and a large section of a flowing river near a cabin for Harrison Ford to pan for gold and canoe down.
Currently, Hays is designing the Disney series, Just Roll With It, and Hillbilly Elegy, directed by Ron Howard. He will soon begin work on Martin Scorsese’s new film, Killers of the Flower Moon, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro.
Heath Hood (Special Effects Coordinator)
Heath Hood is a Special Effects Coordinator known for some really gnarly pyrotechnics and practical fire effects. He started his career in motion picture and television doing extras work, bit parts, stand-in work, and stunts. He spent so much time on set instead of school his parents shipped him off to boarding school. After he graduated, he went straight back into the film biz. Heath landed his first special effects job on The Batman Stunt Show in Atlanta as a stage manager and head pyrotechnician.
After spending nearly three decades working on set, Heath knows how to balance the pressures of production with the Director’s vision while delivering the “look” within the time constraints of the shooting schedule.
Heath has worked on productions around the world. He has run company on Deadpool 2, Tomorrowland, Preacher Season 1, Twilight Saga Breaking Dawn Part 1 & 2 and Percy Jackson Sea of Monsters. He’s lent his skills as a pyrotechnician to Fast 5 and Fast 8, Ride Along, Unstoppable, and Lone Survivor. His most recent work includes coordinating Halloween and Halloween Kills, Mr. Mercedes Seasons 1 & 2, HBO’s The Righteous Gemstones and soon will be coordinating the final installment of the Halloween trilogy Halloween Ends.
Marcus Taormina (Visual Effects Supervisor)
Marcus Taormina has worked in the Visual Effects industry for the past decade, on some of the highest-profile film franchises, including The Amazing Spider-Man, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and The Fast & The Furious. In 2017, Marcus received a main title credit as a Visual Effects Supervisor for his work on the Netflix feature film, Bright. In 2019, Marcus had the privilege of working aside Academy Award winning director Susanne Bier on the film Bird Box in which he was the principal architect both creatively and technically for all 520 visual effects shots in the final cut of the film which consisted of complex character design and development, digital set extensions and matte paintings as well as myriad complex FX simulations and effects that populate almost every scene in the film. Marcus is currently working as the Visual Effects Supervisor on Zack Synder’s debut Netflix feature entitled Army of the Dead.
Jason Piccioni (Visual Effects Supervisor)
Jason Piccioni is a VES and Emmy Award-winning Visual Effects Supervisor who has been part of the FuseFX team since 2011. Since joining, he has supervised some of FuseFX’s highest-profile television projects, including American Horror Story, American Crime Story, Barry, Snowfall, and Manhattan, as well as a wide variety of pilots and features. Most recently, Jason supervised the 2-year run of Castle Rock for Bad Robot and HULU.
Prior to joining Fuse, Jason spent 20 years working in features, beginning his visual effects career in 1992 at Dream Quest Images, where he worked with the miniature department and the company’s proprietary real-time motion control systems. Jason’s feature credits include The Crow, The Mask, Mars Attacks!, Doctor Dolittle, X-Men 2, The Dukes of Hazzard, The Amazing Spider-Man, Alice in Wonderland, and Sinister. Jason has also directed 2nd units on multiple projects, including The Town that Dreaded Sundown, American Horror Story, Gang Related, and Castle Rock.
Jason is a member of the Visual Effects Society, the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, and the Directors Guild of America. His broad range of experience gives him great depth to draw upon to implement creative, effective, story-driven solutions.
The panel will be moderated by Yours Truly.
About Impact24 PR:
Impact24 PR is dedicated to capturing the spotlight for the talent behind-the-camera and behind-the-curtain. From Hollywood to Broadway and beyond, our agency offers a full range of services including public relations strategies, media outreach, social networking, awards campaigns and event programming.
Based in Los Angeles, we are a team of passionate and experienced communications experts who shape and define the public profiles of many of the industry’s leading creative artists, including composers, directors, costume designers, cinematographers, production designers, music supervisors, makeup artists, VFX, VR/AR and more.
We pride ourselves on strategically elevating each client’s personal and professional brand in alignment with their objectives, identity and persona. With thousands of print publications, millions of blogs and billions of social media interactions, we guide our clients through the complex world of entertainment with an effective, positive and results-driven approach.
Have you been enjoying our “Dissecting Horror” virtual panels? Will you be tuning in to our special FX panel tonight at 6 PM (PST)? Let us know in the comments below or on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram! You can also carry on the convo with me personally on Twitter @josh_millican.
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