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People
Making Monsters
Special e ects artist Tate Steinsiek followed a childhood passion into adulthood success.
Special e ects (SFX) and prosthetic makeup are some of the most integral parts of lmmaking, especially when it comes to horror and science ction. Tate Steinsiek, a native Oklahoman, is a master of the craft, working on everything from small budget horror icks all the way up to e Amazing Spider-Man.
“Monsters and imagination were a big part of my childhood,” says Steinsiek, citing the Michael Jackson music video for “ riller” as a major impetus for his obsession. He particularly loved the special features interview with Rick Baker on how he created and applied the makeup for the iconic music video.
“ is was a game changing moment,” says Steinsiek, “when I realized that making monsters was possible.”
Steinsiek left Oklahoma after high school and took a class under Tom Savini, a groundbreaking special e ects artist baed in Pittsburgh, Pa.
“Towards the end of my rst semester, Tom gave me a script called Zombie Honeymoon. Tom was retired from FX and acting full time, so he asked if I wanted to take a look at it,” he says.
Working on the lm in New Jersey, he instantly fell in love with the process.
“I’d never seen such a complex machine at work; it was beyond inspiring,” he says. us began a fruitful career.
After a decade in New York, Steinsiek found himself called back to Oklahoma to open his studio, Ill Willed Productions.
“I anticipated my studio being the home base for the creation of things, and I’d y out for execution,” he explains. “To my great surprise, I returned to nd Oklahoma alive with a creative community, and a lot of lms shooting in and around the state. at was nearly ten years ago, and seeing the progress since has only con rmed that coming home and joining the local creative movement was 100% the right move for me.”
Steinsiek has garnered his fair share of career highlights, including two stints on the SyFy reality series Face O , as well as a 2019 Saturn Award nomination for “Best Practical Makeup E ects” for the lm Dragged Across Concrete.
“I was competing with Marvel lms – it was absolutely bananas,” he says. “Clearly Avengers won the award, but as they say, it was an honor just to be in the same conversation as artists like Mike Marino and Bill Corso.”
In 2019, Steinsiek also directed a horror lm titled Castle Freak, a reboot of the 1995 original.
“We shot on location in Albania,” he says. “I only thought I had experienced the true meaning of ‘challenging’. Try directing a lm with a DP [director of photography] that speaks literally zero English. ings got creative!”
Steinsiek was thrilled to make it to the end of shooting.
“It was a sunrise, and we were all standing outside in the courtyard of a twothousand year old mountain top fortress looking at the open sky,” he says. “We watched the sun come up, passed around a bottle of Raki and celebrated. It was a fantastic experience.”
More recently, Tulsa’s independent theatre, Circle Cinema, honored Steinsiek on its Walk of Fame.
“It was such an insane complete circle in my life, ttingly at Circle Cinema,” he says. “Plus, I’m only feet away from Chuck Norris’ medallion and that alone is life changing.”
As for advice on getting into the special e ects industry, Steinsiek says you should always be practicing.
“You have to be patient and learn the process, but these days, there are volumes of options out there,” he says.
He also recommends getting on set early and often.
“ e experience of interacting with a crew and nding your place in that machine,” he says, “is the most valuable education you can get in lm.”
DREW JOSEPH ALLEN
Tate Steinsiek creates a variety of ghoulish characters in his Tulsa-based studio, Ill Willed Productions. Photos by Stephanie Phillips
