NYWIFT Blog

By Lily Hutcheson

Welcome to NYWIFT, Catherine Craig!

Catherine Craig was George Lucas’s Industrial Light and Magic’s first animation FX camerawoman, later becoming a digital artist at ILM. A highly regarded film archivist, Craig designed the Coppola film archive and implemented Zoetrope’s domestic and international film distribution.

As an early female entrepreneur, Craig founded her own award-winning, union and guild-affiliated film company, specializing in high-end industrial and commercial productions. Her vast experience spans all aspects of filmmaking: she’s worked as a director, producer, camera operator, concept artist, storyboard artist, special FX artist, sound recordist, and more.

Her screenplay OddFX was accepted into the NYWIFT-affiliated The Writers Lab. The film follows a mother living in a women’s shelter, battling a physically abusive husband and a broken support system, who enlists the help of a special FX film crew. It is fiscally sponsored by NYWIFT. 

Catherine discusses her groundbreaking work with ILM, her drive to tell her own stories, and her film currently in development, OddFX!

NYWIFT Member Catherine Craig

Welcome to NYWIFT! Please introduce yourself briefly to our readers.

I am Catherine Craig, a filmmaker in the San Francisco Bay Area. I was raised on the East Coast, and I love NYC. I am very excited to become a part of NYWIFT. If anyone has any questions about any of my areas of expertise please feel free to reach out. I would love to hear from you.

Catherine Craig working with a camera

What brings you to NYWIFT?

NYWIFT has a wonderful community, and I want to be a part of it and add to it where I can. I love being a part of a team.

Catherine Craig directing DP Rick Fichter on a “smoke box” effect. in this effect, smoke is encased in a black box with a glass front. The back was color gelled kodalith art work, and a pinpoint light source shooting through the smoke created the god’s rays.

What inspired you to become a filmmaker?

For years, I poured my passion into other people’s films, always driven by my deep love and study of cinema. As a trained fine artist, filmmaker, and social activist, I knew I had more to contribute than working on others’ projects; I had something vital to share.

It was working alongside Francis Coppola—breathing in his infectious creative spirit—that truly ignited my ambition to make my own films. Now, I am compelled by a firm belief that I have something essential to express, and I am driven to share and create it.

Catherine Craig working on The Mummy at ILM during her transition from special effects into computer graphics

What was it like to be the first woman to work as a visual effects animation camerawoman for George Lucas’s Industrial Light and Magic?

Being hired at ILM at that time meant working at the cutting edge of visual effects, surrounded by immensely talented and innovative individuals, on films that were setting new industry standards. It was a place where groundbreaking technology and artistic vision converged, making it an incredibly special and career-defining experience. Every day, we pushed boundaries, creating things that had never been seen before.

The company was still small; I remember 20 of us sitting in the screening room with George Lucas, as he critiqued dailies for Willow. This was also a predominantly male environment. All the camera equipment was custom-engineered, meaning if a colleague didn’t show you how to use it, success was impossible. Crucially, at a time when many men were learning about sexism, these guys didn’t want to be sexist, and they wanted me to succeed. They made sure I did.

Those same men are great supporters and contributors to my film OddFX.

Catherine Craig and Willow team featured in special effects magazine Cinefex. Top image: still from Willow. Bottom Left: Craig’s Automatte camera (Craig is circled in yellow). Bottom right: visual effects artists Paul Huston and Chris Evans working on the model.

How do you think the film industry’s treatment of women has changed since you began your career? What still needs to be accomplished?

I once believed I was making significant inroads for my daughter’s generation, but until recently, the percentage of women in camera departments remained stubbornly low. Fortunately, a lot has changed in the past few years. I believe Stacy Smith’s founding of the USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative, a leading global think tank studying inequality in entertainment, has had an enormous impact. Combining statistics with lawsuits proved to be a powerful approach.

My current challenge isn’t sexism, but ageism. Fortunately, my screenplay, OddFX, was selected for The Writers Lab, an initiative dedicated to supporting women over 40. Through this program, I have connected with many wonderful women.

The ILM Automatte camera rig used by Catherine on Willow. The 75 lb. anamorphic lens is circled in red. This was all custom machined, and a block and tackle were used to mount the lens.

Can you share a bit aboutOddFX? What drew you to writing this script, and how has that experience been different or similar to working on the technical side of film?

OddFX is an independent film I’ve written and am set to direct, currently in the later stages of development. The screenplay has gained significant traction, selected for The Writers Lab, the Stowe Narrative Screenwriting Retreat, and twice named a finalist for the prestigious Sundance Screenwriting Lab.

There’s a powerful, undeniable drive compelling me to make this film, rooted in a firm belief that I have something essential to express. I’ve spent years diligently teaching myself and collaborating with mentors to advance my screenwriting craft.

My background has always blended artistic vision with strong technical acumen. In special effects, I brought an artistic eye to camerawork. When I transitioned to visual effects (computer-generated imagery), I leveraged my fine arts background as a highly trained photo-real digital painter. For me, special effects are fundamentally about using science to create visual art.

The experience of writing and directing OddFX certainly has its similarities and differences to my technical work. Both require meticulous attention to detail and a deep understanding of visual storytelling. On the technical side, my role was often about executing someone else’s vision with precision. With OddFX, the experience is similar in its demand for technical rigor but profoundly different in that I’m crafting the entire vision from the ground up.

It’s a comprehensive artistic endeavor, requiring me to shape every layer of the story, characters, and visual world. It’s a culmination of all my experiences, from fine art and technical execution to leadership and creative storytelling.

Catherine Craig on the stage of her live action and effects company

How do you think storytelling through film can help combat societal issues, such as those discussed in OddFX?

Storytelling through film, particularly through the lens of Social Impact Entertainment (SIE), offers a powerful mechanism to confront and help combat societal issues. SIE prioritizes compelling narratives to first engage audiences, then organically weaves in impactful social themes, avoiding a didactic “infotainment” approach. Its goal is to inform and educate, often inspiring action or a shift in attitudes and behaviors. SIE projects frequently partner with non-profits and advocacy groups for broader impact campaigns.

OddFX aligns perfectly with this model. My primary goal with this film is to ignite a crucial conversation—especially among men—about their power to dismantle the cycle of violence. For too long, the burden of ending male violence against women has been placed on victims and survivors. If women alone could stop male violence, we would have centuries ago. Male violence is a male problem that requires a male solution; abusers don’t listen to women. My intention is to invite men to learn not to commit, conceal, or condone violence against women.

Beneath its quirky and touching surface, OddFX is built upon years of meticulous research and analysis, including interviews with survivors, therapists, and educators. Recognizing the crucial need to engage men in this dialogue, I deliberately set the story in a special effects shop—a world many men might aspire to. Through our protagonist’s experience there, male viewers are invited to symbolically “walk in a woman’s shoes,” quickly realizing the starkly different reality of that dream job when held by a woman. This narrative approach uses the aspirational world of special effects, which itself is about redefining reality, to shed light on a profound societal issue and encourage a vital shift in perspective.

Catherine Craig with crewmate

What is one of your favorite special effects moments that you helped to create?

The effects I am most proud of are the ones I am creating for OddFX. Every other effect and film that I have ever worked on has been conceived by a man.

In OddFX, I redefine the male-dominated language of special effects into a specifically female perspective with a subjective emotional point of view. Leveraging the tools gathered from my 30-year career in visual effects, I’m bending the cinema language of big-budget Hollywood movies to serve the story of an independent woman struggling with the very gendered problems of domestic violence and motherhood.

Rather than using effects to simply blow things up and grab attention, I re-appropriate them to express the emotional and psychological growth of the characters. Effects become plot points, emotional markers, metaphors, and physical representations of the character’s inner dialogue.

The film, specifically from a camerawoman’s two worlds, shows through her lens what it’s like to escape the claustrophobic sphere of domestic violence and re-enter the outside world with PTSD. Her perception of people is distorted; Cady will have times when help is ‘out of frame,’ and she cannot see it there. Through the lens of the guys, we may even see her in parts, not as a whole.

There will be explosions, though. For example, when, as an apology, a guy at OddFX places an explosive into Cady’s hand and encourages her to set it off, we watch her struggle to trust and accept his apology. When Cady sets off the explosion to blow up a model, we, the audience, feel her sense of relief and her step forward into a new emotional state. She is blowing up her former belief that she must mend and repair her broken life, realizing she can move on. It’s metaphoric, emotional, and cathartic for Cady and the audience. It moves the story forward. It is a non-verbal expression that goes beyond words. It’s fun. It’s meaningful. It’s OddFX.

Learn more about Catherine’s film OddFX at her website https://www.oddfxfilm.com/.

The film is now fiscally sponsored by NYWIFT! Learn more and donate here. 

(Images courtesy of Catherine Craig)