Refinery have announced that they are becoming even finer. The post and VFX house have signed two senior talents to the team; Online Flame Artist Eddie Addinall and VFX Producer Tracy-Lee Portnoi. The duo will be coming on board to bolster the company’s commercial VFX offering.

With Refinery seeing a growing demand for local commercial VFX work, Eddie Addinall and Tracy-Lee Portnoi will be bringing their knowledge and technical expertise to grow the VFX department into the commercial space. Online Flame Artist Eddie will be working collaboratively with the rest of the Refinery departments to creatively drive and lead the team in finishing commercials, while the company will of course be continuing their episodic and long-form work.

Head of VFX at Refinery, Rory Mark, says of the signing: ‘When the pressure is on and you’re playing at the top level, finishing the top work, you need a top team. The people are more important than the machines here and seeing such industry veterans such as Eddie and Tracy-Lee leading the online commercial charge for us is really exciting. Our departments will now work complimentary with each other as part of a symbiotic creative partnership to offer the highest quality of work.’

Eddie Addinall comes to Refinery with over 27 years of experience as an Online Flame Artist and one of the most established in South Africa. Eddie is no stranger to the team at Refinery though, as he began his journey in post alongside Rory Mark. Eddie has built a prestigious career working at some of the biggest and most established post houses in the country on a significant range of projects including those for Heineken, KFC, Flying Fish, Amazon, Golf GTI, Investec, McDonald’s and Santam. He’s also collaborated with some of the most established directors. Eddie joined Black Ginger over 14 years ago and has worked alongside Producer Tracy-Lee Portnoi for over 9 of those years.

Eddie says: ‘For me, the move to Refinery is like coming home to family again. These are people I have known for so long, and including my long-time collaborator Tracy-Lee, these truly are people that I will walk through fire for. Relationships built on complete and utter trust are so important in our game, especially if you are working under immense pressure. I’m really excited to take on a lot more local commercial work here and collaborate with the rest of the talented team.’

For Visual Effects Producer Tracy-Lee Portnoi, joining Refinery is exactly like coming home. She actually began her career with the company over two decades ago, ‘When they were still at the Longkloof Studios.’ she says. Since then, she has established herself as a top VFX producer working on high-end commercials, features and documentaries both locally and internationally. ‘I so admire the team at Refinery, an absolute joy to work with such professionals at the top of their game. I think Flame dovetails perfectly into the rest of the toolset that Refinery already offers and the synergy between the teams to give clients and agencies a full online and finishing offering is really exciting.’ Says Tracy-Lee.

Refinery Did That

Apart from welcoming some heavy hitters to the talent roster, what have the team at Refinery been up to? Well, the last time we checked in they had just been nominated for an Oscar for ‘Best Documentary Feature’ AND a Bafta for ‘Best Documentary’ for My Octopus Teacher. The fame seems to have only fuelled their fire because aside from building an epic new website, the team have also had their hand in some jaw-dropping projects. Below are some of our favourite projects to come out of the Refinery stable in the past year.