March 01, 1999|By Jill Hudson Neal | Jill Hudson Neal,SUN STAFF
The offices of Pixel Workshop, one of the region's leading multimedia production firms, are located in a nondescript, wood-paneled office building nestled in a residential neighborhood in Columbia.
Inside is another story.
The corridors of Pixel's headquarters are painted deep plum, and the walls are lined with animation and science-fiction movie posters. The mood of the place is decidedly mellow and artistic. "Star Wars" action figures sit atop desks and "Wallace and Gromit" stuffed animals litter the floor.
It's clearly an atmosphere where creative people can thrive, a comfortable haven where Pixel's three partners can turn out high-quality video productions, cool graphics and slick animation.
No plain white walls here, says Ilana Bittner, 30, one-third of Pixel's founding team. "We're not a big corporation, and we don't look or act like one, either."
Besides creating corporate and industrial broadcasting, television commercials and com-put-er-gen- er-at-ed animation, Pixel now can add another credit to its list of achievements.
Frank McIntyre, 29, another Pixel partner who specializes in computer-based 3-D animation, produced several special-effects shots and digital composites for a film that played recently at the SlamDance Film Festival in Park City, Utah.
Though the film, "Albert's Thumb," an independent short directed by Baltimore filmmaker Christopher Skokowski, did not win an award at SlamDance, working on the film opened another door for the company, McIntyre says.
"The special effects work is pretty exciting," McIntyre says from his orderly, avocado-colored office. "It's particularly interesting because there's always some new challenge. The technology is constantly changing and growing. You really have to take the initiative to figure it all out on your own or you'll find yourself left behind.
"The challenge in this line of work," McIntyre says, "is to always stay ahead of the curve."
The film, shot in black-and-white and color, tells the story of a man who causes a nuclear explosion and of another man who survives it.
Skokowski says he was impressed by McIntyre's attention to detail and his collaborative effort with his production team. McIntyre did the special effects work free.
"He really tuned into what we wanted in terms of the special effects," Skokowski says. "He didn't do a [poor] job just to satisfy the client and get it over with. We were completely prepared for absolute cheese, for paper cutouts."
McIntyre says he hopes the success of the film will spread the word among local filmmakers that Pixel does quality special effects.
Pixel Workshop was founded in 1994 by Ilana Bittner and her husband, David, who both studied radio, film and television at the University of Maryland. They asked McIntyre, a graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design and David Bittner's high school classmate at Centennial High School in Ellicott City, to become a partner.
Pixel's list of clients reads like a small firm's dream list, including the Food and Drug Administration, ABC News, the Smithsonian Institution, the University of Maryland's athletic department, WHFS 99.1 FM radio and the United Way.
Pixel is working on an interactive project for the Rouse Co. that will let potential homebuyers tour a virtual-reality model home park at a computer kiosk.
Staying ahead of the competition is vital for a "boutique" firm like Pixel, says Steve LeHuray, publisher and editor of iCOM magazine, a monthly publication devoted to film and video production.
LeHuray says the world of multimedia production is competitive, especially for a small firm like Pixel.
"Video production companies need creative talent and marketing skills to be successful," he says. "The problem is, sometimes the best artists don't necessarily have the best marketing skills. You have to be out there networking, and it's a constant thing.
"But the people at Pixel love what they're doing, and it shows in the level of work they're doing and they kinds of clients they're attracting," LeHuray says.
The quality of Pixel's work is such that clients do not have to go to Washington, New York or Los Angeles, says 29-year-old David Bittner.
The business of video production and computer-generated multimedia work is growing rapidly in the Washington-Baltimore area, says LeHuray.
The work is "environmentally clean, it's modern, and it pays people well," he says. "The wonderful thing about it is that you can have a bunch of Silicon Valleys almost anywhere because all you need is a good set of computers with a lot of expensive programs to do the work. No one even knows you're there."
"It's nice to know that we don't have to leave here to be able to compete nationally," David Bittner says. "As long as you have the equipment, you can work anywhere. Here in Columbia, we can go for a walk on a bike path. And I think our clients enjoyed the fact that they don't have to go into a city to visit us."
Pub Date: 3/01/99
