The Story of VAD

VAD grew out of Ricardo Contreras’ work across storyboarding, concept design, creature effects, visual development, and virtual art direction for film and television. Over more than two decades, that experience increasingly centered on a recurring challenge: helping creative ideas move clearly from intention to image, and from image into production.

Around 2020, VAD developed into a collaborative studio model, bringing together artists and technical specialists to work across visual development, digital sets, characters, environments, and production visualization. This period expanded the practice and strengthened its ability to connect artistic development with the practical needs of art departments, construction, VFX, and post-production.

Today, VAD has evolved into a more focused and flexible visual development and production visualization practice. Rather than operating as a fixed full-service studio, VAD builds the appropriate workflow around each project, working directly with directors, production designers, producers, art departments, and VFX teams, and bringing in specialized collaborators when needed.

We’re a great team of artists who follow the VAD way.….