I talked to ILM animation supervisor Hal Hickel about making K-2SO, which I think was the best character in Rogue One. Check it out at Cartoon Brew.
Month: December 2016
The zero-g swimming pool
Here’s a new piece I wrote for Cartoon Brew about the swimming pool scene in Passengers, which featured great vfx by MPC.
Star Wars’ practical and CG make-up odyssey
For Inverse, I jumped into the best practical and digital make-up and animatronics and prosthetics work from the Star Wars films. Such innovation amongst these.
Star Wars – and ILM – changed the way they make movies. Period.
Thrillist asked me to dive into how the Star Wars movies changed the way movies were made, from a VFX point of view. It was fun recounting just some of the advancements, including motion control, camera tech and CG developments.
New Lyft animated short comes from great artists
It’s pretty cool when great animators and artists combine their talents – that’s what Paperman director John Kahrs and Chromosphere’s Kevin Dart have done for this Lyft animated short, which I talked to them about for Cartoon Brew.
Miniatures to CG – how Rogue One kept a familiar look
Inverse asked me to check out the transition from miniatures to digital in Rogue One and ILM’s John Knoll had made some awesome comments about what they were doing with the Death Star and spaceships. Check it out here.
Behind the ILM Mars Attacks! tests that convinced Tim Burton to go CG
1996 was a break-out year for digital visual effects, with advancements in front and centre CG characters (Dragonheart), heavy environments and digital compositing (Independence Day), and photoreal CG simulations (Twister).
Another film that took advantage of the the state of VFX was Tim Burton’s Mars Attacks!, a quirky off-shoot of the 1960s Topps trading cards. Although its martians were initially imagined by the director to be stop-motion characters, Industrial Light & Magic would ultimately produce a series of tests that convinced Burton to realise them in CG. The newly formed Warner Digital Studios also crafted other key CG shots.
On its 20th anniversary, vfxblog revisits ILM’s breakthrough animation tests for the martians with Mars Attacks!’s visual effects supervisor Jim Mitchell and animation supervisor David Andrews (who actually has a VFX supervisor credit on the film). Plus, Mike Fink, then VFX supervisor at Warner Digital, looks back at the saucer and robot effects for the cult classic. Continue reading Behind the ILM Mars Attacks! tests that convinced Tim Burton to go CG
Battle of the Bastards, and digital crowds
The Battle of the Bastards episode of Game of Thrones had some incredible fighting action, much of it orchestrated by Iloura. They used Massive for some of the CG army and horses work too, and I wrote this project profile about the work.
When morphing was cool
I still think it’s pretty cool, but perhaps an abundance of bad morphs ruined the appeal of the effect in the late 90s. I revisited some of the best morphs in this top 10 list for Cartoon Brew, as a follow-up to the Michael Jackson Black or White oral history.
Rob Sitch and Working Dog’s Pacific Heat
In Australia I’ve grown up with productions from Working Dog – they’re behind The Castle, Frontline, Utopia, and the members were part of the D-Generation and The Late Show. Now they’ve just done an animated series called Pacific Heat for Foxtel and Netflix. So I have to say it was a bit of dream talking to Working Dog’s Rob Sitch about the show. Check it out at Cartoon Brew.