Visual Effects & Compositing: 2009

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Upcoming 5 Movies to Watch

Sherlock Holmes (Warner Bros., Dec. 25)
There's no James Bond this year, so why not refashion Arthur Conan Doyle's legendary 19th century sleuth into a superhero that's a cross between 007 and Jim West? Robert Downey Jr. is "quirky and kind of nuts" -- and so is Holmes in Guy Ritchie's conspiracy-driven thriller. Here Holmes' fighting skills are as lethal as his intellect, and Jude Law's Watson proves an adroit foil with his skills as soldier, surgeon, womanizer and gambler. Vfx from Double Negative and Framestore look to be explosive and adroit in recapturing Victorian London.

Ninja Assassin (Warner Bros., Nov. 25)
The studio promises a blood fest in this refashioned martial arts actioner from director James McTeigue and produced by Joel Silver (Sherlock Holmes) and the Wachowskis. Raizo (Rain) is one of the world's deadliest assassins but has become a myth. When his friend is executed by his former clan, he goes into hiding and comes back for revenge. Nearly 800 vfx shots, ranging from CG blood, CG weapons, CG dismemberments, CG embers and matte paintings have been executed by nearly 10 vendors, including Pixomondo, Trixter and Evil Eye. Dan Glass (the overall supervisor) worked with Chas Jarrett, Bjoern Mayer and Chris Townsend.

The Lovely Bones (Paramount, Dec. 11)
Peter Jackson's adaptation of Alice Sebold's best-selling novel is one of the year's most awaited releases and has Best Picture potential written all over it. In 1973, a young girl (Saoirse Ronan) is murdered by a local pedophile (Stanley Tucci), and enters an afterlife with a weird sense of humor. Jackson ,who potentially returns to his Heavenly Creatures kind of movie, has expanded the afterlife with the help of Weta Digital (supervised by Christian Rivers). Not exactly heaven, her refuge is more of an in-between state of mind until she can resolve the issues surrounding her death -- and is the imaginatively metaphoric province of dreams filtered through the lovely New Zealand landscape.

The Twilight Saga: New Moon (Summit Ent., Nov. 20)
The second installment in the Twilight franchise is setting records on Fandango and could top its predecessor. And the vfx bar has been suitably raised, with lots of werewolves from Tippett Studio entering the vampire fray.

Avatar (Twentieth Century Fox, Dec. 18)
OK, this is it -- the film we've been waiting and waiting and waiting for: James Cameron's return to the big screen. We've seen the trailers, we've glimpsed the IMAX 3-D footage from "Avatar Day" and we will know soon enough if this hybrid has been worth all the hype. Rest assured: it will be a forward-looking stereoscopic spectacle that will have the industry frantically seeking to join the virtual production revolution. And Weta Digital is the lead vendor in this game changer.

Thursday, November 5, 2009

Making of Partizan Roller Babies

Saturday, October 31, 2009

Some Behind The Scenes and Practical Effects of movie "2012"

After watching jaw dropping and disaster sequences in the trailers of movie “2012”, We all were waiting and more excited to see how this can be done by visual effects artist.

Here they are,

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Vfx Breakdown of G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra

"G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra" is a movie where big screen heroes leap through moving trains, freefall from the stratosphere, and unleash an ongoing stream of destruction and debris.
How can this happen? here we look.......

The VFX Studios on G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra

Digital Domain:

Practical accelerator suits, constructed by Stan Winston Studio, were made available on set for reference and scanning. Digital Domain relied on 3D scanning company XYZ RGB, who used a combination of projected light and stereo reconstruction in a portable setup to create suit geometry.

CIS Hollywood & CIS Vancouver:

The Baroness, Storm Shadow and Zartan (Arnold Vosloo) attack the Pit in search of nanomite warheads. CIS created their subterranean approach using volumetric fluid dynamic simulations as they surprise a group of camels and a herder. “We called that the Tremors or Bugs Bunny gag as the characters hit the base with their mo-pods,” said Hoita. A small set was built for shots of the mo-pods piercing the Pit walls, which CIS augmented with a virtual environment. A massive fight ensues, with further digital environments, pulse weapons and a camouflague suit all part of the effects work.

Prime Focus VFX:

Prime Focus used its proprietary volumetric particle renderer, Krakatoa, to help create the nanomites and the plane’s disintegration. “Rather than rely on texture maps to make it look like something was eating away at the plane,” added Harvey, “we converted all our surfaces into full 3D geometry with volume so you would see metal being eaten away with internal structures and thickness.”

Monday, October 12, 2009

TAKE IT TO THE LIMIT

Gasket Studios partnered with Best Buy in-house advertising and editorial company Butcher Edit to help create a co-branded Best Buy and Samsung spot that lands buyers in the middle of HD television football action. For this immersive experience Gasket designed and executed visual effects and huge crowd populations in Chicago Bears Soldier Field where the Best Buy game unfolds.

“The ultimate goal was real game feel and authenticity, with the precision and detail you expect from HD,” says Gasket Studios Creative Director Greg Shultz. “Without a motion control camera and only a five hour shooting window with the talent, we knew that using a single, live action plate replication was not going to work for the stadium crowd. We had to develop a multiple effect strategy that could stand up to the most discerning eye.”

This meant extensive preproduction discussions with all parties involved do develop the best approach for the spot. Teaming with Director David Ramser and DP N. Thomas Sigel, our plan was to use a mixture of live action crowd plates on location, individual green screen fans shots and digital 3D animated crowds. With strategy in hand, the Gasket team then went to Soldier Field to supervise the visual effects. Over 65 plates were shot, with Gasket tracking the material multiple ways to ensure a seamless process in post.

Above, you can see the the visual effects breakdown for each shot. We have the starting plate that is just the live action footage of Devon Hester from the Chicago Bears in an empty stadium, followed by a hand rotoscoped alpha of Hester, then the Gasket crowd animations, which are then tracked into the scene. Finally the alpha is applied, final matching, color correction to the crowd, blur and other atmospheric effects are added in the final composite.

We shot crowd and sideline footage both at the live action shoot with our HD camera as well as a shoot back at Gasket Studios. These plates were used in the foreground where 3D characters might have looked less than real. The crowd animations were added behind the live action to fill out the background empty seats.

We were lucky enough to work with N. Thomas Sigel, the Director of Photography, who has vast experience with visual effects on some of our favorite movies, including the recent Superman and X-men blockbusters. So while some people were flocking to see the star of the spot Devon Hester, we were more interested in the fellow looking through the camera lens. However Devon did give us an autographed t-shirt. Go Bears!

Original shot is on the left above. Final shot is on the right above with a brand new jumbotron and a stadium filled with people all the way up through the box seats.

Asylum & T.A.G. Collaborate For Halo 3: ODST

With seamless integration of VFX and live-action footage, Asylum helped to launch Halo 3: ODST, the latest in the Halo series of video games, for the Xbox 360 via T.A.G. SF. Concieved by T.A.G., the dramatic live-action short shot by MJZ’s Rupert Sanders with VFX courtesy of Asylum portrays the story of Tarkov, an ODST (Orbital Drop Shock Trooper)

From inspiration as a young man Tarkov evolves through his training and harrowing battle experience with the band of elite soldiers against hostile enemies to become a seasoned and deadly warrior.

Expertly weaving sophisticated environment and character enhancements and atmospherics with feature film quality particle explosions, plasma weapons fire, CG drop-pods and futuristic Banshee War Planes, Asylum’s contributions to the piece were both explosive and intimate.

In concert with brilliant photography, these matchless effects gave rise to a piece that evokes an immediate sense of danger and adventure, coupled with the grave realities of duty and honor that define the Halo series.

About Asylum

Asylum is a premier visual effects and design company, handling high-profile features, commercials, music videos, and emerging media content for web and mobile platforms. Asylum created the visual effects for such films as the upcoming Terminator Salvation, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Pirates Of The Caribbean ll & lll, Master And Commander: The Far Side Of The World (Academy Award and BAFTA nominated), Moulin Rouge, Minority Report, Phantom Of The Opera, Mel Gibson’s Apocalypto, Tony Scott’s déjà vu, Man on Fire & Domino and Ridley Scott’s Black Hawk Down.

Asylum has done spot work for brands such as Hershey’s, Nike, Sony Playstation, Coke, BMW, Gatorade and Visa. In addition, Asylum Design has created award winning title and graphic design work for such films as Tim Burton’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Bedtime Stories, X-Men I & II, The Island, Bad Boys II and XXX.

Visual Effects & Compositing