Richard Vander Wende

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In 1986, Richard Vander Wende went to work at Industrial Light and Magic (ILM), working on projects like Willow and Innerspace as a concept designer. Partly because of a fondness for the old Disney films, Vander Wende next took a position at Walt Disney Feature Animation. His early visual development for Aladdin was the spark that led directors Ron Clements and John Musker to choose that story as the subject for their next film. Vander Wende eventually became Production Designer for the film.

Following his stint at Disney, Vander Wende became interested in the potential of computer games as a medium for telling a different kind of story. After a chance meeting with Robyn Miller, he began working at Cyan (currently, Cyan Worlds) and eventually became co-director and co-designer of the computer game Riven; the sequel to Myst. His more cinematic visual influence is clearly seen throughout the Riven world. His wife Kate had a cameo appearance in the game as Leira/Keta.

After the successful launch of Riven, Vander Wende left Cyan to pursue other projects.

[edit] External links

• Richard Vander Wende's personal website
• Richard Vander Wende at the Internet Movie Database
• WIRED magazine - Riven cover story
• Feature Creatures, an newspaper interview