Tom Jung
Tom (Thomas) Jung is an American artist best known for his movie poster art. Tom Jung grew up in Boston and attend the School of Museum of Fine Arts. In 1958, after a few years as a freelance illustrator he was hired full-time to redesign advertisement campaigns of foreign films to suit American audiences for Ben Adler Advertising Services Inc., where he worked on Plan 9 From Outer Space and most notably on La Strada, And God Created Woman and helped introduce American audiences to director like Federico Fellini and Roger Vadim.
In 1963, he joined Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, as an art director, and designed posters for Dr. Zhivago, Grand Prix and Ice Station Zebra. Jung selected Howard Terpning to illustrate his concept art for the 1967 re-release of Gone With the Wind. In 1968, Tom Jung was hired by Bill O'Hare to handle the art direction at CBS television network. With the help of able staffer and artist Vincent Marrone, Jung went on to design and illustrate A Man Called Horse, Little Big Man and Le Mans, starring Steve McQueen. In 1971 it was his first major break came with his poster for Papillon. He followed up with poster art for films including The Man Who Would Be king, The Deer Hunter and Apocalypse Now.
In 1977, working for Smolen, Smith and Connolly, motion picture advertising agency as a freelance illustrator, Jung was chosen to design and illustrate the one sheet theatrical poster for one of the most widely acclaimed films ever made, Star Wars. He then worked on 1978, Ralph Bakshi animated version The Lord of the Rings poster, which won first prize for Best Graphic Award in 1978 from the International Society of Science Fiction, Horror and Fantasy. Tom Jung also created art for the now famous Style “B” Theatrical one-sheet poster for The Empire Strikes Back. In 1981 Jung was contacted by Sid Ganis, vice president of marketing at Lucasfilm, to develop concept sketches for their new movie Raiders of the Lost Ark. At the same time the production company, Paramount Pictures, along with advertising agency Diener/Hauser/Bates, were developing the marketing campaign with another illustrator, Richard Amsel, to also develop a marketing campaign. Jung created sixteen concept sketches for the one-sheet, one of which was approved to go to color. Borrowing from his original Papillon artwork, Jung used a "brown sauce" palette and a unique concept to create the iconic character Indiana Jones for his interpretation of the movies Key Art.
Tom Jung did work on several concepts for the release of Return of the Jedi but was only used for the 1985 re-release of the movie as a one-sheet poster. He created art for the Star Wars Heir to the Empire book trilogy.
Starting in 1997 with the Disney film Jungle 2 Jungle, Jung made the Switch to the production side of the business as a storyboard artist. His ability to draw without the use of visual aids, helped him make a smooth transition to storyboarding. Jung's films as a storyboard artist include The Perfect Storm, The Salton Sea, Disturbia, Starsky & Hutch, Ang Lee’s Hulk and Joe Dante’s Looney Tunes Back in Action.
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