Karl Baumgartner (special effects artist)

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Karl Baumgartner (born August 20, 1922 in Munich ; † January 23, 2012 in Brünnighausen ) was a German pyrotechnician in film and one of the most sought-after German special effects technicians (also internationally) after 1945.

Life

Born in Bavaria, he made his first contacts in the film industry shortly after the end of World War II when he was organizing sausage products for the Bavaria studios in Lower Bavaria . He learned his technical film craft under the most important pyrotechnician in German film until 1945, Erwin Lange . Baumgartner supplied productions with gasoline and explosives, which he won from defused aerial bombs. In addition, he trained as a precision mechanic and worked briefly as an aerospace engineer.

After his state examination to become a demolition expert, he was responsible for the pyrotechnic effects - fires, explosions and the like - in Peter Ostermayr's Ganghofer films several times in the 1950s . Baumgartner also worked for American productions shot in Europe from the start. In addition to explosive fireworks in the two world wars themed productions such as Paths to Fame , The Bridge , The Longest Day and Dunkirk, June 2, 1940 , “Charly-Bum-Bum”, as Karl Baumgartner was called in the industry, also created numerous other special effects ( Vehicles falling off rocks, artificial snow and underwater landscapes, storm surges and the like) for cinema films as well as for a large number of television productions ( Tatort , Mathias Kneißl , Wallenstein , Peter the Great ) and opera productions ( Das Rheingold ).

His best-known individual creations include the 300 campfires for Joseph L. Mankiewicz's monumental epic Cleopatra , the bunker explosion in The Longest Day and the air raid on the German naval base in Wolfgang Petersen's Das Boot . In 1992 Baumgartner received the gold film tape for many years of outstanding work in German film.

Filmography

literature

  • Kay Less : The film's great personal dictionary . The actors, directors, cameramen, producers, composers, screenwriters, film architects, outfitters, costume designers, editors, sound engineers, make-up artists and special effects designers of the 20th century. Volume 1: A - C. Erik Aaes - Jack Carson. Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-89602-340-3 , p. 280.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Baumgartner, Karl
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Baumgartner, Charly-Bum-Bum
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German pyrotechnician
DATE OF BIRTH August 20, 1922
PLACE OF BIRTH Munich
DATE OF DEATH January 23, 2012
Place of death Brünnighausen