If you've seen a crazy creature or creepy corpse on the big screen or your television, it might be thanks to MastersFX.
The Metro Vancouver-based effects studio celebrates its 35th anniversary next year. Over the last three decades, MastersFX has provided characters and makeup effects for hundreds of films and TV shows. Masters' innovative team has earned numerous industry awards and nominations.
The pioneering company is now one of the world's leading character FX studios.
"Usually makeup artists remove the blemishes, we add them," says founder and president Todd Masters.
Masters began his career in Hollywood in 1985 and subsequently worked on such productions as Big Trouble in Little China, Predator, and Look Who's Talking. In 1987, he founded MastersFX in Los Angeles and expanded to Vancouver in the early 2000s. A Toronto facility also opened in 2016.
MastersFX is not just a traditional effects studio; the integration of practical and digital has been key to its evolution.
"We've been a leader in combining our practical work with CG (computer-generated) work. Some of it we do in-house, oftentimes we work with other visual effects departments to find the most strategic way to create the best of both worlds," explains Masters.
Much of the studio's work celebrates the macabre. Many of the company's creations conjure horrifying or disturbing imagery.
Masters says it's all part of the job.
"I think it's a similar reason why we like roller coasters. We want to test our senses, we want to feel those emotions. It's a tricky business in that sense, to try to come up with something that creeps people out."
MastersFX is currently working on The Good Doctor, What We Do in the Shadows, SyFy's Day of the Dead series, and recently finished the Firestarter remake with Zac Efron.
