Mike Quinn

Palm Springs, California, United States

Profile Campaigns

Animator, Muppeteer, Actor, Producer, Director

Mike, is a veteran of the film and television industry for over thirty years, both sides of the camera. Originally from the UK, he has worked extensively as a puppeteer for the Muppets and an animator for Pixar but is most well known for his portrayal of Lando’s alien co-pilot of the Millennium Falcon in Return of the Jedi.  He was co-owner of a pioneering animatronic and puppet production company in the UK during the 80’s and 90’s where many breakthrough technologies were created and used, including the first known puppeteer performance motion memory recording and playback system for animatronics. He also directed a short for Sony HD, which was the first in the UK known to employ film style lighting and prime lenses, before any chip cameras were available. Until then all HD footage was pristine and bright commercial styles selling the detail and the technology. One of his popular puppet creations even had his own chat show, interviewing famous UK celebrities, including Professor Rubik, of Rubik’s Cube fame.  Over the years Mike has built puppets, costumes and animatronics for Jim Henson, BBC, MTV, ITV, The Children’s Channel, Cheflive, RTE, Perform FX, PBS and very many more. Mike is also an actor, producer and director. As President of QuinnZone Studios LLC, he is putting all his knowledge and experience into developing many exciting film, television and game projects.  Puppeteer  Film: The Muppets, Sesame Street 3D Movie, Mary Reilly, Muppet Treasure Island, The Muppet Christmas Carol, How To Get Ahead In Advertising, Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, Little Shop Of Horrors, Labyrinth, Dreamchild, Return Of The Jedi, The Dark Crystal, The Great Muppet Caper.       Television:   The Muppets’ Wizard Of Oz, The Slow Norris, The Great Bong, The Secrets Of The Muppets, The Secret Life Of Toys, Jim Henson’s Mother Goose Stories, The Ghost Of Faffner Hall, The Storyteller - The Soldier And Death, Fraggle Rock - Co-productions, Best Of The Muppet Show, The Muppets Go To The Movies (plus many more). <div> </div> Animator <div>Star Wars Attack Of The Clones, Jurassic Park 3, Toy Story 2, A Bug’s Life, Hershey’s Kisses Commercial - Roller Coaster   GAMES Flick A Fly for iPad & iPhone 4                     Producer                   QuinnZone Studios BlackStar MMOLead Animator           Spacetime Studios Rock Band 2 (Wii & PS2)                             Art                             Pi Studios Bonk: Brink Of Extinction                             Lead Animator           Pi Studios Third person original IP (under NDA)           Lead Animator          Pi Studios   Commercials, Music Videos and Pilots                                                                                 Directed, performed, shot and composited all puppet sequences in PAL HD for Thomas Dolby’s first music video in 20 years.                                                                                     Puppet builder and puppeteer for Nike’s popular Kobe and Lebron commercials.                 Puppeteer in two Labyrinth music videos with David Bowie. Directed, produced and performed in many more television pilots and commercials.           Theater / Live Appearances    Rope, the play: Principle actor, playing Brandon at the Masquers Theater, Richmond, CA.   Star Wars Weekends at Disney / MGM: appeared as Star Wars celebrity at three different times. Also at many conventions.      The Muppet Show Live Performed on the first and only live Muppet Show at the Palace Theater, Los Angeles, with guest celebrities Paul Williams, Brooke Shields and John Voight.     BIOGRAPHY Childhood performing included a professional magic act at the age of 8 and a live puppet show  that he insisted would always end in a custard pie fight. He spent many a day backstage exploring the workings of live shows as his older sister performed in Pantomimes such as Babes In The Wood at the famous London Palladium. After becoming fascinated by The Muppet Show, he knew that was the future for puppetry. He first met Jim Henson and his puppeteers as a fan in 1977, later becoming a regular visitor to the set of The Muppet Show bringing along home made Muppet style puppets and learning and receiving much encouragement from Jim Henson and his co-workers.  Upon leaving school he directly landed his first job as a Muppeteer in 1980 being personally chosen by Jim Henson to work on The Great Muppet Caper filling in on crowd scenes and doubling up for main characters. This directly led to building Podlings and Slaves for The Dark Crystal and then actually performing the evil Slavemaster Skeksis for the film.  Many Muppet  projects followed as Mike became a master mimic doubling for the famous Muppet characters. He brought to life many animatronic creatures including the fan favorite alien Millennium Falcon copilot Nien Nunb on Return of the Jedi and assisting Frank Oz with the evergreen lovable Yoda.  Throughout the late 1980s and 1990s, whilst continuing with his puppeteering career, he joined forces with fellow puppet master David Barclay to create Ultimate Animates, a production company created to experiment and develop new building and performing techniques for many of their own internal as well as external puppet productions. This led to Mike directing and producing many productions.  A natural progression for Mike was to explore the use of computer graphic technologies to assist and to open up the performing and acting possibilities for his characters. By early 1997 he moved to San Francisco to become a character animator for Pixar after being impressed by their character work in Toy Story. Although he animated on A Bug's Life, his finest moment at Pixar was most definitely developing and animating on the 1950s style TV puppet show Woody's Round Up on Toy Story 2.  His desire to go full circle took him next to George Lucas's ILM, first animating the famed dinosaurs in Jurassic Park 3, then moving on to animate on Yoda along with many other creatures in Star Wars Episode 2.  Mike then spent three years working in the game industry as Lead Animator, the only other entertainment medium he had yet to conquer.  His current mission is to pull over three decades of knowledge and experience into his new production company QuinnZone Studios LLC and already has many exciting film, television and game projects in development.  Lesser known fun facts about Mike Quinn -He is related to Maureen O’Sullivan (Jane in the classic Tarzan movies of the 1930’s) and her daughter Mia Farrow. His Irish Grandmother and Maureen were first cousins       <p style="font-family: Helvetica, Arial, Tahoma, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 12px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0);">  <p style="font-family: Helvetica, Arial, Tahoma, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 12px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0);">  <p style="font-family: Helvetica, Arial, Tahoma, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 12px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0);">  <p style="font-family: Helvetica, Arial, Tahoma, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 12px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0);">              </div>

About Me

2 Campaigns From the launch to the finish line, these were the campaigns you ran to make something happen for your entrepreneurial, cause-related, or creative passions.
19 Comments Engagement is the name of the game when it comes to crowdfunding. Sharing your thoughts on campaigns can help campaigners and strengthen the Indiegogo community.
3 Contributions Whether you contributed a little or a lot, this number signifies the times you helped support someone else’s idea, project, or goal.

Verifications

This person has not yet verified their account with any social networks.

Find Me On