After leaving the Muppets, Tempia worked on several live-action films, building or puppeteering animal or monster effects such as dogs for Beethoven and Beethoven's 2nd, alien effects for Alien³, a reindeer head for Jingle All the Way, the poodles in Interview with the Vampire, a grizzly bear for Anchorman, and the title chimp in Ed. Several of these projects were done through his own company, Animated FX Inc., co-owned with Dave Nelson. Animated FX also made animal puppets for Hostess snack cake commercials, revised characters for the Fox version of Greg the Bunny, and Tempia served as designer and principal puppeteer for Team America: World Police.