Wesley Snipes visit FDTC, SIMT
Wesley Snipes, left, talks with Leroy Gibson Jr., Director of Student Life at FDTC
Photo Melissa Rollins
By Melissa Rollins, Editor, editor@newsandpress.net
Actor Wesley Snipes encountered quite the crowd when he entered the student center at Florence-Darlington Technical College Tuesday Jan. 23. It was clear that they were expecting him; news of Snipes’ visit spread on social media after FDTC issued a release. He was visiting the college to discuss several ongoing projects that could potentially use the technologies of the Southeastern Institute of Technology and Manufacturing (SiMT).
Before visiting the virtual reality lab and the 3D printing lab, Snipes surprised two classrooms, one full of FDTC students discussing philosophy and the other full of business executives discussing packaging.
When asked what brought him to the SiMT, Snipes said that it was ‘friends (and) opportunity.’
“We’re bringing together technology and entertainment, merging them,” Snipes said. “(We’re working on) new products that incorporate some of the new technologies they are working on here, virtual reality and the like.”
Snipes said that virtual reality and new technology change the game a lot when it comes to making movies.
“It gives you a great opportunity to expand the type of content that you have when you incorporate the technology,” Snipes said. “There are some great models that have already proven the process, you look at Pixar and some of the other things that DreamWorks is doing; we are looking at that for action films and scripted action within the virtual reality space, which is a little more challenging but it is cutting edge.”
Asked for a scoop on upcoming projects, Snipes gladly told the executives about what he has been working on.
“I’ve got two movies coming out and one was shot in the Barco Escape format, which is similar to IMAX; its about 270 degrees,” Snipes said. “That would be (having) your main screen and then a screen to each side. We shot a sci-fi thriller that will be coming out in March, May or so. It is something new, something different; I’ve got to keep creating, keep myself relevant.”
Lindsay Buchanan, the Social Media Listening Center Manager at SiMT, said that the school has enjoyed their conversations with Snipes.
“Dr. Snipes has been awesome to work with,” Buchanan said. “He’s very laid back and down-to-earth. He asks a lot of intelligent questions that help us to see how we can harness our technology at the SiMT to help in the projects that he is working on. We hope that a collaboration with him could turn into something great for the school and also the SiMT, of course, as part of the school.”
As a multi-talented artist, Snipes has a lot of different areas he is working in, Buchanan said.
“We want to help him reach his goals on his projects as he starts pushing them out,” Buchanan said. “He is the host of Project Action Star, his book called Talon of God is coming out in June or July and he also has a movie coming out this year called The Recall.”