Phil Tippett Closes Historic Berkeley Studio After Nearly 40 Years

Fans, collectors, and former employees lined up outside 914 Grayson Street in Berkeley, California, to browse hundreds of items from a four-decade legacy of practical effects work as the historic workshop was emptied of its stop-motion models, production equipment, and memorabilia. The inventory offered to the public featured props and artwork from legendary cinematic titles including Starship Troopers (1997), RoboCop (1987), and the original Star Wars trilogy according to detailed sale listings.

The Bankruptcy, PhantomFX Acquisition, and Corporate Evolution

The physical closure marks the end of an era for the workshop founded in 1984 by Phil Tippett and his wife, Jules Roman. The wind-down of the Berkeley headquarters follows financial restructuring linked to an acquisition agreement struck in 2024 with the Indian visual effects company PhantomFX, which subsequently filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection that May.

A reorganization plan was confirmed in April 2025, and PhantomFX completed its purchase in July of that year as reported across industry tracking. Despite the shuttering of the landmark California workshop where decades of physical effects were engineered, the corporate entity itself remains operational.

“We have recently decided to evolve our physical footprint and production approach, and to exit our longtime Berkeley facility. As we make this transition, Tippett Studio continues its visual effects and animation work across film, television and entertainment.”

Tippett Studio, via social media statement

The company clarified on its official social media accounts that its Toronto office continues operations under new ownership, with active production underway on a large feature film referenced as potentially titled Sentinel. Management noted that while stop-motion remains an integral part of its creative toolkit, maintaining a permanent physical plant of that scale is no longer necessary, relying instead on external stages and fabrication houses as specific project demands dictate.

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Auction Floor Recollections and Saved Academy Awards

Among the items offered during the August 28–30, 2026 liquidation event were artist-proof AT-AT models from The Empire Strikes Back (1980), miniatures from Mad God (2021), signed promotional posters, and three models tied to the Dejarik chess sequence in the original Star Wars (1977) alongside heavy studio infrastructure like 3D printers, welding gear, and toolboxes.

Former staffers and local residents converged on the warehouse space to secure pieces of cinematic history. Kevin K., who worked at the Berkeley facility around 1989, browsed the floor where he once helped build physical assets including iconic jeeps for Jurassic Park (1993). Michael Wong, a Berkeley resident attending the sale, picked up a rare vintage movie poster from the catalog.

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“I’d get a little twinge of regrets sometimes. But I don’t have any place to put anything. And I really don’t like to have my work stuff in the house.”

Phil Tippett, animator

While hundreds of physical props found new homes, the 74-year-old filmmaker ensured his highest honors stayed off the auction block. Tippett kept the two Academy Awards he won for his landmark contributions to Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi (1983) and Jurassic Park (1993).

“They’re the big-ticket items and they were the most significant moments in my journey.”

Phil Tippett, animator

From Go-Motion Pioneering to the CG Era

The closure brings down the curtain on a workshop that helped bridge the gap between classical practical artistry and modern digital filmmaking. After breaking out with the holographic chess game in the original Star Wars (1977), Tippett helped develop go-motion—an evolutionary step in stop-motion animation incorporating motion blur—which was deployed in films like Dragonslayer (1981).

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His career-defining pivot arrived during the production of Jurassic Park, where his team was initially hired to build stop-motion dinosaur puppets before cinema transitioned heavily toward computer-generated imagery. Tippett’s physical instincts and stop-motion acumen proved instrumental in helping translate traditional techniques into the emerging medium of CG animation, a foundational contribution that shaped creature design for decades.

Over the ensuing years, the studio contributed to projects ranging from Starship Troopers and The Matrix films to the Twilight series, while Tippett spent decades on and off completing his personal stop-motion masterpiece Mad God, which premiered at Locarno in 2021.

Future Outlook for the Effects Pioneer

“I will die with my sword in my hand. We had almost a 40-year run. It was a good run.”

Phil Tippett, animator