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Those out to create the best will want to work with the best, regardless of where they come fromFor thousands of fans here and around the world, the two words Star Wars are pure magic.mini storageAs children, my brother and I played with his rendering of the Rebel base on the snow-covered planet Hoth, which he had made from blocks and flakes of foam.Years later, I went to a party where my colleagues and I re-watched the 1977 movie classic and downed some alcohol each time there was a wipe.A wipe is a way to transition between scenes in a film, and the effect is like that of a windscreen wiper moving across the screen.George Lucas made sweeping use of wipes in his Star Wars films. That though, was a long time ago in a galaxy far far away from the world of today's visual effects, but more on that later.Two of my friends even named their son and daughter after Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia.So last week, when the man who created Star Wars praised the quality of the digital effects and animation being done here in Singapore, when Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong met Darth Vader, unveiled a statue of Yoda and declared at the opening of Lucasfilm's Sandcrawler production facility in Buona Vista: "May the Force be with you," that magic came to life once more.Mr Lucas told the story of how he battled naysayers 10 years ago when he first considered moving some of Lucasfilm's production capacity out of North America to Asia.It would be a first for the company he founded, which today is one of the world's leading entertainment firms, and sceptics within worried the work produced elsewhere would be of inferior quality.He pushed ahead and chose Singapore over India, Taiwan and Japan - even though it meant having to "basically start a whole industry from scratch" - because of generous government support for the training that would be needed, because this is a great place to live and because of "a very liberal immigration policy"."Most importantly, I realised, after 9/11, it was very hard for us to bring people from other countries into the United States, and a lot of the people, the talent, came from outside the United States."And Singapore was very gracious in allowing us a very liberal immigration policy, understanding that you need to bring people from all over the world," he said at the Sandcrawler opening ceremony last Thursday.Today, nine years after Lucasfilm first landed in 2005, the Singapore office has staff of close to 40 nationalities, including Macedonia, China and Argentina.There are 360 people in all, including 130 Singaporeans, and they have produced special effects for blockbusters such as Iron Man, Transformers and The Avengers.Their industry is one of the world's fastest-growing and its value-add to the local economy has grown by over 1.5 times since 2008, to exceed $2 billion.This tale of Singapore partnering a world leader in the field of digital effects to grow an industry from scratch can be spun in so many ways.But let me focus on an issue that has been somewhat under-discussed of late, one that has become almost a taboo subject after the 2011 General Election and the fallout from last year's White Paper on Population - foreign talent.There was a time, slightly over a decade ago, when then Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew used his speeches to drive home the point that foreign talent was crucial to Singapore's success.That still holds true but it has been a while since any political leader dared to say so out loud and in public.The Government has in recent years changed its rhetoric on foreigners, even as it seeks to correct what many now consider to be overly liberal policies on foreign manpower.The focus this year is on a national jo儲存s bank and a framework to get companies to consider Singaporeans first for professional, managerial, executive and technical jobs.After complaints that locals are being undercut by foreigners willing to work for less, the minimum salaries for hiring skilled foreigners have gone up.The number of skilled foreigners on Employment Passes has also fallen, from 175,400 in December 2011 to 172,100 last June.Given this shift, it is little wonder that the phrase "foreign talent" has fallen into disuse.But Mr Lucas, being neither a politician nor a Singaporean, had no compunction about telling it like it is - that he set up base here because policies allowed him to get the talent he wanted from around the world.Look a little closer at the numbers cited above and you realise that an outfit like Lucasfilm creates a relatively small number of jobs for a niche group with highly specialised skills. Out of those jobs, one in three has gone to a Singaporean and two in three to foreigners.You would notice something similar if you were to scrutinise the team behind Anthony Chen's award-winning film Ilo Ilo in terms of their nationalities: The two lead actresses are foreigners, one from Malaysia and the other from the Philippines, and the director of photography is French.Talent knows no state boundaries and those out to create the best effects, film or any other product or service for that matter, want to work with the best - regardless of their nationality.So even as we as a society strive to better calibrate policies on foreigners, let us also remember how much we need people from all over the world to come here with their talents, dreams and efforts to add to the diversity of this city.So much attention has been lavished on the downside of rich foreigners coming here, stirring envy with their conspicuous consumption and jacking up property prices.But what of the upside of skilled foreigners joining forces with local counterparts to do cutting-edge work in new growth industries and to create stuff that the rest of the world wants?Industrial Light and Magic, the guardians of visual effects standards within Lucasfilm, and animation giant Pixar were reportedly reluctant at first to give work to the Singapore office.But the former has since declared the work done here equal to that done in California.Senior effects technical director Adam Lee, 32, a Singaporean, is in a team that includes members from Malaysia, Hong Kong, France and Germany, and who have diverse skills in art or computing.They have progressed from creating simple effects like gunblasts to more complex explosions of big buildings and simulating ocean foam, spray and mist in sci-fi movie Pacific Rim. The water simulation took his team six weeks and lasted just five seconds on screen."In our industry, if you can do good work, your reward is to get more work," he said.The upside of foreign talent is that young Singaporeans like Mr Lee get to do the work they love right here.And together, they add not only to the cool vibe of this city but also to the Government's coffers, providing the resources needed to fund public services and support older, weaker citizens in need.Mr Lucas himself may be in the business of visual effects that last mere seconds but he believes in long-term ties, and the gleaming steel and glass Sandcrawler building is a concrete symbol of that belief."The building itself is a milestone of us being permanently here," he said."We're not running or spacing. We're actually starting a business here, and this is the final part that we're building."For the best of the foreigners who choose to come here are ready to partner Singapore in the making of new magic.lydia@sph.com.sg迷你倉