Neill Blomkamp (; born 17 September 1979) is a South African-Canadian filmmaker. He is best known as the co-writer and director of the science fiction action film District 9, for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay, and the director of the dystopian science fiction action film Elysium, which garnered moderately positive reviews. Blomkamp employs a documentary-style, hand-held, cinéma vérité technique, blending naturalistic and photo-realistic computer-generated effects, and his films often deal with themes of xenophobia and social segregation. He is also known for his collaborations with actor Sharlto Copley. Time named Blomkamp as one of the 100 Most Influential People of 2009. A 2011 article in Forbes named him as the 21st most powerful celebrity from Africa. Early life Blomkamp was born in Johannesburg, South Africa. At the age of sixteen, he met Sharlto Copley, who had also attended Redhill High School in Johannesburg. Copley provided Blomkamp with the use of computers at his production company for Blomkamp to pursue his passion and talent for 3D animation and design. In return, Blomkamp assisted Copley in creating 3D work for pitches on various projects. Blomkamp was 18 when he moved to Vancouver with his family, where he enrolled at the Vancouver Film School. Career In the late 1990s, he started working in the film industry as a special effects artist and 3D animator. His animation credits include Stargate SG-1 (1998), First Wave (1998), Mercy Point (1998) and Aftershock: Earthquake in New York (1999). In 2000, he garnered his first role of lead animator for the Dark Angel TV series (2000). He was the lead 3D animator for 3000 Miles to Graceland (2001). In 2003, he was hired to illustrate photo-realistic future aircraft for Popular Science'''s "Next Century in Aviation". In 2004, he illustrated "The Future of the Automobile". Blomkamp worked as a visual effects artist at The Embassy Visual Effects in Vancouver as well as at Rainmaker Digital Effects, and was signed by Toronto commercial house Spy Films. Blomkamp directed a trilogy of live-action short films in 2007, known collectively as Landfall. They were set in the Halo universe, to promote the release of Halo 3. Blomkamp was then slated to direct his first feature-length film, an adaptation of the Halo series of video games, produced by Peter Jackson. Jackson came to know of Blomkamp after viewing a reel of his commercial work and shorts,