photo by: Austin Hornbostel/Journal-World

Hamilton Lewis, a visualization supervisor with The Third Floor in Los Angeles, is pictured Monday, May 9, 2022 in Lawrence. The Free State alumnus was in town after wrapping up his work on Marvel's latest film, "Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness."

Hamilton Lewis, a 2005 Free State graduate, is no stranger to helping bring films from concept to life.

Lewis, now a visualization supervisor with The Third Floor in Los Angeles, has been working in Hollywood since he was 22. His first stop after graduating from Ringling College of Art and Design in Florida was a seven-year stint with DreamWorks Animation, but in more recent years the bigger projects he has worked on have been of a certain variety – the high-flying, action-packed superhero films of Marvel Studios. Lewis played a lead role in plotting out the action of Marvel’s latest movie, “Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness,” and spoke to the Journal-World about the experience Monday while visiting Lawrence for the first time since July of 2019.

“Doctor Strange” has been a box-office success so far. According to Variety, it had an opening weekend of $185 million in ticket sales in North America, and the worldwide sales total sat at $450 million and climbing as of Sunday.

Lewis saw “Doctor Strange” here in Lawrence over the weekend with family and friends, and he said it was a great experience to go to the film together. In part, he said, that’s because he got to see how the final product turned out after plenty of time spent laying the foundation for it.

“I love seeing it on screen; that’s actually the best part for me,” Lewis told the Journal-World. “I don’t get to see the final thing all day, every day; I see the building blocks. I get the story, I know the shots, I know the timing and everything like that. But when I go see it with my friends and family, I catch myself thinking ‘Oh man, they added little particles there,’ or ‘Oh, they did this really cool detail thing here and changed that.'”

Playing a role in developing a Marvel film is something Lewis has spoken with the Journal-World about on more than one occasion, both in 2018 after the release of “Avengers: Infinity War” and a year later when “Avengers: Endgame” premiered in 2019.

Lewis was part of the visual effects team for both projects, and that work largely consists of what’s called previsualization. He said that process often entails animating upward of 150 shot variations for one scene that help to plot out where character models will move and how the action will take place visually, including elements like how many cameras will be tracking the live-action pieces and where they’ll be positioned on set.

This time, though, there were some key differences that reflect how things have changed for Lewis — and the world — in the past few years: an increase in responsibility that saw Lewis leading a large team and collaborating with some of the biggest players on set, all while navigating the challenges of the coronavirus pandemic.

Lewis has progressed from previsualization artist to visualization supervisor in the past few years, starting with another Marvel film, “Spider-Man: Far From Home.” He said that has meant less time making art and more time managing a team of dozens of artists. Lewis said being the one actually doing the animating is one aspect he misses, but it comes with some great opportunities to use his experience in a leadership role — during meetings, while interacting with other players on set, or in guiding visual artists.

For “Doctor Strange,” that role also meant Lewis had to travel abroad to London — where much of the movie was filmed — and live there during production for eight months.

It took a while to get there, though. The movie’s production started in October of 2019, but within months the film director switched from Scott Derrickson — the director of Marvel’s first “Doctor Strange” film — to Sam Raimi, the director of the “Spider-Man” trilogy of the mid-2000s. That delayed Lewis’ departure to London until March of 2020, which happened to coincide with the start of the pandemic. He was then stuck in LA until September, when he finally made it across the pond.

Once he got there, the pandemic caused even more change to his team’s work process. Lewis said that typically the previsualization team works together in the same space but for COVID safety had to sit in a Zoom call all day instead, and that’s how he would approve his team’s work.

photo by: Courtesy of Hamilton Lewis

Hamilton Lewis is pictured on the set of “Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness” in London. Lewis told the Journal-World that filming during the pandemic came with plenty of safety protocols; besides working in separate spaces from the rest of his visual effects team, he also had to wear a mask and face shield while on set and test negative for COVID three times per week.

On top of that, Lewis was sitting in on frequent meetings with high-profile superiors like Raimi and visual effects artist Janek Sirrs, who won an Academy Award for best visual effects for “The Matrix,” and spending more time on set talking through the process collaboratively with people like actor Benedict Cumberbatch, who plays the titular Doctor Strange.

“It is really fascinating,” Lewis said. “That’s what I’m looking forward to (doing more), and hoping to get more opportunities in being on set and starting to grow into a visual effects supervisor.”

For now, Lewis said he has something of a lull to look forward to before getting back into the more involved work of managing a project. He’s preparing to interview for a role as visualization supervisor for several upcoming projects. Most upcoming projects are highly secretive by design, complete with code names while in development, but Lewis did drop one small hint for the next one he might play a role in.

“I’m pretty sure it’s going to be marvelous, if you get my drift,” Lewis said. “… But there’s also other projects I’m interviewing for as well, so there’s plenty of excitement and opportunity to come.”

photo by: Marvel

The movie poster for “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness”