Interview with Eric Bort
Creative Director, Virtual Knee Surgery
ED tracked down Eric Bort, the designer of Living Children's Virtual Knee Surgery, (Flash Film Festival Winner and friends of ED Site of the Week), to shine the interrogation lamp into his eyes and tell him that ve haff vays of makink him talk…
Since the Flash Film Festival the movie has relocated, and can now be found at Edheads Virtual Knee Surgery
ED: Were you surprised by the (Flash Forward) award?
Eric: It’s always a surprise, and it’s always going to be an honor to pick up some national recognition. The award itself is simply a 5 lb rubber (odd smelling) mouse pointer… thing. The best part of this type of award is the stream of new potential clients that take notice.
I love anything with a great feeling of emotion, reaction and sense of environment.ED: What were your favorite other film festival entries?
Eric: I did manage to go through and look at all 60 Film Festival Finalists, and my #1 total favorite was ‘Sonata for the Unaware’.
I love anything with a great feeling of emotion, reaction and sense of environment. This piece reflects all of the above as far as I’m concerned.
There were a few others that kept my attention; 'Chasm' (winner in the game category) was pretty cool. I’m glad it beat out spy kids 3D.
ED: How long have you been using Flash?
Eric: I have been using flash since version 3.0 (1998) when I convinced my old boss we needed something other than rollover images and animated gif files to create an interactive web site. The first thing I ever did was create text that fades in to form a logo.
ED: Why Flash rather than Director?
Eric: What’s Director? I stopped using Director in 1999, simply because I couldn’t afford it. In that year the whole internet boom was gaining speed and Flash looked like the way of the future. Not only could I afford it, but it was simple enough to teach myself, and macromedia user forums provided a few great freelance job opportunities.
Flash just makes sense to me…Flash just makes sense to me… and I think that is the biggest selling point and reason I continue to upgrade every year to the new version. I use flash for print design, web design, application design, animation, game design, and streaming video/audio. What other single program can claim the same abilities, with such ease of use?
That’s right! None!
ED: Are you an artist, or a technician?
I went to art school and majored in Time Based media, which is a very generic major covering a ton of different subjects. I studied graphic design, photography, video editing, 3D animation and marketing. As far as your question though, I'd have to say I am both artist and technician.
My title is simply Creative Director, but that's only because I think it looks a little strange to have three or four different titles. On the average project I will personally be responsible for interface design, color design, animation, programming, user testing, and trouble-shooting any bugs or problems. Outside of the projects, I take care of all of the fun administrative stuff every business needs to do to keep the IRS and clients happy.
Without the help of Foundation Swift 3D I don’t know where I’d be today, probably in a ditch somewhere talking to my shoes.ED: How do you create your 3D?
Eric: All 3D surgical tools for the Virtual Surgery were created using Electric Rain’s Swift 3D 3.0. It was a combination of drawing in Flash, and extruding/lathing out the shapes in Swift 3D to create the final tools.
Without the help of the friends of ED ‘Foundation Swift 3D’ book I don’t know where I’d be today, probably in a ditch somewhere talking to my shoes.
Seriously, that book helped explain everything I needed to know to animate, create and render great looking 3D objects.
ED: Do you have a medical/anatomical background yourself?
Nope, I don't. The best part about this one-of-a-kind type project is that I get to take on a different profession for a brief period of time. Before working on the virtual knee surgery I had never seen a live surgery, except on TV, so getting to join the surgeons and nurses in the Operating Room was quite the experience.
ED: Did you get squeamish?
Eric: Honestly, I felt 10 times more squeamish watching the Passion of the Christ then I did sniffing the cauterized flesh burn as a surgeon sliced open the patient’s leg. I got to watch them rip out a failed Femoral and Tibial implant and scrape out scar tissue from a bone cavity for an hour and a half. It’s quite enjoyable when you get used to it.
The trick is to get desensitized to the subject matter. I looked up as many surgical photos possible on the Google image search the day before, so I’d know what to expect.
ED: Did you take the photos yourself?
Eric: I believe someone either at the hospital or on my client’s staff took the photos. They are nice shots though aren’t they? Very dramatic and well lit.
ED: Does the photographed patient know they've helped you win an award?
That’d be pretty funny… getting them in on the action. Hospitals these days are very tight on information security. I’m sure someone somewhere had to sign off on the photos (and therefore knew their intention), but I haven’t met the person.
ED: What's the reaction from the medical profession?
Eric: They seem to enjoy it. More and more I am getting calls from patients and Surgeons who have used the activity pre-surgery to help explain what either they or their patient is about to go through. Surgery is a lot less intimidating when you know exactly what’s being done to your body, and I think people appreciate a resource that helps them understand.
There is still a huge box of knee joint prosthetics at my client’s officeED: Our mate Simon has had a few problems with his knee, don't suppose you picked up any spare replacement parts?
Eric: There is still a huge box of knee joint prosthetics at my client’s office. If Simon doesn’t mind used, non-sterile objects in his body, tell him to give me a call.
ED: What's next: vasectomies, brain surgery..?
Eric: The next project I’ll be taking on later this year is a heart catheterization procedure where the user will virtually create scar tissue on a patient’s heart, in order to control a whacked out electrical system form causing an irregular and potentially fatal heart beat.
ED: Got any scars yourself?
Eric: I have a couple… nothing real cool though. One scar is under my eye where a thorn branch smacked me in the face. It could have gone into my eye, and that would’ve been a better story. Another is on my thumb from when I cut an onion with a dull knife and slipped.
My hope is to someday be attacked by an alligator, then I might have reason to follow up on this interview.
ED: Odd you should say that …. Unleash the alligators!
(transcript ends)
If you’d like to learn more about Eric Bort and Living Children Multimedia, visit www.livingchildren.com. If you’d like to keep current on new projects and news feel free to sign up to the Living Children Update newsletter.