This subtle change has only recently been fully appreciated. More and more often, large advertising agencies and networks are turning to graphic orientated companies to provide that multi-media new look, which will captivate the viewer and present their client's product as the "now" choice. These agencies are no longer asking the post production coordinator for a simple text treatment or blur filter, but they desire a graphic and animation layer which is inseparable from the live action, and which can be used as a logo-style look and feel for all the client's media offerings. The graphic director must therefore be involved in the project from start to finish, whether the media be print, film, video, or television. This convergence is causing the film and associated media industries to change and merge at an incredibly fast rate. The survivors in all video presentation industries will be those directors, producers and other professionals who can keep up with the new breed of artist, who has the power to create entire worlds conceived in imagination, painted from the vision of their mind's eye, and using magic tools never before available.

Inevitably, there will be tension between the old school and new schools of production. The key for survivors will be to keep that which is good about the old techniques, and eliminate that which is no longer needed. Accordingly, pre-production should be undertaken in cooperation with a graphical artist team. Producers and directors should have experience with these new tools. Of course, any such changes are easier for the latest generation, but competition will force everyone in the industry to a adopt the new, interactive feedback model when dealing with creative staff. The alternative will be for both creative and production control to change its center of gravity away from those who still view post production as the fix-it team. For these people, the tail will, indeed, begin to wag the production dog.

We are coming to an age where films will not have to cost millions of dollars to tell a great story, and where opportunity to realize new ideas are everywhere. Anyone with a desktop computer and video camera is now able to create top-tier projects if they have enough ambition and drive to develop and hone their skills. Although many of the barriers have fallen, success still requires hard work.

Of course it is incumbent upon the graphic artists who aspire to a directorship to have a solid background in film and/or video production in order to understand how and why things work on a physical set. The goal is true integration of the two disciplines, as well as the formation of a pre/post production team. A new breed of creative talent is emerging, better adapted to an environment where reality, imagination, and fantasy intersect. Graphic artists have the opportunity to advance themselves further than the computer screen. They have the ability to take on not only advertising and filmmaking, but to take new media such as the Internet and DVD to places that could not otherwise be accessed in the real world.

The next ten years will bring about better-balanced films and open the doors a little wider for aspiring filmmakers. The industry will come to grips with the new power that has become available through these new tools. In the past decade, audiences have been bombarded with special effects that seem to be crafted solely to outdo the layered-on effects of the last blockbuster movie. Only in the past five years have we started to understand how to merge the new and old production schools. The new breed of directors and producers will continue the journey begun by Chaucer and Shakespeare, and the result will be new and exciting experiences as we explore the deepest recesses of the human condition.

Jeremy Evans is Grand Poobah of Lost Dreams Productions, a post-production house located in lower Manhattan that specializes in CGI special effects and non-linear editing.