Cinema Graphics was founded by Reid Baker in 1994, as a technology company specializing in lighting and rendering software development for use in visual effects production of feature films, television shows, and games.
Cinema Graphics is releasing it's first software product called ShadeTreeTM. ShadeTree is an interactive shader language authoring tool that allows non-programmers to quickly create and edit shaders for RenderManTM and Mental RayTM rendering software.
ShadeTree was created by a team of digital artists and programmers each with an extensive background in visual effects and code development, they are:
Reid Baker, CEO and President of Cinema Graphics.
Reid has more than 10 years of experience in the visual effects industry. As Technical Operations Manager for RFX Inc, the entertainment industry's leading systems integrator. He has been a trusted advisor to many of Hollywood's high end visual effects studios such as Boss Films, Digital Domain, Dream Quest, Industrial Light and Magic, Rhythm & Hues, Walt Disney Feature Animation, VIFX, and many others. Reid's skills as a digital artist has earned him screen credits on three feature films, Walt Disney's "Tall Tale", 20th Century Fox's "Mighty Morphing Power Rangers" and "Broken Arrow." Reid is a member of, and was program chair in 1989, for L.A. Siggraph a professional organization dedicated to the advancement of computer graphics. Prior to supporting the entertainment industry Reid spent 10 years as a mechanical engineer doing product design and development.
Greg Ercolano, Lead Programmer. home page
Greg has a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Film Graphics from California Institute of the Arts. Greg started his career in visual effects with deGraf/Wahrman and as a freelance programmer has worked for more than 10 visual effects studios. His programming skills have been used to create a wide variety of software tools, such as Optical Printer Control Systems, Render Queuing, Facial Character Animation, and Systems programming tools. His work can be seen in such notable films as RoboCop II, Max Headroom Series, and an MCA/Universal theme park ride.
Liza Keith, Shader Language Programmer. home page
Liza has a Bachelor of Science degree in Mathematics/Computer Science from University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA). She started her career in visual effects with Abel Image Research and as a freelance digital effects supervisor/technical director has worked on more than 20 visual effects projects. Her work can be seen in such notable films as Terminator 2 - Judgment Day, True Lies, and Demolition Man. Look at her resume.
Rodney Iwashina, OpenGL/C++ Programmer.
Rodney has Bachelors of Science degree in Computer Science from University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) and a Master of Science degree in Computer Science from University of Southern California (USC). Rodney started his career in visual effects with Cinesite and as a freelance programmer has worked for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and TRW Electronics & Defense Sector. While at Cinesite his programming skills have been used to create a wide variety of software tools for use in 2D and 3D motion tracking, RenderMan shaders and digital compositing. His work can be seen in such notable films as WaterWorld, Under Siege II, Judge Dredd, and Mission Impossible.
Luigi cut his teeth writing microcode for an array processor built by 3Dlabs, back in the days before they were 3Dlabs. He's done infrastructure projects for Sony Pictures Imageworks and Industrial Light and Magic, including the first practical hi-res preview system in the film industry. The latter built on his work as head of software at Viewgraphics, the Silicon Valley firm responsible for the Viewstore HDTV framebuffer. He was lead programmer on Playmates Interactive's Meat Puppet, an action-adventure CD-ROM title released in 1997, and added network play capability to the popular Activison game, Zork Grand Inquisitor.