Ethan Seagren, who graduated in May from the Johnny Carson School of Theatre and Film, is the recipient of a prestigious internship this summer from the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Foundation.
Seagren, from Elkhorn, Neb., will be working at Stargate Studios in Pasadena, Calif. Stargate is a production company offering visual effects and production services to the film and television industry. Their credits include “The Walking Dead,” “Heroes,” “Mob City,” “Pan Am” and “24.”
"I am really excited to have the opportunity to work at Stargate Studios," Seagren said. "They are one of the preeminent studios for television visual effects, and to intern with them will be an extraordinary experience."
The Academy’s summer student internship program provides more than 40 industry-wide internships to college and graduate students from across the country and is considered one of the top 10 internships in the country. The program gives students in-depth exposure to professional television production during an eight-week period in Los Angeles.
“Ethan has worked incredibly hard for this opportunity,” said Assistant Professor of Film and New Media Steve Kolbe. “His passion for the art of visual effects has carried him through many long nights and even longer projects. Working alongside the visual effects artists at Stargate Studios will certainly enhance his knowledge, skill set and connections in the industry.”
Seagren is looking forward to the experience.
“For me, it’s just an incredible opportunity to take the experience and education I’ve gained here in college and go and apply it in a professional environment,” Seagren said. “Especially for myself to have the opportunity to work at a professional visual effects studio.”
Seagren began his interest in film and technology in high school.
“We didn’t have any film classes, so I was just doing all the research I could online,” he said. “I came across Video Co-Pilot, which has After Effects tutorials, so I just started doing that. Then, in college, I realized that visual effects allowed me to combine my passion for film and technology into the same thing.”
While in the Johnny Carson School of Theatre and Film, Seagren completed a UCARE research project with Kolbe to build a large-scale texture library and develop a rendering farm for 3-D animation using the supercomputer cluster at the Holland Computing Center.
“It certainly helped my technical understanding, as far as visual effects goes,” he said. “I’ve had a wealth of opportunities here with student films and the Carson Film Series films to do visual effects on those.”
Seagren was also an intern at HuskerVision, where he directed women’s basketball and operated instant replay for Husker football. He was also one of six featured students in the Hixson-Lied College of Fine and Performing Arts 2013-2014 recruiting initiatives.
Kolbe believes Seagren will succeed at Stargate this summer.
“I have every confidence that Ethan will impress everyone lucky enough to work with him,” he said. “This prestigious Academy internship is the first of many accolades he will enjoy in his budding career. I couldn’t be more happy for Ethan.”
At the deadline for this e-newsletter, the Johnny Carson School is awaiting the results of five additional finalists for the prestigious internships.