Nancy Roberts
S.S. Wilson
Brent Maddock
Ron Underwood
Linda Drake
LINDA
DRAKE
Producer/Visual Effects Supervisor
Linda Drake has had a life-long interest in the movies. A native of Chicago, she pursued this interest at Northwestern University, where she received a PhD in Film Studies.
Soon after making the inevitable move to Hollywood, Ms. Drake raised the money to purchase an optical printer and started her own visual effects company, Motion Opticals, in 1985. Among her early clients was low-budget film icon Roger Corman. Says Drake of these pre-computer days, “Besides titles and bluescreen, we did lightning bolts, ray guns, fairy dust, explosions, magical glows, and transformations on such memorable titles as BARBARIAN QUEEN and SORORITY HOUSE MASSACRE.”
Motion Opticals eventually grew into a larger and very successful operation, providing effects work for over 300 films. But by 1990 Drake saw the digital hand-writing on the wall. In a bold move, she bought computers and began a self-taught crash course in digitally generated visual effects. “Computer manuals became my new best friend.”
Now working free-lance, Drake has served as Visual Effects Editor and/or Supervisor on many films, including the blockbuster BOURNE IDENTITY and its sequels, NORBIT(starring Eddie Murphy), Disney’s EIGHT BELOW, TEAM AMERICA (directed by South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone), and 1999’s family hit STUART LITTLE.
She has worked with Frank Marshall, Ivan Reitman, Paul Greengrass, John Woo, Paul Verhoeven and many others.
She entered the Stampede Universe in 2001, as Visual Effects Supervisor for TREMORS 3: BACK TO PERFECTION. On TREMORS 4: THE LEGEND BEGINS, she served as both VFX Supervisor and Associate Producer.
Not content with the seven-day weeks she often endures on major Hollywood productions, the self-proclaimed workaholic Drake has also financed, produced, and served as editor of her own independent sci-fi comedy, RESCUE ROCKET X-5, now in post-production, written and directed by fellow effects expert Kevin Kutchaver (HimAni Productions).