Director Luke Ployhar
©2020 Angela María Ortíz S.
On a beautiful SoCal Saturday morning we screened Touch The Stars 3D in IMAX (7-story) with a question and answers with the director Luke Ployhar afterwards.
A bit on Luke Ployhar, he’s a director and film producer with experience in visual effects and animation that spans a career of over 20 years. Currently located in Minneapolis Minnesota, Ployhar is the founder of Afterglow Studios, a leading provider of design and animation for a wide range of clients. Ployhar’s career started in film production in Los Angeles with credits that include, Broken Arrow, Austin Powers, Speed 2, Armageddon, and The Insider. He later became a Visual Effects producer at Black Box Digital and worked on Minority Report, Planet of the Apes, A.I., and many others.
The film traces the path to space through the history of NASA’s probes, orbiters, and landers from the heart of our solar system and the surface of its planets and moons to the grand tour of the Voyager spacecraft through the outer planets and beyond. Created with the latest high definition imagery and scientific data, Touch The Stars 3D engages audiences through the use of real footage and 3-dimensional vistas, transporting them to planets and distant stars alongside these heroic robot explorers.
During the q&a we learned that it took 2.5 years to complete the film. He also explained that Deep space gateway is a concept ship for reaching Mars. It was really cool to watch because it is set up as modules that can be removed and reattached during the planet’s explorations.
There was info on the Parker Solar probe, which is going to the sun. It has a heat shield and a coolant to protect it and will be using Venus gravity to control its speed.
We found out that 85% of this film is VFX and 15% is real footage and images. For Ployhar, it’s a huge labor of love working on these type of projects.
Take the family, it opens on Friday, January 17 at the California Science Center.
Photos: ©2020 Angela María Ortíz S.
