Henson Creature Store Innovator David Barrington Holt Passes at 79

David Barrington Holt, whose modern work on the Jim Henson Firm result in the creation of the Henson Efficiency Management System, which enabled operation of subtle, computer-driven puppets by a single individual, handed away from most cancers at age 79. David’s son Chris Holt shared with following obituary:

David Barrington Holt died on March 13, 2024, of issues arising from most cancers. Born in England in June of 1945, David was a person of many skills and experiences. He was an knowledgeable in sensible and inventive issues, and his skilled life spanned a number of careers: restoration of English nation houses, making of museum-quality fashions and miniatures, manufacturing administration, trend, and psychotherapy.

David acquired his BA in Industrial Design with honors from London’s College of the Arts in 1963.  Even within the early levels of his profession, his skills have been acknowledged; he was courted by each London’s Royal Faculty of Artwork and British Rail, amongst others. 

Over the subsequent 20 years he constructed a repute as a designer, photographer, modelmaker, and restorer of mechanical antiquities. His purchasers included the London Science Museum, the Better London Council, the Institute of Mechanical Engineers, and quite a few different companies and personal people each in England and overseas. In 1984 he based Hero Fashions, which equipped fashions, miniatures, and hero results for the TV, movie, and business industries; one such venture together with re-creating the fly-past of the spacecraft GIOTTO and Halley’s comet for the movie Kids of the Mud.  

Amongst many different careers, David owned and operated his personal clothes boutique in London in the course of the ‘60s; on the time he labored alongside famous fashionista Thea Porter.  Within the late ‘80s, he returned to highschool to change into licensed as a psychological therapist and ran a profitable observe till he was scouted by the Jim Henson Firm.  Even whereas devoting appreciable time to his psychotherapy training, he by no means stopped making; he was even commissioned by the London Science Museum to assemble an working mannequin of a Thames Flood Barrier pier, which stays on show to this present day.  It was throughout this time he met and married his spouse.

In 1986 he started a 23-year collaboration with the Jim Henson Firm, first within the UK as Deputy Supervisor of the Creature Store earlier than shifting as much as Artistic Supervisor. In 1993 he made the transfer to Los Angeles to ascertain and function the Henson firm’s first west-coast Creature Store for the aim of manufacturing Disney’s tv present Dinosaurs. David had artistic oversight of store operations together with puppetry; animatronics; results for function movies, tv, and commercials; performers; administrative issues; and R&D, with developments within the subject of real-time 3DCG animation. He was instrumental in growth of the ground-breaking Henson Efficiency Management System, which allowed a single performer to function advanced, computer-driven puppets in the identical method as if they have been bodily. His credit embrace George of the Jungle, The Phantom, Indian within the Cabinet, Dr. Dolittle, Jack Frost, Scooby-Doo, Snow Canines, Stuart Little II, Cats and Canines, and The Nation Bears.

Following his a long time with the Henson Firm, David spent three years consulting for Walt Disney Imagineering R&D, the place he assisted within the technical switch of modern animatronic characters into public displays.

David spent the rest of his in depth and different profession working and consulting for corporations, together with the Chiodo Brothers, Insudung Media, 11:11 Artistic, and Reisman Fashions.

Though David was deeply accustomed to laptop expertise and its functions for design, creation, and manufacturing, he was, at coronary heart, a maker. He may design and construct an animatronic rabbit that you’d swear would take a carrot proper out of your hand or a mannequin prepare that, in the event you have been a lot smaller, you possibly can board and experience to the journey of a lifetime.

David was an clever, proficient, beneficiant, artistic, and charming one who was wickedly humorous and all the time variety. He genuinely cared about the way you have been doing and by no means did not cease and hear. A real Renaissance man, he will likely be significantly missed by all who knew him. He’s survived by his spouse and son.

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Dan Sarto is Writer and Editor-in-Chief of Animation World Community.