Ghostlight Productions Video Podcast

Ghostlight offers high-end visual effects to independent filmmakers and major studios alike. From simple camera tricks to advanced 3D animation and compositing, we can deliver the impossible. Ghostlight makes it easy!

We blow up a guy's home, then nuke Los Angeles in this short for Invisible Engine Films. James was the Cinematographer and Dave was the Visual Effects Supervisor. Multiple video plates, HDRI light probes, a 3D door, HDR rendering and compositing, virtual camera movement, volumetric smoke, miniature smoke, cloud tank effects, and a heck of a lot of fun resulted in the visual effects in this short. Here's what we did.

We have lit and shot on many film and video formats for countless projects. This reel shows some of our favorites.

Branham High School hired us to shoot and edit a narrative-style promotional piece. Four titles were animated in 3D to match hand-held footage. The goal was to make it look like they really existed. Here's how we made it work.

This is the first advertisement that Invisible Engine made for Revver.com. In it, Revver magically heals a pedestrian killed by a frozen water balloon. Then he takes off and flies away. We did the cinematography and visual effects. We used simple compositing to make Revver fly. The original idea was to take a freeze-frame of Revver, cut him out in Photoshop, and paste him on top of the video. That would have worked fine, but we wanted to keep the actor's motion as he levitated. This video shows what we did.

Sam Reich from CollegeHumor.com needed special effects for the movie series "Street Fighter: the Later Years." The second episode brought some fun challenges. We had to create a realistic version of Ryu's hadouken - a flaming fireball attack. There was also a shot where Dhalsim's legs are extended. Here's how we pulled it off.

We were hired as cinematographers and editors to advertise Tuolumne County as a shooting location for films. Dave shot this additional footage of the trains in Railtown that wasn't included in the final Tuolumne video. Railtown provided the train for "Back to the Future III." Special thanks to all those who helped set up this fun day of shooting.

Sam Reich from CollegeHumor.com needed special effects for the movie series "Street Fighter: the Later Years." Stretching Dhalsim's arm was a fun project. We combined 2D effects with a little 3D animation. The goal was to keep things looking realistic and finish it quickly. Here's what we did.

Jon Huybrecht directed "Harvest," about revenge from beyond the grave. We helped Jon add some extra horror with a few visual effects that would have been impossible to get in-camera. Jon isn't an expert firefly trainer, so we created these fireflies on the computer. We didn't just want little yellow dots floating around, so Dave Codeglia modeled a 3D firefly with fully functional wings, torso, and antennae. Some shots have over one hundred insects flying around. One even had to land on an actor's forehead.

Jon Huybrecht directed "Harvest," about revenge from beyond the grave. We helped Jon add some extra horror with a few visual effects that would have been impossible to get in-camera. To fight off the undead guy, this dude puts a cigarette out in his eye. Ouch! Well, for safety the filmmakers didn't use a lit cigarette. We added our own smoke and sparks using custom elements we shot specifically for this project. We had to animate the effects to match the camera movement, clean up the edges, and erase the smoke and sparks to place them behind the actors.