Mike Tristano, owner of Mike Tristano & Co., Los Angeles, is regarded as a nearly legendary figure in the world of feature films, independent cinema, television, reality TV and “B” movies. His body of work as an armorer, on-set weapons handler and special makeup effects artist is staggering. Believing that independent and low-budget filmmakers should have access to the same quality of weapons and special effects for their films as the major studios, he always made his services affordable and still maintained top quality in his work for them. His incredible and ongoing number of credits, and his sterling reputation, are undeniable testimony to that fact.

After a shadowy career overseas in international military intelligence, freelance weapons advising, K&R consulting and executive security, Mike returned to the United States full time, and began his career in the motion picture industry. Since then, he has worked with many of the great independent film directors and producers, including Roger Corman (one of his mentors, for whom he has done more than 40 films), Sam Raimi, David Worth, Fred Olen Rey, Jim Wynorski, William Mesa, Michael Landon, Jr., John Eyres, Chuck Russell, Don Coscarelli, Brian Yuzna, Adam Rifkin, Stephen Norrington, The Polish Brothers, Roland Joffe, Kevin Tenney, Victor Salva, Jeff Burr, Charles Band, Mark Lester, John Terlesky, Phillip Roth, Andrew Stevens, Joey Travolta, Sam Firstenberg, Avi Lerner, Larry Cohen, Menachem Golan, Kim Manners, Jesse Johnson, David Ayer, Craig Baxley, Armand Mastroianni, Randall Wallace and hundreds of others. He has trained and worked on set with many of the actors and actresses in Hollywood, instructing them on how to handle firearms, and how to look good doing it.

Mike Tristano & Co. has one of the largest and most diverse armories of movie and television firearms and weapons in the world, and one of the largest inventories of movie prop guns.