Paula Karsh

Paula Karsh grew up in Pittsburg and earned a Master's degree in Education. She later moved to California with her husband, who was enrolled at Stanford in their film program. She spent some time teaching and later found a job working at a film production company where Lucasfilm was one of her first clients. This later led to an opportunity to come to ILM and work on their Production Services team.

Paula worked as the Head of Production Services for 27 years. She has an amazing story and insight into the needs of a visual effects and film production company. When Dennis Muren calls you in the morning and wants a dead turkey vulture to study the way the wing moves for Dragonslayer, and he needs it by that afternoon, Paula is the one who can get you what you need. Her work, and the work of countless others behind the scenes helped make possible so many of the films you love. While she never won and Oscar, her and her team's work at ILM made it all possible with their critically important work.

Post ILM, Paula worked doing hospice care, and also as a volunteer firefighter. Paula is an amazing human being and it was amazing to catch up with her and hear her story.

Paula Karsh

Scott Squires

Scott Squires grew up in Indiana. As a kid he built his own microscope and was fascinated with bugs and ants. He worked for the local paper as a photographer in high school and was always interested in filmmaking. He travelled out to California shortly after high school and would up with a job opportunity working on Close Encounters of the Third Kind where he helped develop the “cloud tank”.

Scott worked at ILM for 20 years where he served as Visual Effects Supervisor and directed multiple commercials and ride films. Scott was also the ILM CTO during the transition to digital.

He has had 3 Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Nominations for Visual Effects - The Mask, Dragonheart, & The Phantom Menace. He also received an Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Scientific and Engineering Award for Pioneering Work in Film Input Scanning. 

For the last 4 years, he Co-Founded and was CTO as well as Creative Director at Pixvana, a company specializing in making cloud tools to create the highest quality 360-degree videos for interactive VR use. Scott directed several special VR projects including The Play for the Holodome at the Seattle MPOP.

He has co-founded and helped run 3 companies: a visual effects company (Dream Quest– later sold to Disney), a software company based on the Commotion roto and paint software Scott wrote in C++ (Puffin Designs – later sold to Avid), and a virtual reality company (Pixvana) with complete cloud processing and streaming.

Squires is a member of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences and is a Visual Effects Society Fellow. He is a Director of Photography in the International Cinematographers Guild. He was a co-editor and writer on the Visual Effects Handbook and holds 3 patents for special video processes.

Scott’s boundless curiosity and enthusiasm for creative problem solving has propelled him forward throughout his life and made him an industry pioneer of the highest order. His kind and quiet unflappable demeanor, his willingness to share, and his overall good nature make him unique among luminaries of visual effects. It was a real honor and pleasure to chat with Scott about his career, past, present, and future.

Scott shooting a wedge slate of the Mothership for Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

Scott with the Hunt For Red October VFX crew

Scott with Jim Carrey shooting The Mask

On location for Dragonheart.

Dragonheart publicity still

Dragonheart publicity still

Shooting the HP Knievel spot

shooting another HP commercial

Barbara Townsend

Barbara Townsend was born in Florida, spent some time in Arizona, Texas, St. Louis, and lived her formative years in Memphis. As a young person in high school, she had her own radio show. She attended Arkansas State earning a BS degree in Radio/TV.

After school, Barbara moved back to St. Louis and worked at a local access station running cameras for college football, taping interviews with fans, and doing general production work. She continued a successful career in broadcasting working on the Today Show in NY, Saturday Night Live, and Meet the Press in Washington. She was fascinated by Chyron and took the training course in Long Island which opened doors throughout the industry. Her skillset and interests grew leading to opportunites doing broadcast graphics with Paintbox and Harry systems. At a career crossroads, Barbara approached her boss and asked to go out to Santa Barbara to train on Wavefront. It changed her trajectory for the next decade.

A connection with Henry LaBounta led to an interview with John Berton in the computer graphics division of ILM. Barbara was hired and worked at the company as a technical director for the next 11 years. Her credits include, Baby’s Day Out, Star Trek, The Mask, Twister, Mars Attacks!, Men in Black 2, Magnolia, Pearl Harbor, Hulk, and many others. 

She later spent a number of years working full-time as a mother. As her kids got a little older, she pursued a master’s degree in counseling and today works as a full-time therapist engaging with clients in her private practice. She is engaged in psychedelic assisted therapy and using her systems knowledge, education, and life experience to help people with severe depression. 

Barbara is an amazing person and it was truly great to catch up with her and hear about her incredible journey.  

Barbara at her desk at ILM - November 29, 1994 (you gotta love photos with dates on them)

Stu Maschwitz

Stu Maschwitz grew up in Minnesota. As a kid he loved movies. His dad was an entomologist and his mother was an artist working with textiles. He made short animated movies as a young kid and later shot numerous skateboarding videos with friends. He eventually made his way to CalArts and made every opportunity at the school count.

After graduation he landed a job at ILM where he’d work for the next 4 years. He was a founding member of the Rebel Mac group at the company and eventually left to branch out on his own. He co-founded and ran The Orphanage with former ILM colleagues Scott Stewart and Jonathan Rothbart for the next 10 years.

Stu has worked as a Visual Effects Supervisor, commercial and music video director, and software developer. Today he works with Red Giant Software developing tools for artists and creating his own projects. Most notably with his 2018 animated short film “Tank”.

Stu is a true raconteur in the world of filmmaking and visual effects. With his blog, Prolost, and his ongoing work with industry partners he shares his knowledge and skills with great generosity and humor. There’s no doubt he’d make a world class teacher. But in most every way, he already is. It was so fun to catch up with Stu and hear about his amazing journey.

Stu and Trish Shutz-Krause on the backlot at ILM as extras for Star Wars: The Special Edition.

VFX Show 255: Loki

Mike Seymour, Jason Diamond, and Matt Wallin are caught in a time loop that leads to a conversation about the Marvel/Disney streaming television show, Loki. We talk VFX, franchise fatigue and what’s next. Listen online at FX Guide.