Interview with Phil McNally at DreamWorks Part 1

In the beginning, there was a curious teenager with an insatiable appetite for things 3D. Starting at the age of 13, Phil McNally began what would become a lifelong obsession. After finding a WW 2 era stereoscopic viewing device, Phil started to experiment with it and began creating his own original 3D slide shows. This commenced into Phil putting on shows for the local neighborhood kids, which led to the creation of his moniker 'Captain 3D'
In 1991, while attending The World College of Art in London studying furniture design, Phil created his first stereo image in the holography department. However Phil continued to pursue his furniture design dreams for feature films after watching Edward Scissorshand. HIs wife Deepa, who he met in college and happens to be a graphic designer, purchased a Mac. Phil started to experiment with photoshop, 3D manipulation of images, and CG animation.
During this time he also attended a SIGRAPH convention where he attended several workshops by Dreamworks and Pixar. With his imagination fired up, Phil spent a year working on an independent stereo animation film, Pump Action. The film was shown at SIGRAPH, which led to his first animation job at Industrial Light and Magic in 2000. At ILM, Phil worked on feature films such as Men in Black 2, War of the Worlds, Van Helsing and several others.