This page contains affiliate links. We may earn commissions when readers interact with or purchase items through these links. For more information, see our affiliate disclosures here.
There are many famous voice actors in the Transformers universe. Obviously, Peter Cullen (Optimus Prime and Ironhide), Frank Welker (Megatron, Soundwave, Galvatron and the cassettes), and Chris Latta (Starscream, Sparkplug and Wheeljack) are nothing less than iconic but for many fans Gregg Berger is just as legendary. Gregg has a very extensive resume but he's best known to Transformers fans as the voice of Skyfire, Outback, Long Haul and of course GRIMLOCK from the G1 Sunbow cartoon.
Gregg has been a very busy man in 2009, headlining at not one but THREE major conventions this year. The first was at Botcon 2009 in Pasadena, CA this May. I had the honor of being granted an interview with Mr. Berger at that time and he was a true class act. The topics included the most unusual items he has ever autographed, a breakdown of some of his current projects and of course some reminiscing about the old Sunbow cartoon among other things. You may read that interview here.
Roughly 2 weeks ago, Gregg was also one of the featured guests at the world famous San Diego Comic Con. While at SDCC, Gregg again took some extra time out for an interview, this time with newsarama.com. Gregg kindly voices his opinions on the Shout Factory! G1 boxset and the live action Transformers movies, and of course a lot more. You may view the entire interview here.
Headlining at those 2 conventions would be impressive enough but Mr. Berger's appearance schedule still has one major stop ahead. This time, he will be heading to the United Kingdom for Europe's largest Transformers Convention, Auto Assembly 2009. The staff here at Seibertron.com would like to applaud Gregg for everything he has done and continues to do for the many Transformers fans all over the world. Those of us who have been lucky enough to meet him feel very honored for that opportunity. The fans attending AA2009 are in for a treat, to say the least!
For more information on Gregg Berger, you may visit his official website and his myspace page. For serious booking inquiries, you may contact his representative Emily Danyel of Tri-Booking Management at emily@tribooking.com and at 1 (310) 497-7994.
Seibertron.com - If you like Transformers, you'll love us!
Seibertron.com news crew member (and resident motorcycle enthousiast) Skowl recently spoke with Will Kenefick, the owner of RetroSBK, and the creator of the three Arcee motorbikes (Arcee, Chromia & Flareup) from Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen about his experience working on the Transformers movie sequel.
Mr. Keneficks provides some behind-the-scenes details of his experience working with Dreamworks and Michael Bay - and what it was like to have his work become firmly established as part of the Transformers universe. He also reveals that some pieces from one of the bikes will be put up for auction, and the money will go to charity - so stay tuned to seibertron.com for more on that!
Thank you to William Kenefick and his staff for granting us the interview!
Skowl: How long have you been building custom bikes?
RetroSBK: I built my first custom bike at 7 years old with the help of my father, but my first REAL custom bike was named Isabella, in 1996. She was a Ducati Monster 900, and won the Del Mar Concours d’elegance.
Chromia - Suzuki B-King
Skowl: How and when were you approached about working on Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen?
RetroSBK: Early in 2008, with a phone call. I spent the first five minutes of the call trying to figure out who was pulling my leg. They had seen my work in a magazine.
Skowl: How much did you know about Transformers beforehand?
RetroSBK: I grew up playing with the Transformers toys and watching the cartoons. Loved them when I was a kid, but when I discovered girls and cars and motorbikes, I think all that went out the window. I hadn’t even seen the first movie, after having been so disappointed with some of the other adaptations from my youth. Needless to say, I watched it, and loved it, the day after my first meeting with Dreamworks.
Skowl: Is this the first time your bikes have been used in a movie?
RetroSBK: No, bikes I have built have been used in other movies and television shows in the past.
Skowl: Does your company have any forthcoming marketing tie-ins that relate to the Transformers film?
RetroSBK: Dreamworks and Michael Bay are extremely protective about the characters in the movie, and rightfully so. We don’t have any direct tie ins with the movie, however they have been very accommodating with any requests we have had. All in all this is a VERY enthusiastic group of people, and they take the TF2 brand very seriously.
Skowl: What information, if any, were you given about the bike characters before you started working on them? Rumour is the bike characters were meant to combine but it was cut from the film, were you told about that?
RetroSBK: I was given pretty much the low down on the bikes and the big plan for them. I cant comment on any rumors about the bikes or what they may or may not do.
Arcee - Ducati 848
Skowl: We know you and your team worked long hours to get the bikes finished on time. How difficult was this project compared to your usual work?
RetroSBK: These bikes are more of a styling exercise, where the normal bikes we build are much more performance oriented. Our last bike was built in 4 weeks for my television series, taking more than 400 man hours to complete. The unique thing for me was these really were the first bikes with such unreal paint, and so much graphic detail. Our painter, Chris Wood, from AirTrix came up with new techniques just to do these bikes.
Skowl: What was your level of involvement in the process? Were you given creative liberties with the look of the motorcycles, or was it strictly a "build this for us" thing?
RetroSBK: We weren’t given any, but we still took some. Having our painter, who is the best in the world, we were able to do things that the guys who work in CGI full time couldn’t believe were possible. Usually the CG is far beyond the ability of the real world, but not in this case.
We did work on other scenes in the movie, supplying many of the bikes in the “Mikes Custom Cycles” scene with Meagan Fox painting the bike. That was another scene where we brought in our painter, Chris Wood, to consult, and he worked the entire day teaching her how to airbrush and setting up the shot. Funny part is that in the “goofs” sections on the IMDB website, it says that the airbrush is being held sideways and wouldn’t work, but it’s a very special airbrush that Chris actually uses, and works on its side, just as he showed her to use.
There were other things we had our hand in as well, and it was a great time, and a great way to express ourselves.
Skowl: How do you feel about the motorbikes being female Transformers?
RetroSBK: Its great! How could you not like a beautiful, fast woman! Even if she is made out fo metal...
Skowl: Were you disappointed by the little amount of screen time your motorcycles had in the movie?
RetroSBK: Actually, I was quite happy with it. Knowing where the movie was shot, and where it takes place, the bikes play a pivotal role in the opening sequence, and have the most beautiful shot in the entire movie, the dolly around the newly introduced characters. That shot really showed just how beautiful the bikes came out. Motorcycles don’t go to well on the desert sand, so I knew the time would be limited, but there is always TF3!
Skowl: We heard Michael Bay say he wanted to kill-off the bike characters because he didn't like them - how did that make you feel?
RetroSBK: I thought it was awesome! I knew how much he liked the bikes, he really went out of his way to tell me how pleased he was with the bikes in person, so I knew he was doing his thing about keeping the fans on their toes.
I got to hang our with Bay, under his canopy in Bethlehem, and it was a great experience. He actually inspired me to direct, and produce, both of which I have started to do in film and television. Despite his reputation, he is a genuine guy, and a perfectionist. Bring him perfection and he is thrilled, anything less doesn’t meet with his approval, and you suffer the wrath of Bay!
Skowl: We've seen plenty of the other new Transformers vehicles (Trax, Beat, Volt, Stingray concept) in car shows and photo ops leading up the film's release - but we never saw the bikes anywhere, why is that?
RetroSBK: We worked VERY hard to keep it that way. The ONLY thing that wasn’t leaked in the movie, the ONLY real surprise was Arcee. It was great! In that part of it, reading the forums, and the speculation about the bikes and some of the plot lines about them was awesome, I loved it. The best part was the huge amount of mis-information that was out there about the bikes. Honestly, they generated such an enormous amount of press pre-release that it made it really hard to hide.
Flareup - MV Augusta F4
Skowl: Do you know how Michael Bay felt about doing action scenes with motorbikes? Bikes can be very dangerous, were you comfortable with the stunt crew pushing your bikes to such limits?
RetroSBK: The real limits that these bikes keep are MUCH higher than the stunt guys can push them to on the set. These are race bred motorcycles, and I have ridden each of them on the track and street, although not THESE bikes. You can go MUCH harder and much faster than the camera can get to do the stunt orient shots. I think Bay was enamored with the bikes from the get go, and wanted to use them more, but the story takes on a life of its own and just grows and grows. So some of the “good stuff” gets trimmed for other “good stuff.”
Skowl: Speaking of pushing the bikes to the limit, we heard about one of the motorcycles crashing while filming in Bethlehem, PA - what happened?
RetroSBK: It was just a simple low speed miscue. No one was hurt, but maybe a bit shaken up. Part of riding is falling down sometimes, and the rider wasn’t quite prepared. Quite a bit of damage was done to the bike, but it was quickly fixed, and we had a backup bike as well. We actually have the crash damaged pieces of the bike, and will be auctioning them off for charity and other fund raisers over the next few months. A good chance to own a bit of the REAL movie and help some great causes, like the Pediatric Brain Tumor foundation.
Skowl: Have you seen any of the Hasbro toys based on your bikes yet? What do you think of them? One of them has a Burger King kids meal toy, what do you think of that?
RetroSBK: I think the toys are awesome! We did use some special race type parts on the bikes, Leo Vince Exhaust, SpeedyMoto triple clamps and race parts, CRG levers, and Pirelli tires. They carried over most of the parts to the toys and the models, which is great to all of us!
Skowl: And finally, who is your favorite Transformers character?
According to a post by TFW2005.com member Alienbot, Empire Magazine will be featuring a piece on Transformers Revenge of the Fallen Director Michael Bay in its September 2009 issue.
Michael Bay was quoted in the post as saying this about the possible introduction of the Dinobots for Transformers 3:
"They've never been discussed [for inclusion]" stated Bay. "I don't like them. Actually, I hate them."
Could the director of the 10th most domestically grossing film in movie history be throwing us an early "misinformation" loop well before production of the third film begins? Let us know what you think by clicking Discuss this topic above.
Keep your optics locked, right here at Seibertron.com, your Ultimate Transformers Resource!
IGN has posted an interview with Transformers comic legend Simon Furman concerning the previously reported comic series Transformers Nefarious. We've posted a portion of the interview for you here:
IGN Comics: How did this project come about?
Simon Furman: It had its origins in the series I was doing at the moment for IDW called Tales of the Fallen. One of the issues of that features the character called Ravage from the movie. While we were pulling that story together, we threw in some elements there of some kind of mysterious conspiracy that's maybe human-led or maybe some other Transformer-based organization. They're kind of pitting themselves against the Transformers. So we laid some very loose seeds in there. And thereafter we started talking about expanding that into its own series.
IGN Comics: Is this being planned as a mini-series or an ongoing?
Furman: It's a mini-series. We're looking at either five or six issues. But we have yet to pace it out into its respective parts. But it'll be a self-contained series.
In an exclusive interview at Rotten Tomatoes, Transformers movie producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura sat down and talked about some issues that were raised with Transformers Revenge of the Fallen and the possibility of certain characters making an appearance in Transformers 3.
Di Bonaventura was very open about certain questions regarding ROTF, such as movie critic reviews and how the twins characters ,Skids and Mudflap, have been met with certain distaste.
Di Bonavetura said,"Everybody has to put their own lens on these things. The intention was certainly not how some people perceived it... I'll put it that way."
He also said some things about the planetformer Unicron being in the third installment of the franchise and the introduction of minicons. You'll have to read the interview to see what he said though. You can see it by clicking here.
The Transformers Hispanos boards have posted an interview that they conducted with Transformers comic book scribe/historian/fan, Simon Furman.
Check out the translated version of what Simon had to say here.
A few excerpts:
"5. You always seem to have a lot on your plate! So what other projects are you working on right now? Any news or teasers you can throw in about The Thirteen?
SF) The Thirteen is probably not going to happen for a while, as it’s become more of a Hasbro thing than an IDW thing, and Hasbro need to crystallise the whole concept before it can be turned into a comic book. I think and hope it will still happen, as it’s a story I’d dearly love to tell, but I have no firm grasp or when or in what form it will eventually see print. Other than that, I’m working on Tales of the Fallen for IDW, Transformers UK vol 2 for Titan, Starcraft for Wildstorm, a movie script and I have two books out in June: Transformers: The Movie Universe and Rad Robots."
"7. I usually say you are to Transformers what Straczynski was to Spider-man (you made it look fresh again and more mature than it had been before). My little brother calls you “the Chris Claremont of Transformers” and I think you can understand why. I read somewhere that you’ve actually been influenced by Claremont’s X-men multiple subplots...
SF) Yeah, I got a lot out of Claremont’s X-Men run. Mostly how well he managed multiple characters and sub-plots, something I’ve applied to my Transformers work as much as I can ever since. I always love to have other storylines building in the background while the main action is unfolding. The sense of brooding mysterious things to come helps maintain momentum in a monthly comic, I think. But right from the get-go, I never tried to tell anything but ‘mature’ stories in what was primarily a kid’s comic. I hated dumb or lazy storytelling when I was a kid and reading comics, so I wasn’t going to inflict that on my audience."
"14. Now, saw this somewhere else and liked how it turned out so let’s do some word association if that’s ok with you.
- Beast Wars – Bob Forward, lovely chap and he really got me going on the TV animation side of things.
- Animated – Fun! I like their dumb, lovestruck Dinobots.
- Grimlock – Greg Berger, another lovely chap.
- Nemesis Prime - Badass
- G2 – Some of the most fun I’ve had in the many worlds of Transformers.
- WW Age of Wrath – Unfinished business!"
See the rest of the interview translated to English here.
Seibertron.com for all of your Transformers news and resource needs.
In an interview that was conducted by the Film School Rejects just days after the worldwide release of Transformers Revenge of the Fallen, film scribes Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman spoke about the plethora of projects they've been involved in and how they don't control every aspect of what happens in the films that they write.
An excerpt from the interview: FLJ: ...I heard that the gold tooth was [Director Michael] Bay’s idea, but do you have anything to say to people who found The Twins offensive?
Orci: Number one, we sympathize. Yes, the gold tooth was not in the script. That’s true.
Kurtzman: It’s really hard for us to sit here and try to justify it. I think that would be very foolish, and if someone wants to be offended by it, it’s their right. We were very surprised when we saw it, too, and it’s a choice that was made. I think if anything it shows you that we don’t control every aspect of the movie.
FLJ: Were you offended by them?
Kurtzman: I wasn’t thrilled. I certainly wasn’t thrilled.
Orci: Same reaction. I’m not easily offended, but when I saw it, I thought, ‘Someone’s gonna write about that.’”
The rest of the interview really gives you an idea of just how bogged down the two writers were with the multiple projects they faced and how they tried to tackle each the best they could. You can view the entire interview by clicking here.
Check out Seibertron.com's galleries and Vector Sigma Database information of the original Generation One versions of these toys. The Combaticons (Bruticus), and Cassettes Steeljaw, Ramhorn, Ratbat, and Slugfest.
Also updated is an interview with Hishashi Yuki, Transformers designer responsible for such Revenge toy designs as the Fallen, the Twins, and Scalpel.
But be sure to check out Seibertron.com's Revenge of the Fallen toy galleries for even more details to compare to the Japanese versions of these figures.
Seibertron.com for all of your Transformers news and resource needs.
Our friend Stan Bush has informed us of a video interview he did that has been recently posted online. The interview was with Electric Playground and was filmed at Botcon '09 in Pasadena, California.
Watch the video to find out what so many of us already know - Stan Bush is a true class act.
For the best Transformers news coverage in the universe, keep your optics locked to Seibertron.com!
The Film Yap has posted an interview with Scott Farrar the Visual Effects Supervisor for both Transformers (2007) and Transformers Revenge of The Fallen.
With effects work on 38 films to his credit, you’d be hard-pressed to find a more seasoned effects man than Scott Farrar. After accepting an invitation to the set of “Star Wars,” Farrar saw the first motion control system in action. Inspired, he embarked on a career that would see him work on some of the most groundbreaking effects films in history.
Five times nominated for an Academy Award (he won in 1986 for his work on “Cocoon”), his resume also includes work on “Return of the Jedi” “”Star Trek: The Motion Picture” and its sequel, “The Wrath of Khan,” “Who Framed Roger Rabbit,” “Jurassic Park,” “Men in Black,” “Minority Report,” “Deep Impact,” and “Star Wars: Episode I.”
As Visual Effects Supervisor on both “Transformers” films, Farrar continues to work on the cutting edge of visual effects. I caught up with him to discuss his work, how effects have changed over the years, and working with Michael Bay.
JS: Let’s start off by talking about the improvements over the first film.
SF: Sure. You’ll see in this film there are a lot of refinements. The robots look better, the details are better. We tried to move further into a more realistic style of lighting this time. If you know effects, you know the lighting is hard to do with something like robots, especially these that have a lot of refined surfaces. The action is better too, and we learned quite from the last film about what to do and what not to do. As you know, there are a lot of sequences shot on IMAX cameras, where the resolution is eight times larger than a normal camera. The sharpness and overall look a lot better. As a result at one point you see a full-sized Optimus Prime. It’s going to be thrilling. IMAX is designed for big sequences like this, and I think we’ve met the challenge and then some.. We’ve really pushed the envelope with this film quite a bit.
* Price and quantities subject to change. Shipping costs, taxes and other fees not included in cost shown. Refer to listing for current price and availability.
![[Valid RSS]](/images/rss/valid-rss.png "Validate Seibertron.com's RSS feed"){kind=small}
