Kurtzman will open effects studio to students

By Matt Echel­berry
Inquirer Reporter

Within the red walls, amongst the stat­ues of movie mon­sters, a new edu­ca­tional facil­ity is com­ing, only it is no ordi­nary school. The Kurtz­man Insti­tute of Art in Crest­line will allow stu­dents to receive hands on train­ing in the spe­cial effects indus­try for film and tele­vi­sion pro­duc­tion. The Insti­tute is set to open on Oct. 3 and appli­ca­tions (to be sub­mit­ted with a port­fo­lio of past work) are being accepted until mid-September.
Pres­i­dent Robert Kurtz­man said that so far, appli­ca­tions have been received from all over the coun­try and even some from other coun­tries. Kurtz­man will be a lead fac­ulty mem­ber along with Alan Tuskes and Gino Crog­nale; all three have decades of expe­ri­ence work­ing in the spe­cial effects indus­try, involv­ing every­thing from makeup, and crea­ture effects, to sculpt­ing and dig­i­tal pro­duc­tion. There will be some addi­tional teach­ers at the insti­tute who will help with courses spe­cific to their area of exper­tise as well as some guest teach­ers and speak­ers who are sched­uled to visit or speak with stu­dents via video conferencing.

The Kurtz­man Insti­tute of Art is located at Kurtzman’s exist­ing spe­cial effects stu­dio, Crea­ture Corps, on South Thoman Street on the out­skirts of Crest­line. The stu­dio has been cre­at­ing spe­cial effects for film and tele­vi­sion since open­ing in 2003, includ­ing “The Devil’s Rejects” (2005), “Hos­tel” (2005) and “The Spirit” (2008). Music videos and full-length films have also been shot inside the stu­dio.
The 16-month pro­gram, divided into three semes­ters, con­tains an array of courses, includ­ing: basic sculp­ture, mold mak­ing and cast­ing, basic air­brush tech­niques, ani­ma­tron­ics, and pro­fes­sional skills and port­fo­lio devel­op­ment. These courses are a com­bi­na­tion of lec­tures and labs, but the major­ity of the work will be hands-on projects dur­ing labs. Lec­tures will mostly entail demon­stra­tions on the dif­fer­ent tech­niques used, as well as some his­tory of art, film and spe­cial effects.
They will gain expe­ri­ence with makeup effects, mold­ing, suit fab­ri­ca­tion and other related areas nec­es­sary for the spe­cial effects indus­try. They will also learn about the human anatomy, which Kurtz­man explained is cru­cial to mak­ing real­is­tic spe­cial effects. The basics that stu­dents learn dur­ing the first semes­ter carry over into fol­low­ing courses. For exam­ple, what they learn in a sculp­ture class will be used for later projects involv­ing advanced pros­thetic work.
The var­i­ous projects stu­dents work on through­out each semes­ter are designed to hone their tech­niques, but also give them the free­dom to be cre­ative and work with areas of their own inter­est. Stu­dents will also com­plete intern­ships every semes­ter to pro­vide real world expe­ri­ence and allow them to work with pro­fes­sion­als in the indus­try.
Kurtz­man said, “The school is more geared toward the effects end of things, but it’s really a com­mer­cial art house…I think our pro­gram will be dif­fer­ent than a lot of schools because, while we do have a strict syl­labus, it’s not so cum­ber­some that stu­dents won’t be able to explore their own cre­ativ­ity.”
There are other spe­cial effects schools, but most are just 16-week pro­grams in total that offer the basics of hair and makeup, accord­ing to Kurtz­man. That is how he got into the indus­try when he moved to Los Ange­les at age 19 to pur­sue his career. When he went into the work­force, he said he felt like he knew noth­ing because of the lim­ited edu­ca­tion offered at basic pro­grams.
Now, 30 years and hun­dreds of films later, he is open­ing up his own school. He said they are look­ing for peo­ple with a strong inter­est in art and tal­ent in some area, whether it is sculp­ture, draw­ing, paint­ing, etc. Stu­dents should also have a pas­sion for it. The school sched­ules stu­dent walk-throughs, usu­ally on the first and third Thurs­days of each month. Inter­ested indi­vid­u­als can call and set up an appointment.

One area that the school is also focused on is pro­fes­sional skills devel­op­ment, which is another tool that Kurtz­man said he wished he had while start­ing out. Because there are so many dif­fer­ent depart­ments to work with in the field, stu­dents will learn how to col­lab­o­rate with other artists, direc­tors and actors, as well as how to take crit­i­cism and use it to improve ideas. They will learn what to include in port­fo­lios and how to present it. Kurtz­man will per­son­ally cri­tique every student’s port­fo­lio that they sub­mit at the com­ple­tion of the final semester.

“We’ve kind of been teach­ing now for five years…We’re ready to go, but it’s going to be a big under­tak­ing and there will be a lot of learn­ing on our end. Our big goal is to make this a really fun expe­ri­ence and make the kids embrace the cre­ative process,” he said.
The Insti­tute is mov­ing toward becom­ing a degree pro­gram, and Kurtz­man envi­sions expand­ing it. In 2014, a pro­gram in dig­i­tal film pro­duc­tion will be added to the school’s offer­ings, and even­tu­ally pro­grams for com­puter ani­ma­tion and visual effects and dig­i­tal imag­ing tech­nol­ogy will be incor­po­rated. “Even­tu­ally we want an all-encompassing film pro­gram with actual film projects,” Kurtz­man stated, “That way all of the depart­ments can work together on the same projects.”
Some of the projects that Crea­ture Corps has com­pleted recently include: “Fun Size” (shot in Ohio), “I, Alex Cross,” “John Dies at the End” and “Jug­face,” which are all sched­uled to be released this year. It also does effects work for the A&E tele­vi­sion series “Long­mire.”
For more infor­ma­tion about the Kurtz­man Insti­tute of Art, call 419–683-3900 or visit the web­site at www.kurtzmaninstitute.com.