In Memoriam: Stanley Winston, 1946-2008
Jun. 16th, 2008 04:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thatcrazycajunIf you enjoyed the films in the Alien, Terminator and Jurassic Park franchises, or any of a few dozen other SF, fantasy and horror films made you sit up and go "Holy crap, how'd they do that?!?", one of the people you have to thank for that special-effects and makeup magic was Stan Winston. His celluloid wizardry filled even non-genre hits like Pearl Harbor and the now-landmark TV miniseries Roots.
Stan died last night of multiple myeloma after suffering with it for seven years. Thankfully, he was surrounded by his loved ones at the end, and my heart goes out to his wife Karen, his son and daughter and the rest of their families. Our favorite form of entertainment is the poorer for his loss...but ever so much the richer for the work he leaves behind—not to mention the legions of FX specialists who trained under and/or learned from him, and the industry-leading studio he founded which bears his name.
Some of what he did can be done much more easily with computers these days, it's true. But the old-fashioned techniques Mr. Winston pioneered and/or perfected still possess a certain indefinable wonder that no mouse-jockey or server farm can ever duplicate. On behalf of millions of mesmerized moviegoers, goodbye and thank you, sir.
Stan died last night of multiple myeloma after suffering with it for seven years. Thankfully, he was surrounded by his loved ones at the end, and my heart goes out to his wife Karen, his son and daughter and the rest of their families. Our favorite form of entertainment is the poorer for his loss...but ever so much the richer for the work he leaves behind—not to mention the legions of FX specialists who trained under and/or learned from him, and the industry-leading studio he founded which bears his name.
Some of what he did can be done much more easily with computers these days, it's true. But the old-fashioned techniques Mr. Winston pioneered and/or perfected still possess a certain indefinable wonder that no mouse-jockey or server farm can ever duplicate. On behalf of millions of mesmerized moviegoers, goodbye and thank you, sir.
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no subject
Date: 2008-06-17 03:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-06-17 01:01 pm (UTC)Hadn't heard a word about this, but then again, I didn't get home from work yesterday until this morning.