Foreword
Matte painting is all about storytelling. Every good movie tells the audience something relatable—something they already know, but in a way that is new and different. To be a great matte artist is to be a great storyteller. Certainly, there may be only one or two matte shots in a film, or perhaps dozens, but each individual shot has a responsibility to move the story forward. It isn’t about how beautifully the artist renders a tree or a rock or a spaceship; it’s about the collaborative process of continuing an emotional response.
I was fortunate enough to get a job as an apprentice matte artist in the early 1970s at a Hollywood film studio, long before a little film called Star Wars began to make special (visual) effects special. It ...
