Month: August 2017
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New dragons, new fire
As season 7 of Game of Thrones wrapped up, I had the opportunity to chat to Joe Bauer and Steve Kullback who lead the VFX effort on the show. This time we talked about the approach to dragons, and within that, the approach to fire. Check it out at VFX Voice, including a hint at…
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How real-time and VFX are meeting up (in fact, they’ve already met)
For Cartoon Brew, I talked to Epic Games CTO Kim Libreri about the intersection of VFX and real-time rendering. All these areas have been slowly converging for several years, so it’s fascinating to see where things are up to.
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Quickshots: The small VFX detail in ‘Game of Thrones’ this season that says so much about the show
Episode 4 (‘The Spoils of War’) of season 7 of Game of Thrones features one of the most exciting battles of the entire series so far. Known as the ‘Loot Train Attack’, the battle sees Jaime Lannister’s ground forces receiving the brunt of a fiery attack from Daenerys Targaryen, who is riding her dragon Drogon.…
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Quickshots: It’s 40 years since ‘Close Encounters’, but you can see it on the big screen again
Steven Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind was the other big sci-film of 1977. In a year without Star Wars, the film’s effects practitioners would likely have won the visual effects Oscar (they were, of course, nominated). That’s because Close Encounters managed to use miniatures, motion control, optical compositing and even cloud tanks to…
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The amazing amount of roto that went into converting T2
It was a lot of roto. I talked to Stereo D here at VFX Voice.
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The tech of ‘Terminator 2’ – an oral history
Ever since James Cameron’s Terminator 2: Judgment Day was released in 1991, I’ve been reading about the many ways ILM, led by visual effects supervisor Dennis Muren, had to basically invent new ways to realise the CG ‘liquid metal’ T-1000 shots in that film, of which there are surprisingly few. Tools like ‘Make Sticky’ and…
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Horse riding now a thing in Massive
At SIGGRAPH, I caught up with Stephen Regelous from Massive to find out about the software’s new horse and rider agent. Check it out at VFX Voice.
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Body Labs might be a way to change animation
I talked to Body Labs about their statistical models for the human body shape and motion, and how they might impact on animation for gaming, AR, VR and visual effects. Check it out at Cartoon Brew.
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The last-minute roto tool that saved the ending of ‘Death Becomes Her’
I recently spoke to visual effects supervisor Ken Ralston about his work at ILM on Death Becomes Her for the 25th anniversary of the film. The interview received some surprising attention; the film might not have been a hit but the practical make-up effects by ADI and ILM’s innovative ‘digital wizardry’ both continue to be…
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From storyboard to final in ‘GOTG Vol 2’
James Gunn narrates a scene from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 where the Ravagers take on Rocket in the forest – breaking down the shots from storyboards to previs/postvis and final (with VFX by Trixter). This clip is from the film’s DVD/Blu-Ray release.
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