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 Find a long open road - second one to the right. Follow it straight on 'til morning. And, if your childhood recollections are still fresh, perhaps you'll find yourself in a strange place, one home to a group called the Lost Boys. But unlike the fairytale you may remember, these Lost Boys are different. They don't have animal names like Foxy, Rabbit, Skunk, The Raccoon Twins and Chubby, instead they're a whole new group of boys (and girls). A team that make up Vancouver based Lost Boys Studios.
At age 26, Mark Benard helms a crew of 19 fulltime employees and offers an elite service to a base of international clientele. But before his newfound status, his beginnings were humble. As a teenager he held three jobs to attain his first computer and spent most of his spare time squirreled away in the attic of his parent's Courtenay home. "When I was young I did a lot of programming and was always around computers," begins Benard. "I knew I wanted to one day own my own company and figured it would be in the field of programming, but once I got bit by the animation bug, programming didn't seem a whole lot of fun anymore. I initially worked out of my parent's attic with a program called Lightwave and after becoming comfortable with that technology, I came to Vancouver and went to film school for a three month course." As a fresh-faced animator right out of an institute, Benard was content to just show off his talents the only way he could - by working for someone else. He secured a job at a local post facility doing effects and maintained it for a year, but the dream of owning his own company was still on the front burner. After a year of being exposed on the market as a talent, he approached someone with the idea of his own company. A person he felt very comfortable with - his dad - an accountant by trade and a guy Benard felt was fully qualified to create a solid business plan and help find investors. "Within months I was able to purchase my first workstation and open-up-shop," continues Benard. "It was slow for awhile, but soon I got connected with the series 'Outer Limits' and found myself doing visual effects for a major studio - MGM." Shortly after his first big break, Benard networked into the Los Angeles ranks and hatched a synergy with a company called Virgin Digital, together forming Lost Boys. He immediately found himself and his small crew of Lost Boys working hard to keep up with new possibilities and clientele. "It was great because we were able to be like a 50 person crew and deliver quality work, but it was just me and a growing number of part-timers," continues Benard. "That whole experience was confidence building because I always felt, if executed properly, Lost Boys would be a success, and it was." Benard attributes part of his success to the fact he wasn't afraid of the technology and that his timing for the launch of Lost Boys was perfect. "I was able to step into a system for quite a bit less than what the sticker price was a few years prior," continues Benard. "And I found myself being able to offer clients the same equipment and more importantly a creative team." Added to the team was Roula Lainas who came on as the digital effects producer. "The one thing that was difficult at the beginning was educating potential clients as to what we were exactly," begins Lainas. "We happened to offer a service for projects that had completed the production stage, but we weren't really a post-house. We're an imaging based company so everything revolves around the creative end, not necessarily the equipment." "Although technology in the post game changes constantly, I've always tried to keep our creative team strong," continues Benard. "Technology has become transparent; it's not the thing to think about anymore. In the past it was all about the equipment you could offer to clients, now the tools are available to everyone because of cost. So more then ever a visual effects company has to rely on their creative strengths, and you can't just buy that, it has to be nurtured. I've tried to create an environment for my animators that would allow creativity to triumph over the logistics of a business. It's sort of a colony away from the madness and I think the company name reflects just that - we're the Lost Boys in our own little Never Land." After 4 years of operation, Benard claims to have a few plans he expects to move on in the future, an advancement that seems to slowly be materializing for many Vancouver based companies. "Our long term goal is to be able to create our own content and capitalize on our own creative abilities," continues Benard. "The first internal project we're pursuing is a short film based on a children's book; a project we feel will help us figure out how things work. And I think once that information becomes mainstream knowledge, many talented people in this town will find their ticket to ride." "I think there's a big difference between being a Canadian producer and being a production company in Canada," begins Lainas. "The producers that use government money know every loophole and way to get the max out of things. It's a great system but I feel the future of producing in this town will be more of a Hollywood style structure. Creativity and business will meet and a new breed of producer will be formed here. The more of us trying to do it, the better chance of success." "There's a few people that know the government system well," agrees Benard. "And I think it doesn't always allow the best products and ideas to rise to the top. In another way it could be constricting to the creative process and the potential sale of the product to certain markets." "And that brings up another topic of not getting the support from your country," adds Lainas. "Not everyone is going to be a Celine Dion or Brian Adams so why wait for our talented people to be recognized somewhere else before we cheer for them? Are we that insecure about our own talent? Maybe if we didn't wait for other markets to spot our finest first, we'd have our own grooming system." "Sometimes it seems Canadian's are sometimes advanced for what the marketplace wants," continues Benard. "But we're never willing to let our product grow into the market. We're quick to say 'Oh, that's not working, let's try something else.' But international companies are coming here because of our talent and we're a prime example of that. We have quite a large clientele base from all over the world and it makes up a large percentage of our business. All-in-all we really have to consider what we have in Vancouver. People are getting opportunities that weren't there in the past and they're being educated to be able to offer more than just services. So for the kids sitting in their parent's basement that have good ideas, they'll have a much better chance of coming across the opportunities." - Brent Madarasz ReelWest.com Editor  |
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