Biography

Rich Thorne was born in New York City and moved to Los Angeles at age ten. Upon graduation with a degree from the Film School at Cal State Northridge, Rich Thorne began his film career as an editor and compositor for The Post Group, working with Ampex Corp, Quantel Corp and Abekas Video Systems to design and build the early predecessors to today's CG compositing and graphics systems. With CG, compositing, and paint system technologies, Thorne designed systems and techniques that allowed television shows like Star Trek: The Next Generation, Max Headroom and Pee-wee's Playhouse to be shot on film and with visual effects composited on video. This made it possible to bring high-end visual effects to the television industry at a significantly lower cost with faster turn-around than traditional optical visual effects techniques.

Star Trek veterans Peter Lauritsen, Dan Curry, Rob Legato and Fred Chandler approached Thorne and The Post Group in 1984 to attempt to recreate select VFX shots from the film Star Trek: Wrath of Khan (previously done for the film release using optical VFX techniques by George Lucas' ILM). Upon successful seamless replication of these shots using photography and motion control elements from the original film, The Post Group completed the shots using their proprietary techniques, and was awarded all of the VFX work on ST:TNG and all subsequent Star Trek series for years to come. Thorne eventually left The Post Group to form Digital Magic and continued the Star Trek VFX work there. During Thorne's tenure, The Post Group and Digital Magic were also well known for using the same techniques and systems for hundreds of high-tech national commercials and music videos for major recording artists such as Michael Jackson, Paul McCartney, Madonna, Prince, and Joni Mitchell, among many others. Both houses provided special effects for numerous television shows, specials, and major motion pictures. Thorne taught a course called "Techniques of Visual Effects for Television" at UCLA from 1984-1995.

From 1996-2006, Thorne was Senior Vice President of Production at 20th Century Fox. During this time Thorne also directed films, including A Midsummer Night's Dream, Dude, Where's My Car, X-Men, Dr. Dolittle 2, and the critically acclaimed independent feature, Mother Ghost, a film about a man dealing with the loss of his mother, starring KLOS-FM radio personality Mark Thompson. This film went on to win Thorne two Best Director awards at the Great Lakes and Marco Island Film Festivals, and also won Thorne and Thompson Best Narrative Feature awards at the Long Beach Film Festival, the Marco Island Film Festival, and the Ojai Film Festival. Thorne continued to direct 2nd Unit action units for 20th Century Fox on Black Knight and the acclaimed aerial action unit sequences on Behind Enemy Lines. He was Visual Effects Supervisor and action unit 2nd Unit Director on Fox's Blockbuster Daredevil and also League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Dragonball Evolution, The Pyramid, and Hitman: Agent 47.

As of June 2016, Thorne is Chair of the Producing Department at the Los Angeles campus of the New York Film Academy. He is a current member of the Director's Guild of America and the Producer's Guild of America. Other Facts: His name appeared on an Okudagram in the ST:TNG fifth season episode Violations. He is "Perfect Neighbor Rich," a recurring character on KLOS-FM's now archived Mark and Brian morning radio show. His son is Justin Joseph "JJ" Thorne, the musical artist and performer formerly in the bands NLT and One Call.
- IMDb mini biography by: Rebecca Markman

His son is Justin Joseph "JJ" Thorne from the band NLT.