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THE RETURN OF HAND-DRAWN AND STYLIZED EFFECTS ANIMATION September 27,2022

By IAN FAILES

If you’ve noticed that a raft of animated films, shows and visual effects projects have been toying with more hand-crafted effects animation lately, you’re not alone. There’s somewhat of a trend right now to go ‘old school’ on these big projects with what are often anime-inspired animated effects, away from being completely photorealistic. New – and even old – tools have been enabling more painterly approaches to elements such as explosions, lightning, laser fire, smears, speed lines, dust, trails and stylized 2D and 3D effects. Here, artists on several recent projects break down their work in this area.

Imageworks explores the finer FX details

With Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, Sony Pictures Imageworks jumped head-first into a hand-drawn look approach, clearly inspired by the comic books. Many aspects combined for the hand-crafted feel, from line work on the characters, to speed lines, and also for elements such as explosions. In the final act of the film, these explosions were mostly hand-drawn elements crafted first by a 2D artist, as Imageworks FX Supervisor Pav Grochola outlines.

A final explosion shot by Sony Pictures Imageworks from Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. (Image courtesy of Sony Pictures)

The hand-drawn explosion element. (Image courtesy of Sony Pictures)

The explosion element is brought into Houdini. (Image courtesy of Sony Pictures)

A frame from The Mitchells vs. The Machines where Imageworks continued using stylized techniques for the 3D-animated film. (Image courtesy of Sony Pictures)

“We would take in those hand-drawn elements and place them in Houdini on cards. That was combined with very carefully artistically-directed procedural rays that would augment and live within those cards. The 2D elements were split out into tones of color – a smoke tone, a smoke layer and a hotter layer. On top of that we had particles and debris played on 2s, so there were a lot of tricks that we used to try to make things look as convincingly hand-created as possible, including in compositing.”

“What we’re really doing here is ‘designing’ explosions,” Grochola notes. “That’s where 2D artists are really good. That’s what they do! They start from scratch with a piece of paper – from nothing – and they design it, whereas sometimes we are used to simulating things and not really knowing what the simulation did.”

“What we’re really doing here [on Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse] is ‘designing’ explosions. That’s where 2D artists are really good. That’s what they do! They start from scratch with a piece of paper – from nothing – and they design it, whereas sometimes we are used to simulating things and not really knowing what the simulation did.”

—Pav Grochola, FX Supervisor

Then, on The Mitchells vs. the Machines, Imageworks’ brief was to make the film look more like an illustrative novel. For instance, here explosions would begin with partial pyro simulations. Grochola says, “We advected particles through this basic pyro sim. These particles would become camera facing cards with brush stroke textures. This gave us a great base that looked illustrated, but also had the motion and color of the underlying simulation. The 2D artists would finally draw on top of this to further enhance the hand-drawn look.”

Going cute-chunky

Pixar’s Turning Red contains several hand-drawn-effects animation moments that follow what Production Designer Rona Liu had instilled as a “cute-chunky with a soft, lush color palette” for the film, according to FX artist Carl Kaphan. “This was the first Pixar movie, to my knowledge, that had a sketch artist – Lead Animator Rob Thompson – as a dedicated member of the effects team for the entire duration of production. Rob provided draw-overs, timing tests and concept art for much of the effects work across the film.”

One fantastical shot, dubbed ‘Men Man Mountain,’ sees the main character summon her teen idols. Pixar utilized a more hand-drawn feel to the final magical effects look. “The graphical elements and timing of the giant pink poof were roughed out with straight-ahead animation,” Kaphan explains, “with the drawings then brought into Houdini and converted into 3D geometry to be used for interactive lighting on the characters and environments and to help place the giant poof cloud in time and space. The hand-drawn images were also brought into Nuke where shot lighter Molly Meyer applied treatment to add a lustrous glow as well as adding a field of stylized stars.”

‘Panda poof’ effects in the film also took on 2D characteristics while leveraging Houdini effects sims. “To attain a dissipation that mimicked traditional animation,” Kaphan says, “we relied on subdividing the cloud shapes over time instead of decreasing the opacity. To get the timing to feel right, we ended up applying a modified power law distribution to vary the amount of time before each individual poof subdivides. To enhance the read of an appealing silhouette we often cheated the velocities to the camera plane. To add complexity, we used a combination of fluid simulated and hand-sculpted velocity fields to enhance the motion. Jordan Rempel, our Lighting Supervisor, assisted early on by applying multi-scattering approximation to the poofs in RenderMan which added a beautifully luminous glow.”

“[Turning Red] was the first Pixar movie, to my knowledge, that had a sketch artist – Lead Animator Rob Thompson – as a dedicated member of the effects team for the entire duration of production. Rob provided draw-overs, timing tests and concept art for much of the effects work across the film.”

—Carl Kaphan, FX Artist

A homage to the illustrative source

For The Bad Guys, based on the illustrated storybooks, DreamWorks Animation deliberately set out to mimic the hand-drawn imperfections and simplification of the scenes and characters. “One of our goals with visuals was to make all of our effects look like they were 100% 2D animated,” Visual Effects Supervisor Matt Baer advises. Baer notes that a sprite library broken down into sub-components in Houdini was developed for the film. “We also developed particle sim techniques that would be rendered in two-tones, so when we merged them together with the sprites, the audience, hopefully, couldn’t tell the difference where the sprite started and where the simulation began.”

Baer also notes that the requirements of The Bad Guys brought in new workflows, “ones that essentially allowed us to do 2D animation in a 3D application and take advantage of the scalability of the 3D application,” something DreamWorks had not ventured into in a major way at that point. A proprietary tool called Doodle helped achieve the desired look.

“It let us draw in screen space and position the Doodle geometry in 3D space,” Head of Look Jeff Budsberg says. “You could render those doodles directly as an impact or a liquid, you could render it in two-tone, or you could use that drawing to drive a 3D simulation. Even the lighting department was doing some of this sprite work for graphic camera flashes or speed lines encroaching on the frame or on a camera pan. We built these systems that could be interchanged between the departments, and the crux behind everything was all hand-drawn lines.”

A storyboard from the ‘panda poof’ sequence in Turning Red. (Image courtesy of Disney/Pixar)

Early concept art for the shot. (Image courtesy of Disney/Pixar)

A layout frame where the Pixar team make framing and lens choices. (Image courtesy of Disney/Pixar)

FX pass using proprietary software developed for the particular pink-smoke look called ‘pink vapor clouds.’ (Image courtesy of Disney/Pixar)

The final rendered shot. (Image courtesy of Disney/Pixar)

Pipelining 2d effects animation

Fortiche’s animated series Arcane made waves recently with its blending of graphic 2D and 3D styles. To help enable a 2D sensibility to be incorporated into what were often 3D scenes, the studio needed to adapt its existing pipeline for 2D work so that several tools were more closely integrated.

The Crimson Paw reveal scene in The Bad Guys made extensive use of stylized 2D animation combined with 3D. (Image courtesy of DreamWorks Animation)

Hand-drawn imperfections and simplification of the scenes and characters were key aspects of the production of The Bad Guys. (Image courtesy of DreamWorks Anima-tion)

Explosion effects in the film’s third act were realized with multiple techniques on top of simulations. (Image courtesy of DreamWorks Animation)

“One of the biggest challenges,” describes tool developer/TD Marion Debrick, “was to integrate Adobe software and TVPaint in our pipeline which previously only focused on 3D workflows. I had to find a way for our project manager, developed with the Python programming language, to communicate with all the 2D software which did not interpret Python. To achieve that, I built CEP (Common Extensibility Platform) tools that allowed for a user-friendly interface in the software and gave an easy control to the artist.

“We created tooling around incorporating the hand-drawn effects into the engine. This allowed artists to play with the placement of the effects, when they start, and how fast or slow they are. This type of creative freedom really allowed us to elevate not only the 2D workflow, but allowed the animation department to play a greater role in the process of the shot.”

—Dustin Warnock, Creative Director, The Third Floor

“I also had to re-create an Adobe extension manager specific to our pipeline so the artists could easily update their tools after new features are added,” Debrick says. “After the import/export tools were working, I was able to create some other fun tools to help the artists in their drawings for Arcane, such as buttons to clone adjustment layers on multiple layers or blend RGB colors with a linear gamma and a lasso to draw a shape that’s automatically filled.”

The character Jinx in Arcane, featuring a mix of 3D and 2D animation by Fortiche. (Image courtesy of Netflix)

Fortiche needed to develop new 2D and 3D workflows in order to animate Arcane. (Image courtesy of Netflix)

Stylized effects animation for real-time

Animated content being made with game engines – an area on the rise – has also seen a rise in the stylized look and feel of effects for real-time. Director Hasraf ‘HaZ’ Dulull’s animated anime-inspired feature Rift, for example, is currently being made predominantly in Unreal Engine. “When it came to the FX, we created specific shader materials in Unreal Engine to give it that anime look,” Dulull says. “For most of the shots, we used 2D effects libraries, and then in After Effects we combined them to create the desired effect, before rendering them out as PNG with alphas, layering them in DaVinci Resolve, using Fusion FX to help create things like trails and glow effects on top of the EXR final pixel frames from Unreal Engine.”

Dulull adds, “We also took a lot of the 2D elements we created of explosions, smoke and debris hits, and put those on cards as animated textures in Unreal Engine, making them self-emissive to ensure they had their own lighting channel so that they were independent from the main scene lighting. In some instances, we utilized Unreal Engine’s post-processing effects to heighten some of the flatten diffuse look of the stylized FX and lighting as well as the edge lines.”

A frame from Rift in which 2D elements are combined with Unreal Engine renders. (Image courtesy Hasraf ‘HaZ’ Dulull)

2D elements of explosions, smoke and debris hits were put on cards as animated textures in Unreal Engine. (Image courtesy Hasraf ‘HaZ’ Dulull)

Several animation practitioners have found that their 2D animation skills and assets are heavily sought after in the traditional 3D animation and now real-time space. Brent Forrest, who hails from his own outfit called Forrest Schlage and is also a technical director at Marza Animation Planet Inc., highlights this via his effects packs. Faced with the challenge of making large-scale expressive water effects for a real-time production, Forrest’s team developed a ShapeMeshing system. “It was decided early on that we would use pre-designed elements instead of costly simulations – much the same as we would if we were doing a Flash show. Of course, you can’t just plop 2D elements into a 3D scene. Things get complicated when you incorporate transparency, reflections and objects that cast shadows.”

Forrest continues, “No two assets are made the same way, and it takes a combination of modules to create a usable 3D rig, but they all start with a hand-drawn design. The products of the ShapeMeshing system can be seen in [the animated short film] The Peak by Marza, Like and Follow, made by Tobias Schlage and myself, Miskatonic and UltraDuck made by Arcana Studio, and an upcoming Marza production that will have its world premiere at SIGGRAPH this year.”

To help launch its animation division, The Third Floor made a stylized animated short called Skytribe. (Image courtesy of The Third Floor)

The Third Floor’s animation approach relies on real-time rendering tools inside Unreal Engine. (Image courtesy of The Third Floor)

Meanwhile, visualization studio The Third Floor has also embraced Unreal Engine for its launch of a new animation group and a suite of tools based on custom visualization tools that sit on top of Unreal. To launch the animation venture, The Third Floor made a short called Skytribe. “We wanted to find that balance and blend between the 2D and 3D world,” The Third Floor’s Creative Director Dustin Warnock says. “There were a multitude of approaches we took throughout all the departments that tip the hat to traditional 2D processes. We never wanted to over composite them or blend them too far with the 3D plates. It was important to have the elements remaining inherently flat and two dimensional. We embraced the offsets, varying the timing, and pushing and pulling the elements to strike that balance.”

Warnock adds, “We created tooling around incorporating the hand-drawn effects into the engine. This allowed artists to play with the placement of the effects, when they start, and how fast or slow they are. This type of creative freedom really allowed us to elevate not only the 2D workflow, but allowed the animation department to play a greater role in the process of the shot.”

Brent Forrest’s ShapeMeshing system utilizes 2D elements to make 3D sculpts. (Im-age courtesy of Brent Forrest)

The ShapeMeshing approach allows for things like water-splash elements to be turned into 3D elements in real-time. (Image courtesy of Brent Forrest)

Going for a stylized look

Alongside this explosion in hand-drawn effects animation is an equally large push towards stylization in the final rendering. Often referred to as Stylized Rendering or Non-Photorealistic Rendering (NPR), this approach can be seen in films such as Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse and The Mitchells vs. the Machines, the latter of which Lollipop Shaders Founder and Shading Architect Christos Obretenov collaborated on with Sony Pictures Imageworks.

“[Working on Lovecraft Country] was the first time I kept the animation fully at 6K, because I liked the really fine line I could get at that resolution. HD gives a pretty ratty line when you draw on the Cintique, but 6K lets you get a nice variety of electrical bolts working – thick, thin and the occasional big glow when the shape is strong enough and looks nice.”

—Kevin Blank, Visual Effects Supervisor

Hand-drawn effects animation in VFX: still alive and still electric

Some of the hand-drawn lightning or electricity effects animation in projects such as Big Trouble in Little China, Ghostbusters II and Babylon 5 are unforgettable. It turns out that VFX artist Kevin Kutchaver worked on each of those projects, to name a few, and still gets called upon to craft much-desired hand-drawn effects animation to this day, albeit with digital tools. For example, on Lovecraft Country, Visual Effects Supervisor Kevin Blank entrusted Kutchaver to render some electrical energy sparks in a hand-drawn fashion. It was a task he handled mostly in Photoshop. “That was the first time I kept the animation fully at 6K, because I liked the really fine line I could get at that resolution,” Kutchaver advises. “HD gives a pretty ratty line when you draw on the Cintique, but 6K lets you get a nice variety of electrical bolts working – thick, thin and the occasional big glow when the shape is strong enough and looks nice.

Kevin Kutchaver’s hand-drawn, electric-effects animation for an episode of Lovecraft Country. (Image courtesy of HBO)

“The Umbrella Academy Co-Producer and Visual Effects Supervisor Everett Burrell also contacted me about some character animation for an episode with the animated character, Mr. Briefcase. My wife, Kathy Zielinski, designed and animated the character on the Cintique in Toon Boom Harmony, with clean-up and paint actually done again in Toon Boom by my two daughters. It was a great family project!”

In particular, on Mitchells, Obretenov “worked with the team at Imageworks in developing custom shaders in Open Shading Language (OSL) for their artists to use on the line work and dynamic watercolor illustrative lighting.” He is also Lead Developer on RenderMan’s Stylized Looks, working with Pixar’s RenderMan team.

“Lollipop,” Obretenov says, “tends to contribute during a look/visual development stage to match the client’s concept art over animated shots with custom tools and workflows. If there is a match where our tools and workflows are hitting the concept art over animated sequences, we go onto the next stage where the studio uses the tools for the duration of the project and we support them in finalizing their look of the picture across the entire project.”

RenderMan’s Stylized Looks was used to render this frame. (Image courtesy of Christos Obretenov)
METHOD STUDIOS GETS INTEGRATED WITH SPIDERHEAD September 20,2022

By TREVOR HOGG

Images courtesy of Netflix and Method Studios.

The only practical element built for the Spiderhead facility was the entranceway.

Convicts willing to volunteer as medical test subjects get reduced sentences, but in the process begin to question the reality of their emotions in Netflix thriller Spiderhead, directed by Joseph Kosinski and starring Chris Hemsworth, Miles Teller, Jurnee Smollett, Mark Paguio and Tess Haubrich. Method Studios, led by VFX Supervisor Dominic Hellier, created 160 shots under the production supervision of Ryan Tudhope, who collaborated with Kosinski on Top Gun: Maverick.

Composites were done for monitors in the control room.

“Spiderhead was a great opportunity and suited my skill set really well,” Hellier notes, citing “the integration of our CG building and some nice effects work with the car crash. Also, Joe coming off of Top Gun: Maverick had come from a place of real photo-reality integration, and this [approach] was paramount with this [film]. Coming from a compositing standpoint, we were able to work backwards from the plates we were given that were shot beautifully up in the Whitsundays [Whitsunday Islands along the coast of Queensland, Australia]. It was a great experience working across the different departments, having come from the end of the pipeline and discussing how things might end up in compositing, and pre-empting any issues.”

“Joe [director Joseph Kosinski], coming off of Top Gun: Maverick, had come from a place of real photo-reality integration, and this was paramount with this [film]. Coming from a compositing standpoint, we were able to work backwards from the plates we were given that were shot beautifully up in the Whitsundays [Whitsunday Islands along the coast of Queensland, Australia]. It was a great experience working across the different departments, having come from the end of the pipeline and discussing how things might end up in compositing, and pre-empting any issues.”
—Dominic Hellier, VFX Supervisor, Method Studios

A thorough booklet of the design of the Spiderhead facility was provided to Method Studios that included not just its structure but also the interior fit-out.

Kosinski has a strong design aesthetic. “Before we came onto the project, in terms of the Melbourne studio, there was a great production design process with Jeremy Hindle and specifically about the Spiderhead facility,” reveals Hellier, who iterated the most on the weathering of the prison that has existed for 50 years, to make sure that the size and scale were reading correctly. “They also engaged an architect, Adam Spychala, who has done a lot of 3D renderings of Brutalist buildings that he has designed himself, that had caught Joe’s eye. There was a thorough booklet of the design of the facility, not just of its structure but also the interior fit-out. By the time we came onto the project to build the production model, there was a lot of great reference from them about the look and what they were chasing. As an extension of that, Ryan [Tudhope] had a great idea of what the priorities were for the visual effects, in terms of texturing of the building, the reality of the concrete and making that feel tactile, and where to invest our time on such a big asset build.” Initially, the new aspect was the fairly shot production schedule. “Then we had a hiatus and came back,” Hellier adds. “We finished the majority of our work in the first part of the project, particularly the facility shots. It was about getting the texture asset team, look development and lighting running concurrently so we could get shots through to get the asset approved.”

“We did some of the psychedelic treatments when Jeff [Miles Teller] and Abnesti [Chris Hemsworth] are under the influence of the drugs being tested. For the most part, it was chromatic aberration treatments and lens flares additions. That was a fun process to look develop with Joe, who had a particular idea and wanted to keep it in the realm of optical effects and not go too far out. There is a shot at the end when Abnesti is flying his plane under the influence of these drugs and we had to do these sundog effects shown from his point of view.”
—Dominic Hellier, VFX Supervisor, Method Studios

Weathering had to be incorporated into the texturing of the Spiderhead facility, as it is supposed to have been around for 50 years.

The float plane approaching the Spiderhead facility at the start of the film was a 3D build.

“We did a 3D build for the float plane that you see approaching the facility at the start of the film,” Hellier explains. “However, a lot of the flying shots are practical. Anytime the plane is parked at the front of the facility under the overhang, we did a CG build there to shadow catch for that and did the same for the speedboat that is out front.” Previs provided a guide to the desired silhouettes cast by Spiderhead, such as for the dock scenes that were actually shot at a dam in Queensland. “They had a few blockers and things, but nothing that really had the scale of what we were putting in there in terms of the facility and blocking the sunlight. There was problem-solving for that shadow casting and integrating that stuff into the structure of the facility. Thankfully, for the most part, the characters were in shadow, as there was a blocker on the day that helped. Also, things like color temperature of the water between the dam and what you would see in the Whitsundays, this beautiful blue ocean; those sorts of differences and subtle grading [were needed] for integration.”

“One thing that was different between the concept art and the location was man-placed boulders surrounding the facility. It was like a big, almost human-built island, whereas the islands at Whitsunday are volcanic rock. It was a lot of fine-detail, coral-looking formations in the rock there that didn’t transition well into the Brutalist design of the building. We also did a build of surrounding rock formations on top of the scan as if they were placed there to support this facility when it was built. Also, some in the shallows of the water.”
—Dominic Hellier, VFX Supervisor, Method Studios

Actor Miles Teller was practically shot rolling in front of the camera during the car crash scene.

A partial tree stump rig was constructed, so the rest had to be CG extended along with the flames.

Whitsunday Island was partially LiDAR scanned. “One thing that was different between the concept art and the location was man-placed boulders surrounding the facility,” Hellier states. “It was like a big, almost human-built island, whereas the islands at Whitsunday are volcanic rock. It was a lot of fine-detail, coral-looking formations in the rock there that didn’t transition well into the Brutalist design of the building. We also did a build of surrounding rock formations on top of the scan as if they were placed there to support this facility when it was built. Also, some in the shallows of the water. There is a shot at the start of the film of Chris Hemsworth walking in, captured from above, looking down on him. We’re looking into the water, so we had some boulders placed under there to help with the integration.Also, off of the back of the building is a lot of vegetation.”

An important part of the environmental integration was properly casting shadows to reflect the presence of the Spiderhead facility.

Whitsunday Island was partially LiDAR scanned.

A car crashes into a tree and explodes. “That was a stunt rig tree stump that the car ran into, so we had a full tree build for that and had to integrate our explosion within the tree, going up through the branches, and distributing that, smoke and interactive lighting into the scene,” Hellier reveals. There was a practical explosion. Continues Hellier, “With the half stump, it didn’t interact with anything as it went up. We gave ourselves a CG version of that explosion with deep renders, and then had our CG tree in there, and could interweave the fire within the tree.” There is a shot where Miles Teller’s character flies out through the windshield, comes tumbling across the grass and rests right at the camera. “We had one plate where the car hits the stump and another plate with Miles in the foreground as he lands flat on his chest. We had to build that animation that got us from point A to B. We would simulate a car crashing and put a rag-doll digital double that picked up the velocity of that crash and tumbled away. That informed our final animation, and we had to tweak that so it ended up landing in his final resting place.”

Method Studios, led by VFX Supervisor Dominic Hellier, created 160 shots for Spiderhead.

“We had one plate where the car hits the stump and another plate with [actor] Miles [Teller] in the foreground as he lands flat on his chest. We had to build that animation that got us from point A to B. We would simulate a car crashing and put a rag-doll digital double that picked up the velocity of that crash and tumbled away. That informed our final animation, and we had to tweak that so it ended up landing in his final resting place.”
—Dominic Hellier, VFX Supervisor, Method Studios

The dock was actually shot at a dam.

Chris Hemsworth portrays Steve Abnesti, who is in charge of the Spiderhead Penitentiary and Research Facility, where he attempts to influence inmate behaviors with experimental drugs.

Other work included security footage of the boats and blood augmentation for the car-crash death of Emma (BeBe Bettencourt). “There were effects simulations of the blood hitting the window and running down,” Hellier remarks. “Very gruesome stuff. We also did some environment extensions outside of Spiderhead. Anytime we are looking out of Abnesti’s [Chris Hemsworth] window, or outside through the front with the islands and water, was us doing environment extensions. It was all matte painting photography stitches.” Not everything had to be photorealistic. Comments Hellier, “We did some of the psychedelic treatments when Jeff [Miles Teller] and Abnesti are under the influence of the drugs being tested. For the most part, it was chromatic aberration treatments and lens flares additions. That was a fun process to look develop with Joe, who had a particular idea and wanted to keep it in the realm of optical effects and not go too far out. There is a shot at the end when Abnesti is flying his plane under the influence of these drugs and we had to do these sundog effects shown from his point of view.”
FRAMESTORE GOES TO WAR FOR THOR: LOVE AND THUNDER September 13,2022

By TREVOR HOGG

Images courtesy of Marvel Studios and Framestore.

Battered teenage Groot was made slightly taller and beefier with chips, charring and dirt.

Among the army of visual effects vendors working for Marvel Studios Visual Effects Supervisor Jake Morrison for Thor: Love and Thunder was Framestore, which was responsible for the opening scene featuring the Guardians of the Galaxy, Thor and Korg taking part in the Indigarr battle, a crystal temple and giant goats. “The battle has a Mad Max intergalactic feel to it,” notes Framestore Visual Effects Supervisor Matt Twyford. “Indigarr was an alien planet, and you had to be made immediately aware this was not happening on Earth. That’s why we had the monstrous stones, strange galactic objects in the sky, and is a blue, dusty, sandy environment with a warm grade over the top. It was shot at ILM’s StageCraft volume down in Australia.”

Initially executing the destruction of the crystal city was viewed to be the biggest challenge, but even with it being redesigned the rendering went smoothly.

“The battle has a Mad Max intergalactic feel to it. Indigarr was an alien planet and you had to be made immediately aware this was not happening on Earth. That’s why we had the monstrous stones, strange galactic objects in the sky, and is a blue, dusty, sandy environment with a warm grade over the top. It was shot at ILM’s StageCraft volume down in Australia.”

—Matt Twyford, Visual Effects Supervisor, Framestore

There were positive and negatives working with StageCraft. “We ingested the environment from ILM and dropped in all of the battle action,” Twyford explains. “You have all of the actors and extras in the environment, so they are naturally working with it. The lighting was an identical match. But because it was a 3D environment projected onto a curved screen and there are time delays, you can’t do 3D tracking. On the complicated shots, we used the assets from ILM and re-rendered through our track camera where we based it on the set rather than the volume. On other shots, we were doing enhancements, and that was done with simple one-point tracks in compositing. otherwise you would get strange distortions in geometry.”

Visual references for the battlefield were World War I trenches and stumps of burnt trees as well as the graphic black smokestacks from the Gulf War.

Booskans are fighting the native Indigarrians. “We added energy weapons and hover bikes, which are not things you can relate to on Earth,” Twyford states. “The [rowdy, aggressive] Booskans are anthropomorphic like people, but we adjusted the proportions of their legs and arms.” The creature designs for the Booskans were provided to Framestore. “Their headpieces were created, and a few prosthetics were put on the arms and legs,” Twyford describes. “They had four or five different variations. We then recreated digital-double versions of the main bad guy and four hero guys. Then we had a whole raft of crowd variance as well. Because the prosthetic heads were fixed and solid, we rebuilt their faces so they could emote, scream and even talk.”

“We ingested the environment from ILM and dropped in all of the battle action. You have all of the actors and extras in the environment, so they are naturally working with it. The lighting was an identical match. But because it was a 3D environment projected onto a curved screen and there are time delays, you can’t do 3D tracking. On the complicated shots, we used the assets from ILM and re-rendered through our track camera where we based it on the set rather than the volume.”

—Matt Twyford, Visual Effects Supervisor, Framestore

Multiple designs were created for the submissive Indigarrians, which had prosthetic ears and noses. “Originally, the Indigarrians were much more alien and had insectoid eyes,” Twyford reveals. “However, they needed to fit with the performances, especially of the king. We went with a light touch where we made sure that the blue of the skin was clean, added a tiny bit of alien texture to it, and did some work on iris in the eyes. We made sure that they didn’t look like painted people, but you still got the 100% performance, which was driven by great piece of acting.”

Vehicles like hover bikes driven by the Booskans helped the viewer to immediately realize that the battle is taking place on an alien environment.

Most of the explosions are CG. “We had reference from the anime feature Akira for the smoke and explosions,” Twyford remarks. “It was a graphic, almost gamey look. There was also reference from World War I of trenches and stumps of burnt trees. As well as from the Gulf War where there was this graphic black, solid smokestacks. It made the environment feel quite surreal. We rendered a whole batch of explosions, smokestacks and bullet squibs in 3D, and half were rendered shot by shot, and the other half we used as generic elements for the compositing team to place when and where they needed.”

The Indigarr environment was shot at ILM’s StageCraft volume in Australia, with Framestore adding in the battle elements.

“The [rowdy, aggressive] Booskans are anthropomorphic like people, but we adjusted the proportions of their legs and arms. Their headpieces were created, and a few prosthetics were put on the arms and legs. They had four or five different variations. We then recreated digital-double versions of the main bad guy and four hero guys. Then we had a whole raft of crowd variance as well. Because the prosthetic heads were fixed and solid, we rebuilt their faces so they could emote, scream and even talk.”

—Matt Twyford, Visual Effects Supervisor, Framestore

Producing the crystal temple, which the Indigarrians are defending from the Booskans, was originally viewed as the biggest challenge. “It’s huge,” Twyford notes. “600 meters high. We needed to collapse it, and when you put a complicated simulation and essentially crystal through the renderer, things are going to explode. But it actually worked quickly. Although it did get a massive redesign, most of the dynamics setup in look development transferred to new design quickly. A lot of time was spent on modeling because it was a high-resolution model. For the collapse, we went to our effects guys who, within two or three goes, nailed it. We got feedback from the director and [Marvel Studio President of Physical, Post Production, VFX and Animation] Victoria Alonso, who wanted to play more of the comedic value, so we added in a few more twisted bits left over.”

Making a cameo appearance are the Guardians of the Galaxy. “They’re like old friends because I’ve worked on Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 1 and Vol. 2,” Twyford reflects. “I know them inside out as to what they require in terms of visual effects. I love Groot and Rocket. We were reusing a lot of basic assets and adding new costumes. Effectively, Groot is the teenager that you see in Avengers: Endgame, but he is slightly taller and bulkier. As we come across him in the middle of a battle, he is quite a bit battered. Groot is chipped, charred, dirty and frustrated because they wanted a holiday and are not getting one!”

Korg went through a redesign which allowed for his rocks to flex more without viewers noticing.

Thor’s rock creature sidekick Korg was altered. “Originally, he was rocks moving against each other,” explains Twyford. “Then there was a YouTube skit done with Deadpool, which had a slightly different technique, and the director found that to be more interesting. It wasn’t absolutely solid rocks moving around. We came up with new way to do facial expressions where the rocks flexed, but you don’t see them do it. That allowed us to open up a whole new level of performance for Korg.”

“We had reference from the anime feature Akira for the smoke and explosions. It was a graphic, almost gamey look. There was also reference from World War I of trenches and stumps of burnt trees. As well as from the Gulf War where there was this graphic black, solid smokestacks. It made the environment feel quite surreal. We rendered a whole batch of explosions, smokestacks and bullet squibs in 3D, and half were rendered shot by shot, and the other half we used as generic elements for the compositing team to place when and where they needed.”

—Matt Twyford, Visual Effects Supervisor, Framestore

Great fun was had in visually developing the giant goats. “They were based on a real goat design and are literally two to three times bigger and a lot beefier,” Twyford states. “The heads were built as maquettes, and in our minds we assigned characteristics to them. One is more suave and sophisticated like James Bond, and the other is more Dumb and Dumber and happy-go-lucky.” Despite having to hand over the goats to other vendors, working on Thor: Love and Thunder was not a chore. “[Director] Taika Waititi wanted people to enjoy the movie, and we enjoyed making it. You could see that everyone was having a bit of fun and adding a bit of a laugh in along the way.”
THERE IS HORROR IN THE CLOUDS IN NOPE September 7,2022

By TREVOR HOGG

Images courtesy of Universal Pictures and Monkeypaw Productions.

The creature unfolds like origami and moves with the efficiency of a jellyfish.

Being conventional when it comes to the horror genre is something that does not apply to filmmaker Jordan Peele (Get Out) even when presented with his biggest budget to date for Nope. The title is the appropriate answer for the viewers left confused by the first trailer which suggested that the characters were threatened by some sort of malevolent environmental force. The observation is partially correct as the turmoil is caused by a UFO creature that is able to channel the wind, but the visual effects work that total 700 long shots also consists of extensive sky replacements, day-for-night photography and a rampaging chimpanzee.

Different types of digital clouds were rendered.

“When Jordan was writing the script, he had a framework for the story and what he wanted that UFO alien to be. Jordan wanted to figure out some of the visuals to help inform the staging of the story and how to play the horror element of our creature and UFO. … We did six months of shot design to figure out how do we make a flying saucer that is classic and simple as well as being a living and breathing creature of the wind. The whole movie happens in the clouds.”

—Guillaume Rocheron, Production Visual Effects Supervisor

“I was one of the first to start on Nope with Jordan Peele,” explains Production Visual Effects Supervisor Guillaume Rocheron (1917), who collaborated with sole vendor MPC. “When Jordan was writing the script, he had a framework for the story and what he wanted that UFO alien to be. Jordan wanted to figure out some of the visuals to help inform the staging of the story and how to play the horror element of our creature and UFO. It’s a movie about spectacle and the addiction to spectacle. Our characters are trying to film and document the sighting of a UFO and it turns into a much darker and complicated story for them. We did six months of shot design to figure out how do we make a flying saucer that is classic and simple as well as being a living and breathing creature of the wind. The whole movie happens in the clouds.”

Horses and helicopters do not go well together, so separate passes were created, beginning with the plate, a helicopter acting as a wind machine, digital effects and final composite.

Conveying size and scale was complicated by the minimalistic creature design. “Its structure unfolds like an origami and becomes a giant creature that is floating in the wind like a giant sail and skirt,” Rocheron explains. “All of that with extremely minimal details on everything. However, in visual effects we like textural details, things that inform scale to help us make things look photoreal. A flying saucer is 240 feet wide, which is like the size of fairly large airplane, so how do you convey scale, how do you make it photoreal, how do you literally make a white disk photoreal and integrate it into photography? It was a big challenge for us on the film.” To get some practical environmental interaction, a helicopter was utilized and subsequently digitally augmented. Rocheron adds, “We did a lot of large-scale dust simulations because dust is your visual cue to understand that the wind is blowing in this direction or the wind is being dragged by the saucer.”

“Its structure unfolds like an origami and becomes a giant creature that is floating in the wind like a giant sail and skirt. All of that with extremely minimal details on everything. However, in visual effects we like textural details, things that inform scale to help us make things look photoreal. A flying saucer is 240 feet wide, which is like the size of fairly large airplane, so how do you convey scale, how do you make it photoreal, how do you literally make a white disk photoreal and integrate it into photography? It was a big challenge for us…”

—Guillaume Rocheron, Production Visual Effects Supervisor

The nighttime footage was day-for-night with a color film camera synced with an infrared digital camera.

Every shot had CG skies. “Nope is about something hiding in the sky,” Rocheron remarks. “We had to completely create, art direct and light digital clouds. You traditionally do sky replacements because you want the skies to be prettier and look a certain way, whereas for us it was literally our playground. From the previs stage we created setups in Houdini that would give us sky boxes made of geometry that would describe the shape of the clouds so that the clouds could always drift in the direction of the wind. We could keyframe that and animate our saucer hiding and moving through the clouds. It was a huge design exercise to get the clouds throughout the whole movie.” Principal photography took place in California which is very sunny. Rocheron notes, “We said, ‘Our actors are always going to be somehow in between clouds, so they’re always going to get the sunlight.’ In every shot we put the drifting shadows of the clouds on the terrain so to connect the sky and ground.”

Gordy is was an entirely CG creature that goes on a rampage.

“Because all of the encounters happen in that valley at nighttime and cameras don’t see a lot at night. … The only way to do this is day-for-night, where you shoot during the day and in post you try to give it a night look. … We created a new rig where we took a Panavision 65mm film camera and mounted it on a 3D rig with an ARRI ALEXA 65 digital camera that was infrared. Infrared footage gives you perfectly black skies. By match moving the infrared and color film footage we were able to extract depth passes and modulate the visibility. We shot plates at night of a house in the distance and comped those house lights into our day-for-night shots.”

—Guillaume Rocheron, Production Visual Effects Supervisor

Only three shots had greenscreen. “We were going to do all [shots] on location in natural light,” Rocheron states. “Literally, I embraced the blue sky as our bluescreens where we key the blue sky and did a lot of rotoscope to get our actors in and make sure that everything is fitting in. MPC developed an app on the iPad with Unreal Engine that was mapped to the IMAX lenses, and we would go to the virtual viewfinder and we could literally see not only static things but the whole previs on it. We could follow the saucer in the sky that was tracked to the actual location. We looked at it with [Cinematographer] Hoyte van Hoytema [Dunkirk] and Jordan, and said, ‘This is where it is. This is the lensing that works.’ It was trying to stay nimble and embrace the fact that it’s a movie that wants to feel that you didn’t shoot it on the set. It was shot on location and there are imperfections that come with it.”

The props were made 30% bigger so that Terry Notary was at the right proportion to portray Gordy and interact with the surroundings.

“Nope is about something hiding in the sky. We had to completely create, art direct and light digital clouds. You traditionally do sky replacements because you want the skies to be prettier and look a certain way, whereas for us it was literally our playground.”

—Guillaume Rocheron, Production Visual Effects Supervisor

All of the nighttime scenes were shot day-for-night. “Because all of the encounters happen in that valley at nighttime and cameras don’t see a lot at night,” explains Rocheron explains, “you have to put lights to see something. One thing that we realized when scouting at night in that big valley is if you turned all of the lights off, the human eye actually sees in the night. The only way to do this is day-for-night, where you shoot during the day and in post you try to give it a night look. The cool thing is that it was a great collaboration with Hoyte. We were like, ‘What if we try to synchronize an infrared and film camera together.’ We created a new rig where we took a Panavision 65mm film camera and mounted it on a 3D rig with an ARRI ALEXA 65 digital camera that was infrared. Infrared footage gives you perfectly black skies.” The film footage provided the color information. “By match moving the infrared and color film footage we were able to extract depth passes and modulate the visibility,” he says, adding that certain nighttime cues had to be incorporated. “We shot plates at night of a house in the distance and comped those house lights into our day-for-night shots.”

The minimalistic design of the creature made it difficult to integrate into the plate photography.

Not everything takes place in the skies, as there is a flashback scene of a chimp named Gordy killing people on a television production set. “We made a full-frame photoreal chimp and filmed the whole scene from the point of view of our character, who is hiding under a table and sees the whole scene through a double layered semi-transparent silk tablecloth that diffuses the light and creates obscure things,” Rocheron states. “Terry Notary performed Gordy and gave us amazing performances. We didn’t do mocap per se. We had five witness cameras around the set to document his movements. I took the decision to not put him entirely in the full cap suits. I wanted him to have the clothing that our chimp has and the blood on his face because it was trying to play to the horror and how our chimp interacts with its environment. We did a false perspective set where the props that were in the foreground were 30% bigger. The little girl that is hiding behind the sofa is 6′ foot 2” stuntwoman. We created that overscale environment so that Terry would be the right size for being a chimp and then replaced him with our chimp, but we would get all of the interaction with the set.”
IT’S NOT JUST ANOTHER DAY AT THE OFFICE FOR SEVERANCE August 30,2022

By CHRIS McGOWAN

Images courtesy of Apple TV+.

Symmetry rules the blindingly bright hallways of Severance that take Mark Scout (Adam Scott) and Lumon workers to and from offices. The set had several long corridors, then the VFX team extended them and made them even more narrow, symmetrical and endless.

On her first day on the job at mysterious Lumon Industries, Helly Riggs (Britt Lower) undergoes the “severance” procedure, which involves placing an implant in her brain to bifurcate her memories. From then on, her office self remembers nothing of her non-work life, and her outside self knows nothing of her experiences on the job. She is effectively split into two versions of herself, the “innie” and the “outie,” in a twisted kind of work-life balance in the Apple TV+ series Severance.

Executing a zolly (zoom + dolly) shot of Mark in the elevator. The elevators are the site of the “innie/outie” transformation entering or leaving work, in which the workers’ faces reflect the switching of selves.

The darkly comic sci-fi mystery has generated critical acclaim and been renewed for a second season. Dan Erickson created the show, which Ben Stiller (six episodes) and Aoife McArdle (three episodes) directed. Stiller and DP Jessica Lee Gagné “had a very specific look in mind to fit the story,” according to Visual Effects Supervisor Vadim Turchin. The story’s retro-futurist work setting is mostly stark and striking, with influences from modernist architect-designer Eero Saarinen and filmmaker Jacques Tati. To help achieve that vision, MPC’s visual effects team extended interiors, altered exteriors and provided many invisible effects.

Seth Milchick (Tramell Tillman), a supervisor, takes Britt’s photo. The room is sparse, even bare, as are other offices at Lumon.

“When we were filming in New York, Bell Labs came up as an option for us. I thought it was defunct, but someone had restored it and they let us use it. It was designed by Eero Saarinen, it’s in New Jersey, and it’s just amazing. A lot was inspired by him. It was the same vibe, the same landscape, and feeling. The exterior is mind-blowing. Of course, the [Lumon] interior is on a stage, but we design it in this same vein – grand, eerie, but beautiful.”

—Jeremy Hindle, Production Designer

Mark Scout (Adam Scott) and Helly Riggs (Britt Lower) face each other before a vast expanse of astroturf-green carpet and lowered, patterned, symmetrical ceilings. Both interior and exterior shots filtered influences of architect/designer Eero Saarinen and filmmaker Jacques Tati.

Irving Bailiff (John Turturro) in Lumon’s waiting room, which is furnished with green-leather-upholstered seats and decorated with fake green plants. Using an off-putting green as a foundational color was meant to convey elements of envy, illness, pastures and life itself – all mixed together.

On her first Lumon morning, Helly wakes to find herself splayed out on a conference table, with no memory of who she is or how she got there. The filmmakers considered that the birth of her innie self. To begin this existence, she watches a video of herself from some time earlier, agreeing to participate in the severance program. She is told she can elect to leave, which she chooses, but then finds she’s utterly unable to exit the building until the close of work. In the meantime, she is kept under constant surveillance on the job. In a sense, the Lumon office is like a heavily monitored playground for her new self and others. In the Macrodata Refinement (MDR) department, she meets her fellow workers Mark Scout (Adam Scott), Dylan George (Zack Cherry) and Irving Bailiff (John Turturro), who work in cubicles clustered in the center of an 80 ft. x 40 ft. office with bare white walls and deep green carpeting. The windowless room has low ceilings that contribute to the claustrophobia. Trapped together, the workers sit in front of vintage computers and sort numbers into files to no discernable end. Treated like children, they receive silly incentives like “waffle parties.” They live and breathe work because, as innies, that’s all there is. At the end of the workday, they enter an elevator that transforms them into their outside selves through some invisible means. Gradually, while inside, the four workers get curious about their captivity and their “outie” lives. They venture deeper into the building, seeking to uncover the secrets of Lumon, including what it is they and the company actually do.

MPC’s VFX team extended interiors and backgrounds, altered exteriors and provided invisible effects, always adherring to the show’s relentless symmetry. In the foreground are Irving Bailiff (John Turturro), Helly (Britt Lower) and Mark Scout (Adam Scott).

Production Designer Jeremy Hindle says that he and Gagné “had the same ideas about making Severance visually interesting, about pushing the boundaries a little. I wanted it to be playful, and in my look book I actually referenced the movie Playtime, a 1960s movie by Jacques Tati. Their art department was strange and interesting.”

“[VFX artists helped the art department] with creating symmetry in different sets, which otherwise would be impossible to achieve practically, especially when it comes to the interior lobby of Lumon. We put a lot of effort in finding subtle ways to add that symmetry, going for almost surreal.”

—Vadim Turchin, Visual Effects Supervisor

Patricia Arquette as Mark’s boss Harmony Cobel in her office at Lumon, which is eerie and beautiful, like many of the show’s settings.

Serendipitously, the modernist Bell Labs Holmdel Complex (a famed research facility now redeveloped as Bell Works) would contribute to the look sought by the filmmakers. Hindle continues, “When we were filming in New York, Bell Labs came up as an option for us. I thought it was defunct, but someone had restored it and they let us use it. It was designed by Eero Saarinen, it’s in New Jersey, and it’s just amazing. A lot was inspired by him. It was the same vibe, the same landscape, and feeling. The exterior is mind-blowing. Of course, the [Lumon] interior is on a stage, but we design it in this same vein – grand, eerie, but beautiful.”

The Bell Labs exterior served as that of Lumen Industries, with some exterior matte-painting work. “That is a wonderful location, but unfortunately for the story, it had too many residential details, as well as the asymmetrical nature of landscaping, Turchin remarks. “We reshaped the traffic flow, mirrored the ponds on both sides of the building, created symmetrical tree lines, and filled the parking lots with cars that matched the tone of the story.” In other VFX for the Bell complex, “we heavily reworked a lot of the lighting for the exterior of Lumon. Ben and Jessica wanted cooler tones for the parking lot and the building, so we replaced a good portion of it with CG lights,” Turchin adds.

Helly Riggs (Britt Lower) wakes up on a conference table in a windowless, green-carpeted boardroom, her memory erased, following what the filmmakers call the “birth” of her “innie self.”

The MDR (Macrodata Refinement) department team, left, runs into Burt Goodman (Christopher Walken), second from right, head of the Optics and Design department, in the maze-like network of corridors at Lumon Industries.

Other outside scenes featured the corporate duplex residences of Scout and next-door neighbor Mrs. Selvig, played by Patricia Arquette, who also plays his boss Harmony Cobel inside (she has not undergone severance). The scenes were supposed to be taking place during winter in Nyack, New York. The invisible VFX work there included “snow, snow, snow. Lots of it,” Turchin says. “Shooting in late March forced us to add a significant amount of snow and wet downs.” For the inside scenes, the VFX artists also helped the art department “with creating symmetry in different sets, which otherwise would be impossible to achieve practically,” Turchin comments, “especially when it comes to the interior lobby of Lumon.” Indeed, the visuals of Severance have a rather relentless symmetry. He adds, “We put a lot of effort in finding subtle ways to add that symmetry, going for almost surreal.”

Mark Scout (Adam Scott), Dylan George (Zack Cherry), Irving Bailiff (John Turturro) and Helly Riggs (Britt Lower) are filmed in a confrontation with Supervisor Milchick (Tramell Tillman).

Workstations, where the four core “innies” work at sorting numbers into files to no discernable end, are clustered in the middle of the office and outfitted with round, retro computers. The cubicles are surrounded by the ever-present bare white walls and green carpeting, drenched in fluorescent light, with no windows, and a low ceiling to suggest both a playground and a claustrophobic menace.

Inside Lumon, the maze of hallways between rooms is confusing and seems endless. Even though the office corridors occupied three soundstages, visual effects were called upon to stretch them out and to make it all one consistent space. Turchin explains, “As amazing as the set was, there were definitely shots where we had to add extensions, creating more complexity.”

One particularly creepy Lumon area explored by the office workers is called the Perpetuity Wing, an odd, cult-like shrine to company founder Keir Eagan that includes a replica of his childhood home. “The set was meant to feel like a replica of the actual location, housed in a museum-like setting. We found a great spot along the Hudson and then built an exterior portion to represent a museum space, encompassing the real location. The DP did a great job of lighting that exterior location to make it feel as if it was lit by interior lighting, and really helped us with integration,” Turchin says.

“The [Perpetuity Wing] set was meant to feel like a replica of the actual location [of the founder’s childhood home], housed in a museum-like setting. We found a great spot along the Hudson and then built an exterior portion to represent a museum space, encompassing the real location. The DP did a great job of lighting that exterior location to make it feel as if it was lit by interior lighting, and really helped us with integration.”

—Vadim Turchin, Visual Effects Supervisor

The eerie Perpetuity Wing has a replica of the childhood house of Lumon founder Keir Eagan (to the right), housed in a museum-like setting, completed with VFX. The exterior of the Lumon building was shot at an existing modernist mid-century building, the Bell Labs Holmdel Complex in New Jersey.

Other scenes required visible VFX work, such as the “reintegration” scene with former worker Petey (Yul Vasquez), who had undergone severance and now has fused his memories back together, resulting in a scene where he’s whipping back and forth between two places. Turchin explains, “It’s an interesting one. A huge credit has to go to the editorial team to create the right feel, as well as [VFX Producer and Supervisor] Ashley Bernes, who did an amazing job of pre-planning and supervising a lot of those moments. Since we had to shoot on multiple locations, it was essential that the lighting and camera positions were consistent. The camera department took highly detailed notes, so we were able to match scenes really well.”

Another challenge was Irving’s hallucination of dripping and spreading black paint. Turchin recalls, “We shot a lot of practical materials for that but, in the end, we replaced them with full CG simulations. It was fun working on it and getting the right balance of character and realism. I cannot wait to see if we get to make it even grander in Season 2.”

One of the silly incentives that workers receive at Lumon are “waffle parties.” Helly and Seth party in a sterile, symmetrical office, on a dance floor of green carpet.

The elevators are the site of the innie/outie transformation entering or leaving work, in which the workers’ faces reflect the switching of selves. Turchin notes, “We had to do a few adjustments. Besides standard stabilization, we often had to take out unwanted motions. We also re-timed the background in order to help the performance to stand out, slowing it down or speeding it up, enhancing the zolly effect.”

“I would say the greatest challenge was making sure not to do too much. [Executive Producer/director Ben Stiller] had a very clear vision of what he wanted, and subtlety was so important to him. We constantly asked, ‘How do we complement and support the story without the VFX calling attention to itself?’ I hope we succeeded.”

—Vadim Turchin, Visual Effects Supervisor

A motion-controlled zolly (zoom + dolly) move was used for most of the elevator innie/outtie transitions. Turchin notes, “Jessica really loved the flexibility to be able to operate the camera while still being motion-controlled. It definitely made the zolly process much easier.”

Executive Producer/director Ben Stiller had a specific look in mind that fit the story’s stark, retro-futurist work setting.

Turchin also gives kudos to Compositing Supervisor David Piombino, VFX Producer Nicole Melius, Managing Director Angela Lupo and “the entire [MPC] Bangalore team, who made most of this possible.” The series was shot with Sony Venice digital cameras with custom lenses.

Turchin concludes, “I would say the greatest challenge was making sure not to do too much. Ben had a very clear vision of what he wanted, and subtlety was so important to him. We constantly asked, ‘How do we complement and support the story without the VFX calling attention to itself?’ I hope we succeeded.”
INSIDE THE GRAVITY-DEFYING BEAUTY OF BUBBLE August 23,2022

By TREVOR HOGG

Images courtesy of Netflix.

The most significant thing introduced during the story creation process was the idea that the part of the body where Uta is touched would turn back into bubbles.

After building a reputation for working on Death Note and Attack on Titan, which involve the deadly abuse of supernatural forces, Japanese filmmaker Tetsuro Araki was seeking a different creative challenge in the world of anime; he began with a drawing of the aquatic faerie-tale character created by Hans Christian Andersen in the foreground and a devastated Tokyo in the background. “If you look at concept art for The Little Mermaid, the composition of the final animation is basically the same,” Araki reveals. “Perhaps it would have been better to go with images that didn’t show her face, but I think it would have ultimately resulted in the same composition. I wanted to avoid the unnecessary impact created by her face and the strong impression it leaves.” Bubble takes place in Tokyo where a mysterious natural phenomenon that counters the laws of physics has turned the abandoned city into a playground for parkour team battles.

The use of 2D animation meant that there was more creative freedom with the lighting compared to 3D.

“Perhaps it would have been better to go with images that didn’t show her face, but I think it would have ultimately resulted in the same composition. I wanted to avoid the unnecessary impact created by her face and the strong impression it leaves.”

—Tetsuro Araki, Director

Director Tetsuro Araki wanted to explore the beauty of dilapidation in his depiction of post-apocalyptic Tokyo.

“For the action sequences, Mr. Wada [Executive Producer Jouji Wada] and his team had a condition from the beginning that the project should make use of Wit Studio’s action animators. I knew that as long as the film had a lot of action scenes, there would always be places I could use the skills I’d acquired up to that point.”

—Tetsuro Araki, Director

“The combination of The Little Mermaid and parkour came about when I approached producer Genki Kawamura with multiple ideas, and he mixed and matched some of them together,” Araki states. “I think this resulted in the creation of more attention-grabbing hooks. It was an exciting experience, as creating an action film that was simultaneously a love story was a new challenge for us.” Upon falling into the gravity-bending sea, parkour star Hibiki is saved by an otherworldly young woman whom he subsequently names Uta. “From the beginning, creating a coming-of-age love story, which we’d never done before, felt like a massive challenge for us,” Araki observes. “After giving it a go, we realized that when somebody who specializes in action works on a love story, the results would often resemble ‘romance action’ scenes. I feel it was very worthwhile though, and we were able to create something truly unique and interesting.”

Araki tried to incorporate the traditional vivid look of Japanese anime while also incorporating realistic layouts.

Bubble is a combination of 2D and 3D animation. “I believe this film showcases and builds on everything we have done in creating the hybrid 3D CG and 2D animation that we specialized in during the production of Attack on Titan,” Araki remarks. “If this were a fully 3D CG film, we would have needed to calculate the correct lighting, which would have been very difficult. But for 2D animation, since they are drawings, you can place the light wherever you’d like, so it wasn’t that big of an issue. It was just a matter of whether or not we thought it looked beautiful. For this film, we used a process for coloring and lighting called color scripting. We had Mizutamari Higashi do the color scripts for important scenes so we could ensure they turned out beautiful. I had never used anyone from that section on my previous projects, so it was new for me. But it was definitely effective.” Executive Producer Jouji Wada had a specific request. “For the action sequences, Mr. Wada and his team had a condition from the beginning that the project should make use of Wit Studio’s action animators. I knew that as long as the film had a lot of action scenes, there would always be places I could use the skills I’d acquired up to that point.”

“From the beginning, creating a coming-of-age love story, which we’d never done before, felt like a massive challenge for us. After giving it a go, we realized that when somebody who specializes in action works on a love story, the results would often resemble ‘romance action’ scenes. I feel it was very worthwhile though, and we were able to create something truly unique and interesting.”

—Tetsuro Araki, Director

Color scripting was essential in making sure that the lighting and colors combined to make beautiful imagery.

Animatics were critical in developing the narrative structure for the Netflix production. “We created the animatics using a program called Storyboard Pro,” Akari explains. “We actually learned the techniques from overseas animators. Director Makoto Shinkai was the first director in Japan to utilize it and show both myself and other Japanese filmmakers that it could be used. When Your Name came out in 2016, everyone realized that it was something they had to learn to use and began adopting it themselves. The advantage of the program is that you can simulate the viewing experience for your team and change the storyboards based on hard-to-follow sections and feedback. This wasn’t possible with conventional flipbook storyboards, and it was difficult to get proper feedback from everyone. Reviewing with animatics is an effective method for improving scenes, so I had already been using them on previous projects, but I significantly improved my accuracy by using them again this time.”

Serving as the main adversaries in the competition known as Tokyo Battlekour are the Undertakers who cheat using technology.

“I think the attraction is in the shock of seeing a familiar cityscape in ruins. I was also very interested in the beauty of dilapidation. However, for this film, I often told the staff not to portray the world as a dystopian one. From the main characters’ perspective, it’s a utopia. … There’s a tendency to immediately draw a dystopia as an unpleasant place, but based on my description, I got [the art team] to depict it as a lovely and beautiful place instead.”

—Tetsuro Araki, Director

Araki has his own unique interpretation of a post-apocalyptic Tokyo. “I think the attraction is in the shock of seeing a familiar cityscape in ruins,” he says. “I was also very interested in the beauty of dilapidation. However, for this film, I often told the staff not to portray the world as a dystopian one. From the main characters’ perspective, it’s a utopia. I would also say to the art team that the world outside the bubble was stifling for the characters and that their world should be depicted as a utopia so the visuals would convey their feelings of happiness. There’s a tendency to immediately draw a dystopia as an unpleasant place, but based on my description, I got them to depict it as a lovely and beautiful place instead.” Despite the fantasy aspect, the characters and story had to have an element of reality. “I tried to incorporate the traditional vivid look of Japanese anime while also incorporating realistic layouts. I think my style falls somewhere between realistic and comic book,” Araki adds.

Clouds, bubbles and debris populate the frame but were art directed to prevent them from being distracting.

One of the reasons Wit Studio was chosen is the ability of their animators to handle action sequences.

“The most significant thing we introduced during the story creation process was the idea of something that would collapse when you touched it,” Araki notes. “It would have been difficult to make it into a film without this element. This idea was suggested by Ms. Kawaguchi, a member of Wit Studio, and I am very grateful to her for this. There was a big difference with and without this concept in place.” Uta and Hibiki share a sad farewell. “I put a lot of thought into the spiral motif and how I could make the scene less sad,” Araki comments. “Uta says at the end that she won’t be lonely because they will meet again in a few decades or a few hundred million years, but Hibiki is both amazed and astonished at the scale of her statement. At that moment, you feel the difference between the scale of the universe and ordinary humans. I included spirals as I wanted the audience to feel Uta’s statement of meeting again decades from now.”
THE OFFER CAN’T BE REFUSED WHEN IT COMES TO INVISIBLE EFFECTS August 16,2022

By TREVOR HOGG

Images courtesy of John Mangia and Paramount+.

A number of CG cars were created, such as the Alfa Romeo.

Every movie that gets made is a miracle as so many elements need to come together logistically, budgetarily, artistically and narratively over a period of a couple of years before it can be presented to audiences. There are moments when artistic ambitions are able to rise above the societal and economical obstacles to create a seminal classic like Francis Ford Coppola was able to achieve with The Godfather. The Offer, which consists of 10 episodes streaming on Paramount+, recounts the trials and tribulations of producer Albert S. Ruddy to cinematically adapt the pulpy gangster best-selling novel by Mario Puzo. The biographical drama miniseries created by Michael Tolkin (Ray Donovan) and guided by showrunner Nikki Toscano (Hunters) relied on Visual Effects Supervisor John Mangia (The Queen’s Gambit) to transform the Paramount Studios backlot and Universal Studios in Los Angeles into early 1970s New York City.

“The key to being able to pull that off [building a believable New York City on an L.A. backlot] was doing the research and having those early discussions with the production designer and showrunner, making sure that we had a clear target of what we were achieving and making sure that all of our vendors were on the same page. The Offer did not have the budget for the schedule to do something twice.”

—John Mangia, Visual Effects Supervisor

Bluescreen assisted with scenes that had wet downs.

The bulk of the environment work occurred in Episode 106 when the principal photography of The Godfather is portrayed.

“I started on the show in May of 2021 and during shooting we had a couple of COVID-19 related shutdowns which created some scheduling issues and caused us to strategize and rethink a couple of things, but the impact was not terrible, especially because we were shooting on studio backlots which are much more controlled environments,” Mangia notes. “It was challenging to find and secure vendors because we were looking for ones that were invested in what we were making. It’s a show about how The Godfather got made, and when it’s an incredibly beloved film like that, you have to put the love into it and make sure that everything is true to the film. We’re recreating some of these famous sets from that film, and we were looking at all of the small details trying to get them right.”

Outpost VFX, Mavericks VFX, CBS VFX, Epic Shepherd and Basilic Fly Studio created 800 visual effects shots for the 10 episodes. “We had 10 weeks of post per episode, but it was all overlapping,” Mangia explains. “We were block shooting, so we were prepping, shooting and in post concurrently.” The bulk of the visual effects occur in the middle of the season when the actual shooting of The Godfather is recreated. “They’re out on Fifth Avenue or in Harlem or the Bronx, and you have all of this environment work in these scenes,” Mangia outlines.

“For some reason, out here [in L.A.] it’s bluer, and having lived in both places I know this. When we were working on our environment and set extension work, sometimes we would modify the amount of cloud coverage and how blue the sky was in certain scenes. It was something we were sensitive to and conscious of because it’s one of those subtle things that people might not think about. That’s one of those unique things about Los Angeles that we wanted to feel different in the New York City shots.”

—John Mangia, Visual Effects Supervisor

“Episode 106 was our biggest one as it had 30% of our set extensions shots for the entire season, which was a tremendous amount of work. Almost all of those set extensions had to be CG because of the fluidity of the camera moves. By the end of it, we were delivering an episode every other week.” The development process was driven by visuals. “Visual effects vendors working on specific scenes would provide a concept still of that environment, which could be shown to the showrunner and get the creative signoff,” he says. “Sometimes it was ‘Fifth Avenue is Fifth Avenue,’ and we had to make it look like it was in The Godfather. Other times it was getting the right vibe.”

Plate photography was conducted in Sicily, but not in New York City. “The visual effects team shot thousands of photographs of neighborhoods, like Columbus Circle, Mulberry Street and Carroll Gardens,” Mangia remarks. “It was important especially for me as I’m originally from New York City and of Italian-American heritage, that if we’re making a show about The Godfather set in New York City it has to have that authenticity, otherwise my great-grandfather is going be rolling over in his grave! We did source a lot of the designs of the buildings, textures, grunge and patina that is on everything in New York City. There is nothing clean in New York City.” New York City has changed a great deal since the early 1970s. Mangia explains, “That was part of the reason why it didn’t make sense to shoot the show there, because some of the locations that we were depicting either don’t exist anymore or don’t look anything like they used to. We looked through photo and video archives of New York City, old tax survey photos, and we were collaborating with the art department the entire time to get the aesthetic right.”

The visual effects team shot thousands of photographs of neighborhoods like Columbus Circle.

New York City has changed a great deal since the early 1970s, so the decision was made to transform the Paramount Studios backlot in Los Angeles.

Actual set plans from The Godfather were sourced by the art department led by Production Designer Laurence Bennett (Billions). “They were able to rebuild the Don’s office based on the original blueprints of Louis Restaurant where Michael Corleone shoots Virgil Sollozzo and [NYPD Captain] Mark McCluskey was redone completely from scratch,” Mangia reveals. “But some of the other things, like Best & Co., which is a department store that is no longer on Fifth Avenue, we had built on the backlot, and we were able to do some previs to work out how to fit the building by taking over the top of it and extending it by three or four display windows. We also had to build St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Saks Fifth Avenue and Cartier Building. All of these landmark buildings on Fifth Avenue would be there and are actually in The Godfather. We built all of that including the period cars and people walking around. We shot photo reference of 170 extras in period clothing to create the crowds in various shots, and we also did a bunch of bluescreen plate photography for crowd elements for scenes in Columbus Circle where there is a crowd chanting, waving signs and yelling. Some shots such as the aerial of Columbus Circle were fully CG.”

“The visual effects team shot thousands of photographs of neighborhoods, like Columbus Circle, Mulberry Street and Carroll Gardens. It was important especially for me as I’m originally from New York City and of Italian-American heritage, that if we’re making a show about The Godfather set in New York City it has to have that authenticity, otherwise my great-grandfather is going be rolling over in his grave!”

—John Mangia, Visual Effects Supervisor

A personal favorite for VFX Supervisor John Mangia is the opening shot of Mulberry Street and seeing New York City.

“That [the changes in New York City since the 1970s] was part of the reason why it didn’t make sense to shoot the show there, because some of the locations that we were depicting either don’t exist anymore or don’t look anything like they used to. We looked through photo and video archives of New York City, old tax survey photos, and we were collaborating with the art department the entire time to get the aesthetic right.”

—John Mangia, Visual Effects Supervisor

“Something that was helpful was our vendors all had similar cloud pipelines which allowed us not to double down on certain kinds of assets,” Mangia remarks. “We did share assets. Mavericks VFX built all of the cars except for the CG Alfa Romeo in Episode 109. Outpost VFX built a crowd asset.” Virtual production was not a viable option. “We had a lot of exterior shots and the LED panels are not bright enough to have the right dynamic range,” Mangia adds. Bluescreen assisted with scenes that had wet downs. “What that required was reflecting our environment work into the puddles on the street, which was quite a bit of extra compositing,” Mangia notes. “But as soon as you put something like that in shot, the viewer is more likely to believe because it’s what you expect to see. On my end, it was making sure that the bluescreens were tall enough that we didn’t have to do an extra roto and paintwork. If the bluescreens were high enough, the reflection would be entirely bluescreen and it would be easier to key. It’s an interesting conversation to have because sometimes you’ll get a unit production manager or line producer asking, ‘What is the reason the bluescreen is so large?’ And you need to explain that it has to be that big because of the environment that’s going there.”

The visual effects team looked through photo and video archives of New York City, and old tax survey photos, and collaborated with the art department to get the aesthetic right for landmarks such as the Brooklyn Bridge.

The former Lincoln Medical Center was recreated, as it served as the location for where Michael Corelone attempts to prevent the second assassination attempt on his father.

“We also had to build St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Saks Fifth Avenue and Cartier Building. All of these landmark buildings on Fifth Avenue would be there and are actually in The Godfather. We built all of that including the period cars and people walking around. We shot photo reference of 170 extras in period clothing to create the crowds in various shots, and we also did a bunch of bluescreen plate photography for crowd elements for scenes in Columbus Circle where there is a crowd chanting, waving signs and yelling. Some shots such as the aerial of Columbus Circle were fully CG.”

—John Mangia, Visual Effects Supervisor

Special effects compensated for the climate differences between Los Angeles and New York City. “Special Effects Supervisor Blumes Tracy [Made for Love] and his team created snow from 180 tons of chipped ice, had snow blowers, fans, falling snow, and dusting greens with snow,” Mangia states. “Then we had some other scenes that involve the mafia and some violence like gunplay and people getting shot, so there were squibs, and maybe later in post, visual effects would enhance it for timing. It’s always great to get that stuff in-camera. We also had a big shootout scene in Episode 106 in Harlem where a couple of the mob guys go and shoot up Nicky Barnes’ club. The special effects team placed 500 squibs on this building that were all blowing as these guys are shooting with shotguns and rifles, that visual effects ended up going in and doing a little bit of augmentation primarily due to editorial adjustments that were made.”

Plate photography was conducted in Sicily for settings such as Castello degli Schiavi.

The sky in Los Angeles looks quite different from sky in New York City. “For some reason, out here [in L.A.] it’s bluer, and having lived in both places I know this,” Mangia states. “When we were working on our environment and set extension work, sometimes we would modify the amount of crowd coverage and how blue the sky was in certain scenes. It was something we were sensitive to and conscious of because it’s one of those subtle things that people might not think about. That’s one of those unique things about Los Angeles that we wanted to feel different in the New York City shots.” The biggest challenge was how to make a believable 1970s New York City with just a couple of streets on Los Angeles backlots. Mangia observes, “The key to being able to pull that off was doing the research and having those early discussions with the production designer and showrunner, making sure that we had a clear target of what we were achieving and making sure that all of our vendors were on the same page. The Offer did not have the budget for the schedule to do something twice.” All of Episode 106 was challenging. Concludes Mangia, “I love the opening shot of show with the camera booming down on Mulberry Street and seeing New York City. It sets the mood and tone as well as brings the audience into it. There are so many great shots and scenes in The Offer.”
DIGITAL DOMAIN ENCOUNTERS DOCTOR STRANGE IN THE MULTIVERSE OF MADNESS August 9,2022

By TREVOR HOGG

Images courtesy of Digital Domain and Marvel Studios.

Digital Domain had to come up with how effects simulations would work and look to show what happens when two universes collide with each other.

Living up to its title is Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, where filmmaker Sam Raimi (Spider-Man) infuses his horror sensibilities into the Marvel Cinematic Universe for the sequel that stars Benedict Cumberbatch, Elizabeth Olsen, Rachel McAdams, Chiwetel Ejiofor and Benedict Wong. Digital Domain was hired by Marvel Studios Visual Effects Supervisor Janek Sirrs (The Matrix) for a 100 shots that consist of the aftermath of two universes colliding with each other, a Sinister Universe version of the Sanctum Sanctorum, and the revelation of a hex conjured by Wanda and the attempt to capture her in the Mirror Universe. “For this show, it was a standard pipeline,” Digital Domain Visual Effects Supervisor Joel Behrens states. “We didn’t have to go outside of using our typical tools. We did V-Ray for lighting and rendering, Houdini for our effects, Nuke for compositing and Maya for asset builds.”

“We had the ground level of buildings built as set pieces and dressed accordingly per universe, and then they would do a LiDAR scan of that. We would get the geometry from the LiDAR data, build out the actual extensions based off the ground-level buildings and maintain that architectural look that was already established with the ground level, and run our destruction simulation, which in this case was a pseudo anti-gravity destruction.”

—Joel Behrens, Visual Effects Supervisor, Digital Domain

Filmmaker Sam Raimi brings his signature comedic spin on the horror genre to the MCU with the release of Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.

High-resolution digital doubles of Wanda and Doctor Strange were created by Digital Domain and shared with other vendors.

The Mirror Trap proved to be the most challenging look to develop and required 20 other versions of Wanda to appear in the various reflections.

On his way to find the Sinister Sanctum Sanctorum inhabited by the antagonistic and alternative version of himself, Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) and Christine Palmer (Rachel McAdams) traverse through two different realities of New York City that have collided together and are ripping each other apart. “There were a lot of effects simulations and visual design that needed to happen to come up with that look,” Behrens reveals. “On a backlot location in London, there was a basic intersection and street that you see multiple times throughout the movie in various universes. We had the ground level of buildings built as set pieces and dressed accordingly per universe, and then they would do a LiDAR scan of that. We would get the geometry from the LiDAR data, build out the actual extensions based off the ground-level buildings and maintain that architectural look that was already established with the ground level, and run our destruction simulation, which in this case was a pseudo anti-gravity destruction.”

Plates were shot in Iceland, while portions of the grand staircase and foyer were practically built for the Sinister Sanctum Sanctorum.

“You can’t have it [the set of destroyed buildings] drifting away too quickly. Otherwise your buildings are gone by the end of the shot. It was finding that balance of how to keep interesting motion up there, along with these large, smoky, viscus-liquid tendrils that pull away from the buildings as well as the pieces of debris. Then, on top of that you’ve got the incursion from the other universe colliding and floating through space, whether in real-time or in a slightly slow-motion fashion to heighten the interest of the motion.”

—Joel Behrens, Visual Effects Supervisor, Digital Domain

Animation and motion tests were conducted for the debris. “You can’t have it drifting away too quickly. Otherwise your buildings are gone by the end of the shot,” Behrens remarks. “It was finding that balance of how to keep interesting motion up there, along with these large, smoky, viscus-liquid tendrils that pull away from the buildings as well as the pieces of debris. Then, on top of that you’ve got the incursion from the other universe colliding and floating through space, whether in real-time or in a slightly slow-motion fashion to heighten the interest of the motion.” As with all of movies by Sam Ramai, a certain automobile is seen floating in the background. “Some of the floating objects like the Oldsmobile Delta 88 were hung off of a large crane arm on wires to have them slightly spinning and drifting through a scene,” Behrens remarks. “It was taking a look at that and matching it. Sam and Janek wanted everything to have a hyper-real, more than slightly slower than real-time look in this universe from the incursion. We tended to go with a heavier slow-motion, high-frame-rate-shutter look for these elements like the Brooklyn Bridge or the subway that is crashing through the ground behind them or the Empire State Building.”

Plate photography was shot in Iceland of the black sand beaches to create an otherworldly feel for the Sinister Sanctum Sanctorum.

A car that cameos in the films of Sam Raimi is an Oldsmobile Delta 88.

Different iconic landmarks appear in the Sinister Universe, such as the Brooklyn Bridge in a Victorian Steampunk Gothic style sliding through the ocean.

The Sinister Sanctum Sanctorum was treated as if it was a haunted house.

A haunted house aesthetic was given to the original model of the Sanctum Sanctorum to create the Sinister Universe version. “We didn’t modify the silhouette or the shape of the building, but changed the materials it was made out of, such as using large, weathered pieces of stone that had large cracks in them,” Behrens states. “We had vines that went up the side, and it looked like it had been a 16^th century mausoleum that has seen a lot of age and wear over time.” The building is slowly being pulled apart by a massive dark void. “You have this large chunk in the upper right-hand corner that is slowly pulling rocks apart from the construction along with these sinewy, inky tendrils that come off of it,” Behrens adds. “Then, once you go inside the Sanctum there is some weird universe stuff going on. Inside the foyer you’ve got the Grand Staircase, and behind it is this odd otherworldly beach where the surf is rolling up and [there’s] a gigantic, red ominous moon.” Plates were shot in Iceland, while on set Cumberbatch walked on a mirror that had some actual sand on it. “It was a fairly complex simulation to tie in with the surf edge as waves break on the beach,” Behrens says, “and we had these tributaries around the staircase that we wanted water to pool in so Doctor Strange would walk through the water. They played him dry for wet, so we also had to try to make his boots look like that they were getting wet from the water he is walking through.”

“[O]nce you go inside the Sanctum there is some weird universe stuff going on. Inside the foyer you’ve got the Grand Staircase, and behind it is this odd otherworldly beach where the surf is rolling up and [there’s] a gigantic, red ominous moon. … It was a fairly complex simulation to tie in with the surf edge as waves break on the beach, and we had these tributaries around the staircase that we wanted water to pool in so Doctor Strange would walk through the water. They played him dry for wet, so we also had to try to make his boots look like that they were getting wet from the water he is walking through.”

—Joel Behrens, Visual Effects Supervisor, Digital Domain

Doctor Strange encounters Wanda in an orchard that is an illusion, disguising a darker reality that builds upon the Marvel Studios television series WandaVision. “WandaVision had that digitized, almost pixelated television look for the hex as it got dropped and revealed what was actually happening in the world,” Behrens notes. “For this one they wanted it to be more natural and organic. We decided to tie it more into her smoky red magic and the dark hole magic. The idea of this wall of her magic that reveals the universe was tricky because we didn’t want it to be like a simplified wipe-away or dissolve. We had this swirling stuff that, as it wiped over certain branches of the trees, the smoke would cling and almost pull away, so you got this interaction between the wall and the objects that it intersects with as it was revealing that.” The trees appear significantly different in the post-hex world. Comments Behrens, “They went from a fairly normal, healthy trees to these twisted, decayed trees.” Practical trees were constructed around the actors, with the rest being a digital set extension. “We struggled with drifting fog that didn’t look too much like smoke because they didn’t want it to feel like a burnt-out forest that the characters were standing in,” Behrens says. “There is a lot of talking back forth in that scene. We ended up doing background extensions and atmospheric simulations as well as the CG dark hole.”

“Some of the floating objects like the Oldsmobile Delta 88 were hung off of a large crane arm on wires to have them slightly spinning and drifting through a scene. … [Director] Sam [Raimi] and [Marvel Visual Effects Supervisor] Janek [Sirrs] wanted everything to have a hyper-real, more than slightly slower than real-time look in this universe from the incursion. We tended to go with a heavier slow-motion, high-frame-rate-shutter look for these elements like the Brooklyn Bridge or the subway that is crashing through the ground behind them or the Empire State Building.”

—Joel Behrens, Visual Effects Supervisor, Digital Domain

A swap gas-like fog that has a pinkish-orange color drifts around the trees.

A portion of the post-hex orchard was practically built around the characters.

It was important to avoid the real orchard appearing as a forest ravaged by a wildfire.

In order to imprison Wanda in the Mirror Universe, Doctor Strange conjures a Mirror Trap. “There were all sorts of permutations, such as being glassier, but we went for it being more mirror-like and reflecting a digital environment as well as a digital-double version of our actress,” Behrens explains. “When shooting the footage on greenscreen for Wanda, we had a few witness cameras for some of those reflections; however, because these mirror pieces were at different angles and magnifications of her, we ended up using a digital double for quite a bit of that.” The decision was to have a lot less distortion in the mirror images. “We needed to see clearly what is happening with Wanda,” Behrens explains. “We had spikes built out of this mirrored glass as well so you could see her reflections, in which we used a combination of both digital-double and plate reflections. It was tricky coming up with the look because you didn’t want it to feel like a flat chrome surface. So we were trying to put imperfections on the front glass, smudges, a bit of dust and dirt, scratches, small cracks, things that were grounded in reality, because the initial passes did not look good when they were strictly a purely reflective material. It looked incredibly CG. It’s always about those imperfections and realism that you can add to those pieces that hopefully fit it in there and make it feel realistic.”
RISING ABOVE THE NETWORK SCHEDULE FOR SUPERMAN & LOIS August 2,2022

By TREVOR HOGG

Images courtesy of The CW.

A shot taken from the pilot episode outside the Fortress of Solitude.

A creative partnership and friendship forged 28 years ago at MGM has Visual Effects Supervisor John Gajdecki (Stargate: Atlantis) and Visual Effects Producer Matthew Gore (Battlestar Galactica) working together again on the second season of The CW production Superman & Lois. Co-creator and showrunner Todd Helbing (The Flash) has produced a unique spin on the superhero genre where at the heart of the story are the family struggles of Clark Kent (Tyler Hoechlin), Lois Lane (Elizabeth Tulloch) and their twin sons (Jordan Elsass, Alex Garfin) who have inherited the patriarchal supernatural abilities.

“We know that the artists are good and the art is built into the people. This team manages the process so tightly that we can deliver shots without panic two days before they’re on TV.”

—John Gajdecki, Visual Effects Supervisor

Superman & Lois is a testament to logistical prowess of the visual effects team that manages without panicking to deliver shots two days before they are on television.

Even though Superman & Lois is spun off of Supergirl, the look of the series is uniquely its own.

Superman (Tyler Hoechlin) must not only fly, he must fly through elements such as smoke, fog, clouds and dust. Bigger ambitions resulted in a 25% increase in visual effects shots in Season 2.

A major part of the visual language are Cooke Xtal Xpress lenses, which were emulated in the visual effects shots.

It was important to be able to produce feature-quality visual effects shots within a television schedule.

Water was poured onto Tyler Hoechlin when shooting the scene where Superman rescues a submarine in Episode 201. The submarine was created in Maya, with Houdini water and lots of clouds and smoke from the stock library added in Nuke.

The Kent family farmhouse is dilapidated and the barn has burned down in the Bizarro World version. Even though there are assets and locations that carried over from Season 1, modifications still had to be made.

A particular expression comes to mind for Gajdecki when describing how the show operates. “You hear people saying, ‘Armchair generals talk strategy, but the pros talk logistics.’ ‘Can we get the weapons to the front? Will there be food for the soldiers when they get there?’ We know that the artists are good and the art is built into the people,” Gajdecki states. “This team manages the process so tightly that we can deliver shots without panic two days before they’re on TV.”

“At the beginning of the season, we said that we wanted to take this up another level and try to get as close to feature quality as we could, knowing our limitations. But every time Superman does something, there is usually a CG component to it that adds to the schedule and budget issues. John mentioned to me that he had an in-house team on Project Blue Book, and so we proposed that. The in-house team has shined and been great in helping us to get this on the air.”

—Matthew Gore, Visual Effects Producer

Necessity led to a creative solution for Season 2 of Superman & Lois. “We have a tight network schedule, so it’s tough to try to do what we’re trying to do,” Gore notes. “At the beginning of the season, we said that we wanted to take this up another level and try to get as close to feature quality as we could, knowing our limitations. But every time Superman does something, there is usually a CG component to it that adds to the schedule and budget issues. John mentioned to me that he had an in-house team on Project Blue Book, and so we proposed that. The in-house team has shined and been great in helping us to get this on the air.”

15 different vendors worked on Season 2, including Zoic Studios, Refuge VFX, Boxel Studios, Frame Lab Studios, Barnstorm VFX, Tribal Imaging, Od Studios and Lux VFX.

The more shots were broken up over multiple vendors, the more often they would come back to the in-house team as the final 2D. “I see us as the final line of digital defense,” Gajdecki remarks. “Everything comes in and we do the comps, and we’ll put that photographic pass on it to make sure that the lens flares feel right and that the camera move looks like it fits between the shot, before and after, and the contrast, smoke and dust levels are matching. When Superman flies in and comes to a stop, something else has to keep going otherwise it doesn’t feel right. With some artists it is hard to explain why that’s wrong. We came up with the term energy transfer and suddenly people went, ‘Okay, I see it now.’”

“I see us [the in-house team] as the final line of digital defense. Everything comes in and we do the comps, and we’ll put that photographic pass on it to make sure that the lens flares feel right and that the camera move looks like it fits between the shot, before and after, and the contrast, smoke and dust levels are matching. When Superman flies in and comes to a stop, something else has to keep going otherwise it doesn’t feel right. With some artists it is hard to explain why that’s wrong. We came up with the term energy transfer and suddenly people went, ‘Okay, I see it now.’”

—John Gajdecki, Visual Effects Supervisor

There is mutual cooperation between the different departments which allows for seamless integration between practical and CG elements.

Tyler Hoechlin was put through the deepfake process to apply Bizarro’s face. Deepfake technology was critical in being able to create the Bizzaro version of Superman.

Bigger ambitions have meant that the visual effects count increased from 2,300 to 2,500 shots for Season 1, to an additional 25% for Season 2. Also expanded are the number of vendors, which can be a many as 15 depending on their availability. Among the contributors are Zoic Studios, Refuge VFX, Boxel Studios, Frame Lab Studios, Barnstorm VFX, Tribal Imaging, Od Studios and Lux VFX. “We have an honest relationship with our vendors,” Gore notes. “In my conversations with them, are you available and can you do this work? They’ll tell you flat-out. It won’t be like the shop that wants to take the work and figure it out. They’ll say, ‘We don’t have these artists available for those weeks, but we have these who are available.’ We’re constantly trying to fill what somebody can do.” Even though there are assets and locations that carried over from Season 1, modifications still had to be made. “The [Kent family] farmhouse ended up in Bizarro World, so even though the farmhouse didn’t change between seasons, there was a whole new farmhouse and barn,” reveals Gajdecki. “The barn has burned down and the farmhouse is dilapidated.”

Villainous Ally’s acolytes prepare to travel through the portal to Earth Bizarre in a greenscreen plate of the actors on the dressed studio floor. The portal was created in Houdini and comped in Nuke with smoke elements.

A greenscreen plate of Superman and Tal-Rho on the volcano’s edge. The Maya model of the interior of the volcano was comped with Houdini lava, live-action volcano splashes and lots of smoke and embers to produce the final shot.

“There is stuff that we can’t talk about for the series finale that might come as a text from Todd Helbing with a photo that says, ‘We’re going to do this,’” Gore comments. “We went, ‘Okay. Cool. Let’s figure out how.’ A lot of times Todd will give us a heads up that something big is out there, so we can at least start thinking about it even if we don’t get a full outline or a script yet. At least we know conceptually this is something that we have to try to fit into the schedule.”

“Anything that we need we get. When we shoot greenscreens, the line producer says, ‘It’s Gadjecki Rules.’ They light it for us and get the exposures and interactive light that we need. Our shots look good even though we have little time because we shoot the pieces so well and production is behind us.”

—John Gajdecki, Visual Effects Supervisor

Gajdecki has a particular philosophy towards visual effects. “Every shot that we do has to look like that the art department directed it and the camera operators operated the camera. We are sensitive to the inputs from the other departments to make sure that we put in the same chaos that would be in a real shot.” The cooperation is mutual, he says. “Anything that we need we get. When we shoot greenscreens, the line producer says, ‘It’s Gadjecki Rules.’ They light it for us and get the exposures and interactive light that we need. Our shots look good even though we have little time because we shoot the pieces so well and production is behind us.”

The term ‘energy transference’ was coined for the scenes where Superman flies in and comes to a stop, to explain why the energy all around that action must continue.

Episode 208 features a portal. Comments Gajdecki, “Upon hearing that there was going to be a portal, we got all of the reference together, numbered all of the references, put it out in front of our executives, got on the Zoom and asked, ‘Todd, is any of this close to what you’re thinking?’ He might have 50 images to look at, and we start to talk about the nature of the portal, what’s the portal doing and the behavior. We go from there and start narrowing down the focus.” Superman gets affected in a dramatic way. “There had to be some component of him getting shredded as he enters it,” Gajdecki adds. “Then we had this whole other thing where once he’s inside there, what does it look like? It goes back to who does what. Our in-house team started a look in Episode 201 where Bizarro is flashing to stuff. We need some cool flash that is supposed to sell that it’s him traveling through the portal. The in-house team was tasked with that. They came up with a look. It evolved to a certain point, and we knew that we wanted it to feel like it had depth to it. That was our other challenge. Todd wanted it to feel that he is breaching something, but we also wanted to sell that there is something behind it, and then he had to shred in there at some point. We didn’t want it to be holes underneath and you see through him. We wanted a substance there, but didn’t want it to be bone and skin because it’s CW.”

Only 10% of the shots don’t have a custom 3D element.

Adding to the shot count was number of deepfakes associated with the character of Bizarro, who is revealed to be an alternative dimension version of Superman. “We let everyone know that the AI approach was not going to be a one-size-fits-all answer to all the Bizarro shots,” Gore explains. “We had numerous discussions with Todd that if a shot was going to ‘break’ the AI, we were going to have to apply more traditional methods to get the sequences to where he wanted them to be. For example, there were a couple shots where we needed to go all CG on Bizarro in order for him to be able to appear in the same shot as Tyler during some of the fight scenes. We massaged the cuts with Todd. Boxel Studio took on all the work that the AI couldn’t do. The in-house team came up with the look for Bizarro’s eyes and then worked with Tribal Imaging in Calgary, Wild Media Entertainment in Toronto/Vancouver, Kalos Studios, Animism Studios and Refuge VFX to make sure no matter who took Bizarro to final, the look for Bizarro’s eyes and makeup was going to be consistent in all the comps across the various episodes. It was also a great learning experience working with this new AI toolset. And to be clear, not every scene in the Bizarro story arc was achieved using AI.
GOING BIGGER TO HONOR THE FRANCHISE DNA WITH JURASSIC WORLD: DOMINION July 26,2022

By TREVOR HOGG

Images courtesy of Universal Studios.

The chase involving the Velociraptors combined plate photography from Malta and Chris Pratt riding a stationary motorbike on a massive rolling road in the U.K.

Prehistoric beasts have had a constant presence in the life of David Vickery, who served as Visual Effects Supervisor on Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom and Jurassic World: Dominion. “I’m still working on dinosaurs! Not the film ones, but for promotional media, advertisements and public relations related stuff.” Any concerns of repeating himself were alleviated by working with a different director, crew and script. “There are always new challenges.” About 1,450 visual effects shots were created, with ILM being responsible for 1,000 shots while the rest were handled by Lola VFX and Hybride. “[Director] Colin Trevorrow had a one-on-one relationship with the storyboard artist, and those storyboards were handed over to us to create animatics. I worked closely with the previs and postvis teams [provided by Proof].” Collaborating with Production Designer Kevin Jenkins was easy as he is a former art director at ILM. “Kevin clearly understands visual effects and worked a lot in 3D, so he could hand those designs over to us,” Vickery observes. “Because of our previous working relationship, Kevin trusted me to take incomplete designs to ILM and to continue their evolution.”

“There are probably more animatronics in Jurassic World: Dominion than in Fallen Kingdom and Jurassic World combined. … [T]he digital dinosaurs we had were an exact match for the physical animatronic dinosaurs that we had on set. It didn’t matter where they positioned the rig because the range of motion was exactly the same as the range of motion in the digital dinosaur. The goal being to get a plate that gave us practical animatronics that could move and perform on set and be digitally extended without us having to replace it.”

—David Vickery, Visual Effects Supervisor

‘Digital archeology’ was conducted to return the original T-Rex from Jurassic Park to her former glory.

1,450 visual effects shots were created, with ILM being responsible for 1,000 shots while the rest were handled by Lola VFX and Hybride.

An entirely new feather system was constructed in Houdini by ILM to deal with creatures such as the Pyroraptor.

Chris Pratt reprises his role of Owen Grady in Jurassic World: Dominion.

Jurassic World: Dominion was the first Hollywood production to recommence shooting during the pandemic.

Five weeks into principal photography for Jurassic World: Dominion, the pandemic caused a global lockdown. “Nobody knew what was going to happen when COVID-19 hit and we had to start shooting again during the pandemic,” Vickery states. “It was hard to understand how we were going to be able to communicate with each other, because suddenly we had to stay distant, were all wearing masks and couldn’t all cluster around the director’s monitors. We had tech scouts where the DP, John Schwartzman, was still isolating before he was able to come back onto set. We were deploying all sorts of new techniques such as wearing Bolero headsets rather than the usual walkie system.” Travel restrictions caused a few key scenes to be reimagined, such as Velociraptors chasing a motorcycle driven by Owen Grady (Chris Pratt) through the streets of Malta. “We had array photography and LiDAR data from location, which was then projected and manipulated rather than being a fully CG environment. Once we got back in the U.K., Chris rode a stationary motorbike that was placed on a massive rolling road that was 25 feet wide. The bike was rigged so it could weave left and right.”

“There was a cool bit of what I called ‘digital archeology.’ We had 3D SoftImage files but didn’t even have the software. However, we managed to get those NURBS files into Maya and convert them into polygon meshes. We also referenced all of Stan Winston’s photography. It’s a beautiful piece of recreation of that original T-Rex model.”

—David Vickery, Visual Effects Supervisor

A different approach was adopted for Mosasaurus attacking the crab boat. “Our editors scoured through 16 seasons of The Deadliest Catch program, correlated and created an edit from outtakes,” Vickery reveals. “The goal was to use the natural aesthetic of the footage that we had and integrate the CGI elements into it. The crab pod is something that we added in as well as the Mosasaurus and a bunch of spray.” Shifting weather patterns had to be accommodated. “When we were shooting at a lumber yard and had to put two huge Apatosaurus in the background, the whole sequence was shot in the morning in bright sunlight and no snow,” Vickery says. “Then it started snowing at lunchtime and we had to reshoot the entire scene again because the snow was going to change the look of our plates. We had a huge team of effects artists at ILM whose job was adding digital snow and dust.” An entirely new feather system was constructed in Houdini by ILM to deal with creatures such as the Pyroraptor. “It relied on the geometry of the feathers being described as a curve for the quill and a flat piece of polygonal geometry for the feather itself,” Vickery explains. “The feathers had to be able to interact with environmental elements. “On set we had the special effects team with air movers, some snow and atmospheric effects, but we had to recreate the same effect in post to be able to integrate the Pyroraptor.”

When designing dinosaurs the first point of reference is the holotype.

A massive animatronic was constructed for the Giganotosaurus.

There are probably more animatronics in Jurassic World: Dominion than in Fallen Kingdom and Jurassic World combined.

“There was a moment on set where Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum, Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard and DaWanda Wise are with the biggest animatronic that I’ve ever seen in my life. Bringing all of those things together was amazing!”

—David Vickery, Visual Effects Supervisor

There was a close collaboration between the art department, visual effects and creature effects to make sure that there was seamless integration of CG and practical elements.

The goal was to get a plate where the practical animatronics could move and perform on set and be digitally extended without it being replaced.

Production Designer Kevin Jenkins created clay maquettes that were scanned and given to ILM to make sure that the models were anatomically correct before being 3D printed by John Nolan and the creature effects team.

Each instalment of the franchise introduces new dinosaurs. “The Giganotosaurus was a real dinosaur,” Vickery remarks. “You look for the holotype, which is often a partial specimen so scientific that experts have to guess the rest. Some of the dinosaurs look so bizarre, like the Therizinosaurus, which is this huge theropod that is covered in feathers and has one-meter-long baseball bat-like claws on the edge of its fingers.” A massive animatronic was built for the Giganotosaurus. “There are probably more animatronics in Jurassic World: Dominion than in Fallen Kingdom and Jurassic World combined.” Jenkins collaborated with Trevorrow and paleontologist consultant Steve Brusatte to develop concepts that were turned into clay maquettes and then scanned. The scans were given to ILM which made sure the model was anatomically correct before handing them off to John Nolan, the head of the creature effects team, for 3D printing. “This meant that the digital dinosaurs we had were an exact match for the physical animatronic dinosaurs that we had on set,” Vickery notes. The process helped to minimize the amount of CG. “It didn’t matter where they positioned the rig because the range of motion was exactly the same as the range of motion in the digital dinosaur. The goal being to get a plate that gave us practical animatronics that could move and perform on set and be digitally extended without us having to replace it.”

“From a simulation perspective, [with feathers] you’re dealing with a huge amount of geometry that is deforming and moving on a frame-by-frame basis, and is reacting to external forces like the wind, but also to the way that the creature is moving. Creatively, ever since Jurassic Park, fans and paleontologists have been crying out to see feathers on dinosaurs, and we will deliver this time.”

—David Vickery, Visual Effects Supervisor

Restored to her former glory is the T-Rex from Jurassic Park. “There was a cool bit of what I called ‘digital archeology,’” Vickery recalls. “We had 3D SoftImage files but didn’t even have the software. However, we managed to get those NURBS files into Maya and convert them into polygon meshes. We also referenced all of Stan Winston’s photography. It’s a beautiful piece of recreation of that original T-Rex model.”

Feathers proved to be the biggest creative and technical challenge. “From a simulation perspective,” Vickery comments, “you’re dealing with a huge amount of geometry that is deforming and moving on a frame-by-frame basis, and is reacting to external forces like the wind, but also to the way that the creature is moving. Creatively, ever since Jurassic Park, fans and paleontologists have been crying out to see feathers on dinosaurs, and we will deliver this time.”

The on-set special effects team deployed air movers, snow and atmospheric effects so the feathers of the Pyroraptor interacted with environmental elements.

All of Stan Winston’s photography was referenced in the recreation of the original T-Rex model from Jurassic Park.

Seeing the Jurassic Park and Jurassic World franchises come together was a career highlight for Vickery. “There was a moment on set where Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum, Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard and DaWanda Wise are with the biggest animatronic that I’ve ever seen in my life. Bringing all of those things together was amazing!”

VES Partnersadmin2022-02-28T10:02:04-08:00

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