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CASE STUDY DIGIC Pictures: Movie-makers for the Gaming World
Ubisoft, Activision, CD Project, and Sony Computer Entertainment are just a few of the bigger names among the companies for which DIGIC Pictures has made cinematic trailers, intros, and in-game cut-scenes since its foundation in 2002.
By Gergely Herpai
The studio’s first work was an intro and cut-scenes for the real-time strategy video game “Armies of Exigo”, developed by Black Hole Entertainment. Thanks to its huge success, more and more major publishers asked them to make similar film intros, cut-scenes, trailers, or commercials.
Thus DIGIC Picture’s name has been associated with such famous game franchises as the Assassin’s Creed series, Final Fantasy, Mass Effect 3, Civilization V, The Witcher 3, Halo 4, Destiny, and the Call of Duty series, among others.
While the Hungarian video game industry’s current situation, as far as the development of actual video games is concerned, isn’t very impressive, in the field of animation production, DIGIC Pictures truly stands out, in Hungary and internationally. For Alex Sándor Rabb, CEO, producer and co-founder of the company, a flow of information with the client is essential and the company places great emphasis on talking with the customer. A dedicated account manager team facilitates communication between the customer and the production unit; it is through these that customer expectations and manufacturing information reach the team.
“The very first step in working together is to get the treatment, the storyboard, or even the entire script from the client. Based on this, we get an idea of the world of the film, the characters and the locations, which helps us to create a so-called 3D animatic, in which we outline how we imagine the film,” Rabb explains.
How much they get a free hand in shaping the story is customer dependent. Some clients will come with a fully developed concept, or will know exactly what characters they want. Others will ask for DIGIC Picture’s input.
Rabb gives one example: when making the animated short film “The Secret War” for the “Love, Death & Robots” animation anthology running on Netflix, the client was fully open to DIGIC’s suggestions. In this case, the team worked based on a script. All the other creative and production developments needed to make the film were entrusted to them.
MAJOR STARS
DIGIC Pictures also sometimes works with major stars such as Kevin Spacey or John Malkovich
for their respective roles in “Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare.”
“Kevin Spacey and I had the opportunity to shoot for Advanced Warfare in Los Angeles, and John Malkovich was recorded in Paris. Kevin Spacey was a fantastic and dedicated actor. Many times he suggested more and more recordings because he felt his acting wasn’t perfect yet,” recalls Rabb. “He was prepared as if he were shooting a high-budget live-action movie. A true pro who added a lot to his role because he wanted to give his best to a game as well.”
Rabb explains that most actors don’t usually travel to Budapest because of the motion capture technology, which is used to record the actions of human actors, before using that information to animate digital character models in 2D or 3D computer animation. Only if the actors are Europeans or are shooting in Europe will they fly into the capital for a day, for example for the sake of 3D Photoscan.
Looking at the current situation of the animation profession in Hungary, DIGIC Pictures does not have the field to itself. According to Rabb, there is
an extremely strong professional environment in Hungary, with many animation professionals and programmers.
“However, I believe that a good professional alone, unfortunately, does not always get such a professional opportunity compared to working for a company with an already established network of relationships,” he added.
“In 2002, I followed this line of thought and we founded DIGIC, seeing an excellent opportunity in the professionally established environment of this era. It took nearly 20 years of hard work and now I can say that we are a company that is at the forefront internationally and has recurring customers such as Netflix, Sony, Microsoft Studios, Activision, Ubisoft, Bungie, Riot Games, and Square Enix.”
Rabb admits that the first five-to-10 years were especially difficult for DIGIC, because it was still building up its portfolio. At that time, it had to fight hard for all the work opportunities it could get. This has changed so much that it is already counted on by potential customers and is usually on the list of game producers as well. But this is not enough for success, as for each project the game companies choose the animation studio that it considers will be the most suitable for the job.
SUCCESS-HUNGRY
“In this line of work, it’s not enough that someone made a good animation years ago. They look at how our latest films have succeeded. It is not enough to rely on old successes, as there are always talented and success-hungry claimants to the throne who are applying for the same job as us,” Rabb explains.
He says DIGIC needs to pay close attention to its competitors in the United States and Canada, primarily because of its extensive customerbase there.
Rabb adds that being based in Hungary makes the job more difficult in some respects. Due to language barriers and time differences with North America, communication is somewhat more difficult. Therefore, DIGIC needs to be much better than a Montreal team, for example, if it is to be chosen by a big publisher there.
Getting the educational background to join the profession can be a challenge, given the wide range of requirements. 3D animation in a broader sense is an extremely exciting, diverse and intricate means of adding animation or visual effect for movies. Indeed, according to Rabb, it’s a form of applied art, an interesting mix of technology and flair. As it covers a lot of sub-fields, those working in this profession also come from a lot of backgrounds. There are a wide variety of jobs, from programmers to modelers, animators, assistants, coordinators, to visual designers. If someone specifically knows that he or she wants to be employed in the industry, there are both public and private education institutions. In Hungary, the art part is covered by Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design Budapest (MOME), animation by Budapest Metropolitan University (METU) and the technology (informatics, programmingmathematics) by Budapest University of Technology and Economics (BME) and Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE), but the various fields are necessarily quite different.
BME and ELTE do not have a specialization in animation, computer
generated imagery (CGI) or visual effects (VFX), but there are related compulsory and admissions subjects.
There are several private educational institutions as well, which can provide shorter and more targeted training in specific areas such as VFX, visual design, character modelling, or software-based training.
How has DIGIC coped with the move to home office? The studio started a gradual transition to working from home in mid-March. This was a completely new situation, but Rabb says he decided to introduce home office because the most important thing during this period was to keep
the health of his employees and their families and to work continuously on projects. He adds that economic “casualties” were caused because of the COVID-19 situation. “Unfortunately, the health situation also affected us. A previously won project was eventually cancelled precisely because of the virus,” he recalled.
Still, regardless of the difficulties, the creative company has been able to make continuous progress on the production of its films, and expects to have the opportunity to start new projects “of exciting and well-known franchises.” It is also making a trailer announcing some completely new games.
