Mitchell Drain’s expertise in the visual effects industry spans over 30 years. He is an inventive, adaptable VFX Supervisor with an impressive résumé in features, episodics, and limited series long-form entertainment. The depth and range of his work is remarkable. Mitchell has successfully led visual effects teams on some of the biggest feature films like “National Treasure” as well as several award-winning episodics for HBO, Netflix, TNT, NBC, ABC and Sony Pictures Television.
Mitchell is currently on production for Marvel’s “Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.”
For the HBO hit series “Westworld,” Mitchell instilled his visual effects expertise across multiple seasons and episodes, leading effects, robots and set environments with VFX Producer Elizabeth Castro and VFX Supervisor Jay Worth. Mitchell was on set for Marvel’s “Jessica Jones: A Netflix Original,” leading effects work alongside showrunner Melissa Rosenberg. During the course of his episodics career, Mitchell also supervised visual effects, including environments, explosions and pyrotechnics for additional Netflix shows, including “Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events” and “Sense8,” and HBO’s highly acclaimed series “True Detective.”
The Chicago native began his career as a matte painter and animator before transitioning to compositing to 2D Supervisor. Mitchell’s talent and reputation within the VFX community grew quickly and he soon was tapped for the key role of visual effects supervisor.
Mitchell’s specialty is real-world visual effects with a focus on work relatable to global audiences everywhere. When on set, he is the director’s and studio’s partner with a keen eye for detail to ensure that the work is photographically correct and grounded in reality. An excellent problem-solver, he loves the challenge of synthesizing abstract concepts into fully-realized, well-structured visual effects. Mitchell’s mastery and command of the visual effects craft has won him an Emmy award for Outstanding Special Visual Effects on “Westworld” in 2017. His other notable work includes “The Nun,” “Kong: Skull Island” and “Downsizing.”
Now part of the talented Digital Domain studio, Mitchell’s goal as a leader in visual effects, is to make the impossible, possible by creating seamless and memorable images for the screen, no matter what the size.