好莱坞小型工作室创作特效

Small Hollywood Studio Creates Special Effects

好莱坞小型工作室创作特效

 

Companies like this often have quirky names. This one is Defaultmind studios, meant to suggest that creative thinking is the standard here.

 

Surfboards are mounted in the hallway, so the two avid¹ surfers on the staff can head to the nearby beach when they need a break. The rest of the time, they sit in front of computer screens, working at the junction² of high-tech³ and entertainment.

 

Iranian-born Foad Afshari is the company's president. Just 23 years old, he started this business working out of his home, and later moved to an office in a converted warehouse⁴. It was done on a shoestring⁵ budget.

 

Foad Afshari: A lot of it is my own money that I've saved up, or called on friends and family. A lot of it is us and just work that comes in and funds the studio.

 

With four full-time⁶ workers, who are as much partners as employees, this small production studio expands as work comes in, using outside contractors⁷ when they are needed. A fifth staff member, a veteran Hollywood composer, will soon come on board.

 

Mr. Afshari shows a visitor a room full of computers, which is the heart of this virtual world. It also expands and contracts, based on the needs of the client, and provides the digital muscle for the high-tech enterprise.

 

Foad Afshari: We go anywhere from having 12 computers to 50 or 100 computers, depending on what projects we're working on and what they need us to accomplish in a certain timeframe.

 

The company works on films, television shows and commercials. Recent corporate⁸ clients have included the sporting goods company Nike and the hair-care firm Vidal Sassoon.

 

Artist Aristomenis Tsirbas, known to his friends as Meni, shows a whimsical production that he made to demonstrate his company's skills to clients. The short animated⁹ film called The Freak tracks the adventures of a small creature in a futuristic city. The video shows potential clients what the company can do, and has won a number of awards at international video festivals, including the Sundance Festival in Park City, Utah.

 

Foad Afshari: It was a chance for me to do whatever I wanted, so I just put my heart in it and decided¹⁰ to do something a little personal.

 

A full-length animated feature is now in production.

 

Small companies like this rely on word-of-mouth advertising¹¹ to build a network of contacts in the entertainment industry. A producer may need just a few seconds of animation¹², and if the results are good, he'll ask for more on a future project.

 

Foad Afshari says each job brings a new challenge.

 

Foad Afshari: One of the projects we're about to start is just adding a hot-air balloon to three commercials, and it's about 90 seconds worth of animation. We'll get reference material as far as what this real hot-air balloon looks like, and we'll take that and create a 3-D model of that.

 

He says the 90-second production could take a few days, or weeks, to finish.

High-profile companies like Pixar are known for their special effects and computer animation. But Foad Afshari says small firms like Defaultmind do much of the special effects work for the major studios, and many provide products for a related industry that is seeing tremendous growth: computer games.

 

Mike O'Sullivan, VOA news, Los Angeles.

 

注释：

quirky [5kw\:ki] adj. 离奇的

surfboard [5s\:fbR:d] n. 冲浪板

shoestring [5Fu:striN] n. 零钱，零星资金

commercial [kE5mE:FEl] n. 广告

whimsical [5wimzikEl] adj. 古怪的

futuristic [fju:tFE5ristik] adj. 未来派的

potential [pE5tenF(E)l] adj. 潜在的

high-profile 鲜明特征，典型

tremendous [tri5mendEs]adj. 极大的，巨大的

1 avid   

adj.热心的；贪婪的；渴望的；劲头十足的

参考例句：

• He is rich,but he is still avid of more money.他很富有,但他还想贪图更多的钱。
• She was avid for praise from her coach.那女孩渴望得到教练的称赞。

2 junction   

n.连接，接合；交叉点，接合处，枢纽站

参考例句：

• There's a bridge at the junction of the two rivers.两河的汇合处有座桥。
• You must give way when you come to this junction.你到了这个路口必须让路。

3 high-tech   

adj.高科技的

参考例句：

• The economy is in the upswing which makes high-tech services in more demand too.经济在蓬勃发展，这就使对高科技服务的需求量也在加大。
• The quest of a cure for disease with high-tech has never ceased. 人们希望运用高科技治疗疾病的追求从未停止过。

4 warehouse   

n.仓库；vt.存入仓库

参考例句：

• We freighted the goods to the warehouse by truck.我们用卡车把货物运到仓库。
• The manager wants to clear off the old stocks in the warehouse.经理想把仓库里积压的存货处理掉。

5 shoestring   

n.小额资本；adj.小本经营的

参考例句：

• In the early years,the business was run on a shoestring.早年，这家店铺曾是小本经营。
• How can I take the best possible digital pictures on a shoestring budget?怎样用很小投资拍摄最好的数码照片？

6 full-time   

adj.满工作日的或工作周的，全时间的

参考例句：

• A full-time job may be too much for her.全天工作她恐怕吃不消。
• I don't know how she copes with looking after her family and doing a full-time job.既要照顾家庭又要全天工作，我不知道她是如何对付的。

7 contractors   

n.（建筑、监造中的）承包人( contractor的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• We got estimates from three different contractors before accepting the lowest. 我们得到3个承包商的报价后，接受了最低的报价。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Contractors winning construction jobs had to kick back 2 per cent of the contract price to the mafia. 赢得建筑工作的承包商得抽出合同价格的百分之二的回扣给黑手党。 来自《简明英汉词典》

8 corporate   

adj.共同的，全体的；公司的，企业的

参考例句：

• This is our corporate responsibility.这是我们共同的责任。
• His corporate's life will be as short as a rabbit's tail.他的公司的寿命是兔子尾巴长不了。

9 animated   

adj.生气勃勃的，活跃的，愉快的

参考例句：

• His observations gave rise to an animated and lively discussion.他的言论引起了一场气氛热烈而活跃的讨论。
• We had an animated discussion over current events last evening.昨天晚上我们热烈地讨论时事。

10 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

11 advertising   

n.广告业；广告活动 a.广告的；广告业务的

参考例句：

• Can you give me any advice on getting into advertising? 你能指点我如何涉足广告业吗?
• The advertising campaign is aimed primarily at young people. 这个广告宣传运动主要是针对年轻人的。

12 animation   

n.活泼，兴奋，卡通片／动画片的制作

参考例句：

• They are full of animation as they talked about their childhood.当他们谈及童年的往事时都非常兴奋。
• The animation of China made a great progress.中国的卡通片制作取得很大发展。