VFX Voice - Spring 2017 Issue by Visual Effects Society

PREMIERE ISSUE SPRING 2017

VFXVOICE.COM

GHOST IN THE SHELL: VFX ON A MISSION WESTWORLD’S VIOLENT VISUAL DELIGHTS • CARS 3: RAY-TRACED RACING ARRIVES GEARS OF WAR 4: GRAPHIC VICTORY • CLOSE ENCOUNTERS: EFFECTS MILESTONE 2017 VES AWARD HONOREES KEN RALSTON AND VICTORIA ALONSO

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[ EXECUTIVE NOTE ]

Welcome From the VES Leadership When the theater lights dim, when the TV screen glows, when the headset is in place – that’s when the artistry and innovation of visual effects comes into the spotlight. That’s when we revel in the talent, ingenuity and passion that bring us truly remarkable imagery and immersive experiences, all in service to the art of storytelling. Today, with the introduction of VFX Voice, we are ushering in a new era. A new platform to recognize and illuminate those often unsung heroes, the community of VFX artists from around the world who have introduced us to worlds that once only lived in our imagination – and drive box-office like never before. For 20 years, the Visual Effects Society has been the industry’s only global organization dedicated to advancing the arts, sciences and applications of visual effects. It has been our proud mission to elevate visual effects as an integral element of the art and business of all areas of entertainment and redefine its profile on a global scale. Over the last two decades, the VFX industry has evolved and grown at a rapid pace. Our membership – which now includes more than 3,400 members from diverse disciplines in 35 countries, with 11 member Sections worldwide – reflects an industry that is constantly reinventing itself. Developing a magazine has been a longstanding goal of the VES, and introducing you to the premiere issue of VFX Voice, our new signature print and online publication, is a truly exciting way to embark on our next 20 years. In developing VFX Voice, we had a clear vision. We set out to create a magazine that embodies our charge in educating, celebrating and supporting visual effects artists and enhancing a connected global community. To offer a tangible demonstration of the artistry and innovation conceived by talented professionals advancing the field, who can further raise the awareness and value of our industry among business and entertainment stakeholders. To craft content reflecting the diversity of the VES membership and visual effects industry, inclusive of film, television, commercials, animation, special venue, games and new media. And to provide a magazine that is at once a benefit to our valued membership and a new must-read publication for the industry at large. We are immensely proud of the work that’s been done to meet these lofty goals in launching our inaugural issue. In this premiere issue and those to come, you’ll find that sense of joy and wonder in what we all do daily. You’ll find it in compelling profiles of industry leaders and pioneers who share their inspirations and how they got to where they are. Insightful craft roundtables that tackle industry trends, challenges and opportunities.

Back stories you’ve never heard on projects you know and love. Exclusive glimpses into projects just hitting audiences. Deep dives into VFX artists as problem-solvers who relish the thought of conquering what some deem impossible. Tech news that highlights barrier-busting inventions and new applications. Roundups from across the globe showcasing VES members in action. Historical reviews coupled with an eye towards what comes next. And visuals that make VFX Voice a coffee table centerpiece well worth holding on to. In addition to our quarterly magazine, you can read VFX Voice online at vfxvoice.com. It houses the digital version and will be a robust platform of news and features, keeping you engaged and up to speed on the VFX industry and the people who make it tick. Getting to our launch is due to many people who share the vision and worked collaboratively to make VFX Voice a reality. Thank you to the VES Board of Directors for fostering this long-held goal of the organization; to our Publication Workgroup for lending your time, talents and resources to the creative and business development process; and to the VES staff for its commitment to excellence. VFX Voice has an esteemed creative leadership team at the helm, led by Publisher Jim McCullaugh, who previously served as the Publisher of the award-winning American Cinematographer magazine, Editor Ed Ochs, who comes to VFX Voice with decades of editorial experience, notably as Editorial Director, Special Issues for Billboard Magazine, and Alan Alpanian, a multiple award-winning creative director responsible for the launch of hundreds of leading entertainment brands. We have the benefit of a world-class team of creative directors, editors and writers. And VFX Voice also brings a venerated Advisory Board to the production, lending insight and expertise to its editorial focus. On behalf of the VES, we hope that VFX Voice is your new source of information and inspiration that celebrates this industry we all love and tethers us ever closer together. We welcome you as readers, future advertisers and valuable contributors to its continued success. Please let us know your thoughts – we want to hear your ideas and feedback. Thank you again for joining us on this exciting endeavor.

Mike Chambers, Chair, VES Board of Directors

Eric Roth, VES Executive Director

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[ CONTENTS ] FEATURES FX TRENDS: AHEAD IN VFX 10 V From CG humans to new horizons in VR/AR.

VFXVOICE.COM

DEPARTMENTS 4 EXECUTIVE NOTE 103 VFX TECH & TOOL NEWS

20 VR/AR: WANTED - VFX ARTISTS VFX artists are gravitating to the new media. 28 TELEVISION: WESTWORLD The vivid, visceral effects behind the HBO hit. 36 COVER: GHOST IN THE SHELL Director, VFX team pay homage to anime classic. 44 INDUSTRY: Q&A ROUNDTABLE Industry leaders on the future of the VFX business. 52 SFX: JOHN RICHARDSON Born to be a Special Effects Supervisor. 56 THE 15TH ANNUAL VES AWARDS Celebrating the best in VFX. 64 VES AWARDS WINNERS Photo Gallery.

104 VES SECTION SPOTLIGHT 107 VES NEWS 108 THE VES HANDBOOK 110 CROSS CRAFT 111 V-ART: PHIL TIPPETT 112 FINAL FRAME: KEN RALSTON

70 VR: FANTASTIC BEASTS Framestore VR expands mobile applications. 72 PROFILE: VICTORIA ALONSO 2017 VES Visionary Award Winner. 76 PROFILE: KEN RALSTON 2017 VES Lifetime Achievement Award Winner. 80 COMPANY PROFILE: MR. X Honing their craft in visual storytelling. 84 GAMES: GEARS OF WAR 4 Microsoft, The Coalition studio achieve visual glory. 90 ANIMATION: CARS 3 Road-testing Pixar’s shiny, new rendering skills. 94 VFX VAULT: CLOSE ENCOUNTERS Spielberg classic as VFX landmark. 100 PREVIS: THE GREAT WALL Visionary Chinese director discovers previs.

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SPRING 2017 • VOL. 1, NO. 1

VFXVOICE

Visit us online at vfxvoice.com PUBLISHER Jim McCullaugh publisher@vfxvoice.com

VISUAL EFFECTS SOCIETY Eric Roth, Executive Director VES BOARD OF DIRECTORS

EDITOR Ed Ochs editor@vfxvoice.com CREATIVE Alpanian Design Group alan@alpanian.com ADVERTISING advertising@vfxvoice.com MEDIA media@vfxvoice.com CIRCULATION circulation@vfxvoice.com CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Renee Dunlop Andy Eddy Ian Failes Naomi Goldman Debra Kaufman Ed Ochs PUBLICATION ADVISORY COMMITTEE Rob Bredow Mike Chambers Neil Corbould Debbie Denise Paul Franklin David Johnson Jim Morris, VES Dennis Muren, ASC, VES Sam Nicholson, ASC Eric Roth

OFFICERS Mike Chambers, Chair Jeffrey A. Okun, VES, 1st Vice Chair Kim Lavery, VES, 2nd Vice Chair Rita Cahill, Secretary Dennis Hoffman, Treasurer DIRECTORS Jeff Barnes, Brooke Breton, Kathryn Brillhart, Emma Clifton Perry, Bob Coleman, Dayne Cowan, Kim Davidson, Debbie Denise, Richard Edlund, VES, Pam Hogarth, Joel Hynek, Jeff Kleiser, Tim Landry, Neil Lim-Sang, Brooke Lyndon-Stanford, Tim McGovern, Kevin Rafferty, Scott Ross, Barry Sandrew, Tim Sassoon, Dan Schrecker, David Tanaka, Bill Taylor, VES, Richard Winn Taylor II, VES, Susan Zwerman ALTERNATES Andrew Bly, Fon Davis, Charlie Iturriaga, Christian Kubsch, Andres Martinez, Daniel Rosen, Katie Stetson, Bill Villarreal Tom Atkin, Founder Allen Battino, VES Logo Design Visual Effects Society 5805 Sepulveda Blvd., Suite 620 Sherman Oaks, CA 91411 Phone: (818) 981-7861 visualeffectssociety.com VES STAFF Brent Armstrong, Director of Operations Nancy Ward, Program & Development Dir. Jeff Casper, Manager of Media & Graphics Ben Schneider, Membership Coordinator Colleen Kelly, Office Manager Jennifer Cabrera, Administrative Assistant P.J. Schumacher, Controller Naomi Goldman, Public Relations

VFX Voice is published quarterly by the Visual Effects Society. Subscriptions: U.S. $50: Canada/Mexico $60; all other foreign countries $70 a year. See vfxvoice.com Advertising: Rate card upon request from publisher@vfxvoice.com or advertising@vfxvoice.com Comments: Write us at comments@vfxvoice.com Postmaster: Send address change to VES, 5805 Sepulveda Blvd., Suite 620, Sherman Oaks, CA 91411. Copyright © 2017 The Visual Effects Society. Printed in the U.S.A.

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VFX TRENDS

AHEAD IN VFX: PATTERNS, POSSIBILITIES AND PREDICTIONS By IAN FAILES

The digital Governor Tarkin in Rogue One, made via a combination of real actor Guy Henry, reference from now-deceased Tarkin performer Peter Cushing, and visual effects by ILM. (Photo credit: Lucasfilm/ Industrial Light & Magic. (Photo credit: Copyright © 2016 Lucasfilm Ltd. All Rights Reserved.)

Things move quickly in visual effects. An appetite for imagery that has never been seen before, coupled with fast-moving technological advancements and changing global settings for entertainment production, means it can be hard to predict what might happen in VFX. But we can look to recent developments, say in digital humans on screen, or the rise of real-time and VR, to think about future developments. Here’s a look at what might be some of the main visual effects issues coming up. DIGITAL ACTORS ARE READY FOR THEIR CLOSE-UP, WHETHER YOU LIKE IT OR NOT

The prospect of a fully photoreal digital actor gracing our screens has been simmering along for several years now. But the appearance of the CG likeness of the deceased Peter Cushing as Governor Tarkin and a young Carrie Fisher as Princess Leia in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story recently re-stirred the debate. What debate? Well, it’s multi-tiered. First there are the legal and ethical considerations about whether a dead (or alive) actor should be brought to life in a digital role in the first place. Would that actor want to have appeared in another film, a TV commercial, a game? Ultimately, that might be something that is solved purely in a legal way, such as via a contract or estate permissions. Then there are the technological issues. It can be done. We are at the stage where CG modeling, facial and body scanning, the capturing of performances, animating digital actors and rendering them can be done incredibly convincingly. It’s already commonplace for digital double and stunt work, and characters such as Tarkin, Leia, and others (notably the digital Paul Walker seen in Furious 7 and the young Sir Anthony Hopkins in Westworld) are evidence that the phenomenon is already with us as a filmmaking technique.

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If filmmakers are crafting scenes that require digital humans, then digital humans will exist. So the question might not be, are CG actors ready for their close-up, but instead, how good will their close-up look? And the audience will always be the judge of that, even if the future of digital humans is already here. But are these digital actors convincing enough, and should it be used in the first place? Have we brought CG humans out of the Uncanny Valley? Remember, making a digital actor is hard and requires a ton of nuance, technology and perhaps luck. And do we even need to replace actors – even dead ones – just because we (almost) can? In the end, none of this debate might matter. If filmmakers are crafting scenes that require digital humans, then digital humans will exist. So the question might not be, are CG actors ready for their close-up, but instead, how good will their close-up look? And the audience will always be the judge of that, even if the future of digital humans is already here.

TOP: A still from The LEGO Batman Movie. Animal Logic has diversified from a visual effects studio into animated features, including several LEGO films, and has its own production slate, too. (Photo credit: Copyright: © 2016 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. and Ratpac-Dune Entertainment LLC.) BOTTOM: Race Through New York Starring Jimmy Fallon required extensive digital sets, complicated greenscreen shoots, motion capture and CG imagery to become a theme park ride at Universal Orlando. (Photo credit: © 2016 Universal Orlando Resort. All Rights Reserved.)

MAKE YOUR OWN IP (OR PERISH?)

Visual effects is a service industry, and that’s great when there is constant work available for visual effects studios. But with the advent of global competition in VFX, differentiating subsidies, fixed bids and the ebb and flow of work in the entertainment industry, it can be hard to predict just how much work – and therefore income – will be coming in. One way studios have already tried to turn this around is to, instead of being the service provider, become the content creator. That can involve owning the IP itself and finding production partners, or simply diversifying into different areas of production. The idea is to capitalize on well-developed creative, artistry, and technical pipelines inside VFX studios so that they can create their own films, TV shows and other entertainment. It’s a way of keeping their own staff busy, too.

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AD - MIKROS FELIC Making content is expensive – and risky. There’s no guarantee of a ‘knock it out of the park’ hit. But visual effects studios are well poised to make these moves – especially in terms of offering their creative expertise on design and tech. They also often have an established infrastructure and already interact with filmmakers and production-side contacts constantly. Look out for a push behind their own content ideas for years to come. Some studios are, of course, doing this right now, in places like animated features and VR. Animal Logic, historically a visual effects studio that has segued also into animated features, now has several features on its development slate, including the live-action/CG-hybrid Peter Rabbit. Then there’s Stuttgart-based LUXX Studios which is putting its toe in the water of animated features with Manou the Swift. Cinesite and Double Negative now have animated features divisions. And several visual effects studios, for example Luma Pictures, have production arms that aren’t even necessarily for VFX-centric forms of entertainment. The catch? Making content is expensive – and risky. There’s no guarantee of a ‘knock it out of the park’ hit. But visual effects studios are well poised to make these moves – especially in terms of offering their creative expertise on design and tech. They also often have an established infrastructure and already interact with filmmakers and production-side contacts constantly. Look out for a push behind their own content ideas for years to come.

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TOP: Framestore VR Studio delivered a tie-in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them VR experience for Google Daydream. (Photo credit: Copyright: © 2016 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. All rights reserved.) BOTTOM: A still from Ninja Theory’s upcoming Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice video game. (Photo credit: Copyright © 2016 Ninja Theory Ltd.)

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VFX TRENDS

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We might traditionally think of visual effects being made mostly for film and television. That’s still the case, with TV enjoying a current explosion in cinematic-like VFX production. But there are other places where visual effects artists can be – and have been – lending their services. Virtual and augmented reality experiences are the most talked about current opportunities. Partly, that’s because billions of dollars are being spent on this nascent medium by large companies like Facebook, HTC, Samsung, Sony and Google, which need content. With a history of shooting elements, stitching, locking CG images to plates, producing 360-degree environments and working with stereo imagery, it’s clear that visual effects artists are well-suited to working in VR and AR. Studios like Framestore, MPC, Digital Domain, ILM and Mirada are well into the making of VR, 360-degree video and immersive experiences. To be fair, right now this content is a mix of original entertainment and promo material or commercials. Still, several studios are able to take advantage of assets they’ve already helped create for a feature film or TV project. Framestore delivered a Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them tie-in, for example, and other VR experiences have been

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VFX TRENDS

AD - THE THIRD FLOOR announced by the studios behind 2017 releases War for the Planet of the Apes and Alien: Covenant. There’s been a clear, dramatic upsurge in TV shows with cinematic production values. The attraction of working on the newest kinds of entertainment is surely an engaging factor. Video games are another area where VFX skills can be interchangeable. The film and gaming industries tend to require understanding of similar technologies and artistry – design, 3D modeling, programming, animation, effects simulation, motion capture and rendering. Then there are opportunities for the creation of game cinematics and a wave of real-time rendered experiences coming on-board, again areas in which VFX artists and studios can offer their skills. The possibilities are evidenced in games studio Ninja Theory’s Hellblade demos of late, which combine the facial animation, game engine, motion capture and rendering abilities of 3Lateral Studio, Cubic Motion Ltd., Xsens and Epic Games Inc. to capture an actress in real-time and render her, also in real-time, as a photorealistic CG character. Meanwhile, a steady stream of Disney animated films, new Star Wars movies, Avatar sequels and other blockbusters is spurring on associated theme park rides. Witness Pandora – World of

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Virtual and augmented reality experiences are the most talked about current opportunities. Partly, that’s because billions of dollars are being spent on this nascent medium by large companies like Facebook, HTC, Samsung, Sony and Google, which need content.

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Avatar currently under construction in Disney’s Animal Kingdom park, the planned ‘Star Wars’ Land at two Disney locations, Race Through New York Starring Jimmy Fallon at Universal Orlando Resort, and the already in existence Wizarding World of Harry Potter and Fast and Furious – Supercharged experiences. These attractions are realized with a mix of greenscreen shoots, motion capture, high level animation and compositing and often have very specific screen and immersion requirements, something VFX artists are again well suited for.

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A CHANGE IN THE CONVERSATION

We all know that just about all of the blockbusters released at the cineplex contain heavy amounts of visual effects. Even smaller films often have more VFX in them than people realize (just look at films like Arrival, Silence, Allied, Deepwater Horizon and Sully released last year). Indeed, all these films – big and small – would not be able to tell the stories they do without visual effects. But sometimes the strong presence of computer-generated imagery or over-the-top stunts and action can be considered a turn-off for audiences. Comments like ‘too much CGI’ are occasionally bandied around, while others pine for the days of practical creature effects, animatronics and miniatures. Perhaps that’s why both filmmakers and film marketers have been pushing the practical side of production in recent times. The recent Star Wars releases, The Force Awakens and Rogue One, pushed heavily on the practical creature creations and the real sets built for the film (this was all true, and didn’t mean the VFX were ignored, but the message was about how much was delivered practically). Likewise, the early marketing and imagery for Michael Bay’s Transformers: The Last Knight releasing this year is high on the practical stunts. What’s clear is that the practical side of filmmaking is being talked up more than ever before.

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WANTED: VFX ARTISTS By DEBRA KAUFMAN

Virtual reality and augmented reality are in their embryonic stages but are predicted to become a $150 billion business by 2020, surpassing the mobile industry. That matters to the visual effects world, because its artists’ skills are a perfect match for what’s required to make convincing VR and AR. Already, nearly every media and entertainment company from Pixar Studios to IMAX is creating virtual reality content. Studios have created VR experiences to accompany movies as disparate as Wild and The Martian, and director Jon Favreau just created Gnomes and Goblins, an interactive VR experience that pushes the boundaries of what the medium can do. Dozens of VFX artists are gravitating to the new medium. At USC’s Entertainment Technology Center, VR/AR initiative project lead/consultant Phil Lelyveld – who notes that the new media will create “whole new markets” including training, customer support and marketing – differentiates virtual reality from augmented reality. “If you’re walking down a supermarket aisle, holding up your cell phone and the camera gives you information about the products in front of you, that’s augmented reality,” he says. “If you’re at home in an easy chair, directing a robot down that supermarket aisle, all the sensory input is coming from a place you aren’t actually in. That’s virtual reality.” Mixed reality describes the continuum between those two extremes, based on a scale established during virtual reality’s first boom in the 1990s. “As you increasingly add virtual things, it flips from augmented to virtual reality,” explains Lelyveld. “VR glasses isolate you, and AR lets you see the world around you,

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but in both cases, you’re inputting virtual sights and sounds.” The barrier to entering the VR/AR creation community is not high for VFX artists who are already adept at creating and manipulating computer-generated imagery. Unity and Unreal are the two game engines on which VR experiences are based, so that’s one new skill some VFX artists will need. “But once you learn those, there’s a big need for visual effects artists to make VR a quality experience,” says Lelyveld. Another added value that visual effects artists bring to the table is expertise with 3D stereoscopic imagery, honed during the push for 3D in movies and TV. The VES Vision Committee, chaired by Toni Pace, has held events on virtual reality, including “Storytelling in VR” and “VR Post Production.” Scott Squires, VES, a member of the committee who has played a leading role in its VR initiative, is an example how veteran visual effects professionals are repurposing their VFX skills for the new medium. As Chief Technology Officer and Co-founder of virtual reality company Pixvana, Squires has directed or supervised numerous 360-degree videos for viewing on VR headsets, built and programmed specialized video players for VR headsets as well as a number of interactive 3D experiences for VR headsets using Unity and Unreal. Squires explains how he became interested in virtual reality. “With the advent of the Oculus DK1 [headset] it seemed VR had real potential at a near point in the future,” he says. “With the arrival of the Oculus DK2 and certainly the prototypes of the HTC Valve Vive, the quality and experience levels raised enough to see the potential of VR.”

OPPOSITE PAGE: The Jaunt VR 360-degree camera ABOVE: The Expanse. Experience Mars in VR. TOP TO BOTTOM: Phil Lelyveld, Neishaw Ali, Jacki Morie

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VR/AR

Squires points out that VFX is a great background for a number of areas of VR. “Anyone on the 3D rendering side – modelers, painters, lighters, animators, particle artists, developers and so on – can apply much of what they’ve done to make 3D worlds for VR,” he says. “It’s similar to the transition from visual effects for film and TV to those for video game production. Typically, VR production means creating assets for a game engine, with further manipulation in the game engine.” The expertise required for VFX that can be applied to VR extend beyond the creation of 3D assets. “The skillsets of personnel involved in post production, including compositors, rotoscopers and so on, apply directly to stitching and blending 360-degree videos,” Squires says. “This is a much needed area to achieve the best quality. Nuke, After Effects and specialized tools are used for this type of work.” VFX professionals on the live-action production side also possess skills important to virtual reality production, says Squires. “They understand the need to shoot, mindful of the requirements of post production,” he says. “Issues they would be sensitive to include stitch edges, which can be thought of as matte edges, camera calibration and dealing with multiple camera alignment. Volumetric capture takes many of the photogrammetry or Lidar VFX skillsets and applies them directly to build VR worlds.” Squires points out that “another advantage for VFX artists is that we tend to understand the 3D world and can imagine working in that space.” Likewise, he says, “there are some VR tools that could be a real boon to VFX. “VR provides the ability to see a model spaceship or set in real scale,” he says. “It allows you to walk around the previs design or set designs before that work is done. There are tools to paint and model in 3D while in the headset, and that’s a much different experience than looking at a monitor and using a tablet.”

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“Anyone on the 3D rendering side – modelers, painters, lighters, animators, particle artists, developers and so on – can apply much of what they’ve done to make 3D worlds for VR. It’s similar to the transition from visual effects for film and TV to those for video game production. Typically, VR production means creating assets for a game engine, with further manipulation in the game engine.” —Scott Squires, VES, Chief Technology Officer, Pixvana SpinVFX in Toronto is among the visual effects facilities that are now using their knowledge and experience for virtual reality projects. “After 30 years in the film and television industry, it is no wonder that we are pushing the envelope and looking at what’s next,” says President/Executive Producer Neishaw Ali. “Virtual reality is such an immersive experience and is a natural fit for SpinVFX, as we are a content provider.” She enthuses over the new medium that “allows you to be physically transported” and “interact within your environment. It’s exciting, unnerving and challenging,” she says. Ali reports that her company’s experience in creating photoreal imagery has been applicable to its new focus on VR. “We know

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TOP: Sony Playstation VR Headset. CENTER: Oculus Rift 3 VR Headset BELOW: Samsung Galaxy Gear VR Headset

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VR/AR

where the uncanny valley lies,” she says. “We know how to play to the medium’s strengths and adjust to accommodate for what the naked eye needs to perceive.” Because VR is a new medium, she adds, “there are plenty of challenges to contend with.” Those challenges have been both technological and creative. “From the technology side, we are learning a lot about real-time rendering from video game engines,” she says. “We’re also learning about the importance of scene optimization to maintain frame rate.” From the creative side, she says, the company has learned that planning for the user experience is critical. “The relationship between the inner ear and our eyes is a delicate balancing act,” she says. “We always need to stay within a certain level of tolerance that doesn’t run counter to human physiology. We often act as a guide to maximizing the experience with interesting things to look at, listen to and interact with, so the one thing flows into the next.” To target new markets for VR and AR, including architectural visualization, healthcare, automotive, product design, advertising, social media and games, SpinVFX has developed BRIO VR, a platform to create 3D virtual reality experiences.“The platform is designed to be as simple yet powerful enough for anyone to use, without needing to code,” says Ali, who reports that the platform has a template library for auto design, VR photo/video galleries, architectural visualization and others. The platform connects to HTC Vive, Oculus Rift and Gear VR headsets. A completed design can be shared via a link. VES member Jacki Morie, who helped found USC’s Institute for Creative Technologies (ICT) and who wrote her 2007 Ph.D.

TOP: HTC Valve Vive VR Headset CENTER: Oculus Rift 4 VR Headset BOTTOM: The Walk IMAX VR Experience: 94 stories up on a wire stretched between two skyscrapers.

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dissertation on VR as a new medium, started her own company, All These Worlds, to focus on virtual world projects. Her company’s work also provides ample evidence of the variety of projects that can and do employ virtual and augmented reality. All These Worlds worked with NASA to create a virtual world ecosystem to mimic Mars, which was installed in a geodesic dome in Hawaii. There, scientists were sequestered for a full year to test the impact of social isolation and sensory deprivation. At the end of the study, the scientists that could interact with the virtual world showed better psychological health than a control group that didn’t have the system. Morie presented a workshop at NASA on the results. She reports that many rank-and-file visual effects artists who have worked in all aspects of film VFX are getting involved in VR to expand their opportunities and skillsets. “There’s a need for modelers, for people who can do environment design and look – all the things we do in VFX,” Morie says. “There are beautiful visual effects that would translate beautifully into VR. The things that grab our attention for film also work in VR.” The differences that VFX artists have to learn, she says, is that the environment is totally immersive and gives agency to the viewers to craft their own stories. “The message about VR that I’ve been trying to get out since I became involved in 1989 is that VR is a totally different medium,” Morie says. “We’re at that moment with VR that we were with film at the turn of the 20th century. But some of the best VR has beautiful effects with moody lighting. That’s what VFX people can bring to VR: the artistic sensibility and the production expertise to bring it into reality.”

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TOP: Star Wars: Trials on Tatooine IMAX VR. Step into a Star Wars world set after the events of Return of the Jedi. From Lucasfilm’s ILMxLAB. BOTTOM: Rabbids IMAX VR Ride: A wild rollercoaster through the world of the Rabbids. Slide, jump, fly and free-fall without leaving the ground.

“The skillsets of personnel involved in post production, including compositors, rotoscopers and so on, apply directly to stitching and blending 360-degree videos. This is a much needed area to achieve the best quality. Nuke, After Effects and specialized tools are used for this type of work.”—Scott Squires, VES

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BEHIND THE VITAL, VIOLENT, VISUAL EFFECTS IN WESTWORLD By IAN FAILES

TOP AND TOP RIGHT: Oliver Bell plays the Little Boy, actually a host with an older-style exoskeleton similar to that of Delores’ that is revealed in these shots. (Photo credit: HBO)

Michael Crichton’s 1973 future dystopia Westworld, in which the androids of a Western-themed amusement park begin malfunctioning and turn on the park’s human visitors, was a keystone moment in visual effects. Its use of digital-image processing to represent an android POV was the first of its kind in a feature film. That was a legacy Visual Effects Supervisor Jay Worth had somewhat on his mind when he approached the effects assignment on HBO’s television series, Westworld, created by Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy and based on Crichton’s film. “We weren’t necessarily thinking about the 1973 movie all the time,” says Worth. “It was more about the feel of that film, and with the effects what we would do is say, ‘How might they have done this kind of effect 30 years ago?’ Most of the shots that we did I always felt like we could have done practically if we had to.” Those shots ranged the full gamut of effects techniques, from crafting a young version of Sir Anthony Hopkins, to building, de-generating and destroying various hosts, and to delivering a world of visuals inside the amusement park featured in the show.

We even did a test of taking the head of one of those shots and putting it onto our stand-in.” Ultimately, the scenes would be achieved with a CG Ford face. This began with shooting a stand-in who performed both with and without facial tracking dots. Hopkins was also cyberscanned by SCANable in order to provide a baseline facial structure. VFX studio Important Looking Pirates then took on the task of generating Ford in CG. The process of modeling a convincing digital representation of the ‘youngified’ actor quickly hit an unexpected road block, as Worth explains. “We tried matching Sir Anthony exactly to what he looked like back then, but the thing is, Anthony from the early 80s actually looks quite different to what most American audiences remember him as from, say, The Silence of the Lambs. We realized that our role really was to make him instantly recognizable, so our de-aged model actually had to be what people would think he looks like, not what he actually did.” UNDER THE SKIN

MEET YOUNG SIR ANTHONY HOPKINS

Although the audience knows that central character Dolores

“We tried matching Sir Anthony exactly to what he looked like back then, but the thing is, Anthony from the early 80s actually looks quite different to what most American audiences remember him as from, say, The Silence of the Lambs. We realized that our role really was to make him instantly recognizable, so our de-aged model actually had to be what people would think he looks like, not what he actually did.” —VFX Supervisor Jay Worth BOTTOM: 3D printing in Westworld. Although many practical props were created to show the hosts under construction, visual effects artists also augmented and added digital nozzles and muscle weaves. (Photo Credit: HBO)

Westworld’s season one plot weaves in and out of the past and present, often initially without audiences realizing. However, at one point the show makes a very clear flashback to park founder and creative director Robert Ford (Sir Anthony Hopkins) as a younger man. Several ways in which to depict Hopkins 30 to 40 years ago were considered. One included cutting out existing footage of the actor from his previous films such as Dark Victory (1976) and 84 Charing Cross Road (1987). “We actually shot the scenes with specific angles matching those films somewhat in mind,” says Worth, “but we had issues with clearances; we had issues about whether we could get the negative.

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BEHIND THE VITAL, VIOLENT, VISUAL EFFECTS IN WESTWORLD By IAN FAILES

TOP AND TOP RIGHT: Oliver Bell plays the Little Boy, actually a host with an older-style exoskeleton similar to that of Delores’ that is revealed in these shots. (Photo credit: HBO)

MEET YOUNG SIR ANTHONY HOPKINS

Although the audience knows that central character Dolores

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TELEVISION

SIGGRAPH AD

Abernathy (Evan Rachel Wood) is one of several older models of hosts inhabiting Westworld. Her true inner workings are not revealed until the final episode of season one. Here, Dolores’s exoskeleton is uncovered, thanks again to VFX artists at Important Looking Pirates. “To film the Dolores exoskeleton shots,” outlines Worth, “Evan was in a blue turtleneck jumpsuit all the way to her toes and all the way to her fingertips. We shot her, shot a clean plate, and then shot some lighting reference.” Worth says there was much discussion about whether the exoskeleton should actually look like a skeleton or something else, and whether it should be white or black. “It was a little more unexpected not to look like a skeleton, so we went with that. We ended up going with a matte black finish partly because we thought it looked more elegant.”

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TOP: Old Bill, played by Michael Wincott, is an older model host. The VFX teams implemented some subtle face contortions to hint at his more animatronic-like nature. (Photo credit: HBO) ABOVE LEFT: After considering the use of miniatures, a CG approach to the terraformer shots was ultimately chosen. This is the original background plate. (Photo credit: HBO) ABOVE RIGHT: The final CG terraformer crafted by Important Looking Pirates. (Photo credit: HBO)

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BRINGING ANDROIDS TO LIFE (AND DEATH)

Delores isn’t the only host receiving the effects treatment. Both practical and digital effects were relied upon to accomplish scenes where they were malfunctioning, being frozen still, or shot to pieces. Old Bill (Michael Wincott) is a host who exhibits signs of glitching when he seems to perform looped animatronic-like movements. Surprisingly, the effect was achieved with what Worth describes as relatively simple compositing. “Basically, the actor was performing everything relatively smoothly and we were ramping in and out in terms of speed,” he says. “CoSA VFX handled that. They also did some augmentation for other hosts that were malfunctioning by taking plates shot at different frame rates, and we realized with Old Bill we could almost start and stop the actor as if we were doing speed changes.” The park controllers have the ability to “freeze all motor functions” of the hosts. The effect initially required a simple solution – having the actors try and stay as still as possible. “Everyone got really good at it,” recalls Worth, “but we did do a lot of subtle compositing with old-fashioned grunt roto to get these people to freeze, occasionally with projection mapping if the camera was moving around them. “One thing we did differently with the freezing,” adds Worth, “was when the hosts were down in the diagnostics area, we would take out their eye blinks but still have them breathing. It made it feel like the hosts were even more helpless under the management’s control.” The treatment of the hosts by management, guests and other

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TOP: The map projection technique was adapted to also produce “bucket” views of surveillance footage from the park. (Photo credit: HBO)

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BOTTOM: Evan Rachel Wood as host Dolores Abernathy during an interrogation scene while under the “freeze all motor functions” command. The actress held still as much as possible, but was aided in terms of small movements and eye blinks by the visual effects team. (Photo credit: HBO)

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LEFT: An on-set photo of Thandie Newton as madam host Maeve Millay during a “freeze all motor functions” scene. (Photo credit: John P. Johnson/HBO) RIGHT: Millay is interrogated by park operator Elsie Hughes (Shannon Woodward). (Photo credit: HBO)

hosts is often brutal and bloody. Significant make-up effects gags orchestrated by make-up effects designer Christien Tinsley were relied upon for things like shotgun blasts and the resulting wounds. “Christien’s team built these face rigs with magnets and blew them apart, and we would then comp certain pieces in,” states Worth. “It just had to be very visceral and so it was relatively simple from a VFX standpoint compared to if we had had to do a full CG version.” HOSTS IN PROGRESS

Down in the depths of the park’s central offices, scenes of hosts under construction relied on a mix of practical and digital work. Mostly the construction resembled an advanced kind of 3D printing in which the humanoid host bodies and their skeletal structures and organs are weaved together and then dipped into a white milky substance. A signature image from the show depicts the hosts in the pose of Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man, albeit attached to a robotic arm. “Our Special Effects Supervisor Michael Lantieri and then Christien Tinsley and their teams were responsible for what we had on set,” outlines Worth. “Michael had found a glue company that could produce massive amounts of glue without the bonding agent, and that provided the cool dripping look coming off the bodies. “Christien built the clay bodies in his shop (Tinsley Studio),” continues Worth, “and the special effects crew made the rigs and robotic arms. Digital effects came in to add small details such as muscle fibers being built up or threading in the wet substance of a host’s eyes, for instance.”

“We had to figure out how the motor controlling the map would spin in conjunction with the projectors. And we even changed the time of day on the map throughout the series depending on what was necessary for the story. I don’t think anybody even picked up on that, per se, in that when it was nighttime outside, it was nighttime on the map, or it had a sunrise or a sunset when it was supposed to.” —Jay Worth

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NAVIGATING WESTWORLD

In the park’s control room, an ever-present 3D hologram-like map displays the position of the hosts at all times. Westworld’s creators wanted to move away from a typical hologram look, instead suggesting that the map was being projected. “With a lot of projector technology these days there’s a way to actually make it appear dimensionalized,” says Worth. “You see it, say, at basketball games where they’re projecting these 2D images but from a certain angle it looks 3D, and then it also looks different from different angles.” For the map itself, fabrication company SCPS sculpted a rocky terrain for use during filming. A matte painting of the Westworld environment was then created, including aspects allowing for

TOP: A sculpted surface representing Westworld. Live projections were the means by which the control room map was brought to life. (Photo credit: HBO) LEFT: 3D printing in Westworld. (Photo credit: HBO)

changes of the time of day. That was projected directly onto the sculpt – live. One of the most challenging aspects of the map then became its movement, since some scenes had it spinning around. “We had to figure out how the motor controlling the map would spin in conjunction with the projectors,” says Worth. “And we even changed the time of day on the map throughout the series depending on what was necessary for the story. I don’t think anybody even picked up on that, per se, in that when it was nighttime outside, it was nighttime on the map, or it had a sunrise or a sunset when it was supposed to.” CHANGING THE LANDSCAPE

During season one, Ford begins efforts to build a new experience for outsiders. This involves a massive digging effort by an enormous terraforming mining machine which rips up an existing area of Westworld. Worth notes that, early on, miniatures were considered for the terraformer before a CG route by Important Looking Pirates was adopted. “We looked at miniatures partly because this terraforming

machine was based on real things that tear up the land like that,” says Worth. “But we realized we’d have to do a number of setups for that; the plate, then the miniature and then combine them, plus it was going to have a moving camera. ILP did such a great job – we had even shot some dirt and dust elements just in case but they were able to simulate all of that at the right scale.” THE EFFECTS WORLD OF WESTWORLD

In completing the show’s visual effects, Worth had at his disposal several studios, including Important Looking Pirates, CoSA, Double Negative, Shade VFX, Chicken Bone VFX, Encore Hollywood, and a crew of independent compositors and in-house artists. Collaboration with the practical, make-up and special effects crews remained key in achieving the final shots. “The show has such an organic nature to it,” suggests Worth. “We never wanted the VFX to be a centerpoint but instead always just in there supporting the story. That approach actually gives you a lot more freedom in some ways because you know what lane you need to stay in.”

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NAVIGATING WESTWORLD

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EFFECTS ELEVATE DAZZLING LIVE-ACTION REMAKE OF CLASSIC GHOST IN THE SHELL By IAN FAILES

TOP: Scarlett Johansson plays The Major in Ghost in the Shell, a synthetic cybernetic counterterrorist assigned to take on a gang of cyber criminals. All photos courtesy of Paramount Pictures. All Rights Reserved.

In the years that followed the release of the anime Ghost in the Shell, directed by Mamoru Oshii and based on the manga series by Masamune Shirow, a bevy of science-fiction films seemed to echo both the look and futuristic predictions of the 1995 film. Jump forward just over two decades and director Rupert Sanders has entered the Ghost in the Shell fray with a live-action remake starring Scarlett Johansson in the role of The Major, a synthetic cybernetic counterterrorist who is assigned to take on a gang of cyber criminals. Looking to honor the original visions of Oshii and Shirow, while implementing his own take on the Ghost in the Shell world, Sanders assembled a team of effects artisans for the task. Visual Effects Supervisors Guillaume Rocheron and John Dykstra and Visual Effects Producer Fiona Campbell Westgate oversaw work from lead vendor MPC and other studios, among them Atomic Fiction, Territory Studio, Pixomondo, Framestore, Method Studios and Raynault VFX. Weta Workshop took on several conceptual design, fabrication, prop and costume challenges. Steve Ingram handled special effects duties. Sanders says he went for a grounded approach to the visual effects in the film. “I use visual effects to embellish and do things that aren’t achievable in-camera,” he says. “I try and do everything else in-camera. We built a lot of animatronics, we did a lot of prosthetic makeup, we built a lot of sets and we did very little full greenscreen environments. I always wanted Ghost in the Shell to be a tactile world that you felt really existed.” A CYBORG IS MADE

In a ‘shelling’ sequence that echoes the original anime, The Major is shown entering the world – her cybernetic parts are melded together and then infused through a white milky substance that rips off to reveal her outer suit layer.

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Based on initial art department concepts and previs from The Mill, Weta Workshop continued designs for the sequence. It was part of the company’s wider compilation of elements for the film. “We used visual graphics to help organize the film,” notes Workshop Concept Designer Leri Greer. “What we were trying to do was take the really broad team of people coming onto the film and give them info-graphics to get them up to speed very graphically.” The Workshop designed and 3D printed The Major’s brain and underskeleton parts, in metal and as optically clear materials to represent more fibrous pieces. They were then assembled, jigsaw puzzle-style, for the shoot at the nearby Stone Street Studios in Wellington, New Zealand. A dry for wet approach using smoke and particles was followed to make the shots at times appear underwater. Weta Workshop also built a replica of The Major’s body weighted with concrete for views of it emerging from the white liquid. “That liquid was a mix of products to give it the right thickness that our Special Effects Supervisor Steve Ingram put together,” says Rocheron. “We shot a bunch of passes of dipping the body into the white liquid and

TOP: The Major (Scarlett Johansson) in camouflage suit. Weta Workshop fabricated a silicone suit, tinted fleshcolored, for Johansson to wear. BOTTOM LEFT: The Major on a mission. BOTTOM RIGHT: Major Maddy Kisana (Scarlett Johansson) entering the world – her cybernetic parts melded together and then infused through a white milky substance that rips off to reveal her outer suit layer.

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pulling it out. In the end it was a combination of CG and live action, with elements of the dripping liquid and bubbles that we shot at 1500 frames per second.” “Rupert had a driving desire to do as much practically as possible,” says Weta Workshop CEO Richard Taylor, noting the combination of practical and digital for the shelling sequence. “At the Workshop, we don’t think digital is the enemy, far from it. But there is no doubt for us that our passion is the physical feel of practical effects.” The Major dons a thermoptic suit that allows her to go into camouflage mode. Weta Workshop fabricated a silicone suit, tinted flesh-colored, for Johansson. “We had measurements and a body scan sent to us for Scarlett,” describes Workshop costume maker Flo Foxworthy. “We then found an in-house fit model and we milled out and created life-size mannequins, too. We didn’t get it onto Scarlett until the day before filming but it worked out great.”

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TOP: Ghost in the Shell’s cityscape. Director Sanders sought to populate the city views with a form of solid, sometimes enormous, augmented reality holograms he called ‘solograms’. LEFT: Pilou Asbaek plays Batou. RIGHT: Director Rupert Sanders and Scarlett Johansson on the set of Ghost in the Shell.

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WORLD BUILDING

BEWARE THE ROBOT GEISHA

Ghost in the Shell’s city landscape was fleshed out by several artists, including Production Designer Jan Roelfs and Concept Designer Ash Thorp. Sanders chose to reveal the city with a series of long, floating camera moves, dubbed ‘Ghost Cam’, that he devised with cinematographer Jess Hall. “We flew a helicopter up and down paths pre-determined from Google Maps, photographing textures and roof textures and then we photographed the same places from the street so we could start to build a digital environment,” says the director. Sanders also sought to populate the city views with a form of solid, sometimes enormous, augmented reality holograms he called ‘solograms’. To acquire the imagery appearing in the solograms, a specialized 80-camera rig array designed by Dayton Taylor took a ‘fully immersive’ 15-second take showcasing an actor from all angles. Still camera arrays have been used on many films, but in this case the rig was a video array, an attractive prospect to Rocheron for achieving the desired sologram look. “This technique allowed us to capture 24 cyberscans per second of an actor and generate what was effectively animated clips,” he says. “MPC’s Visual Effects Supervisor Axel Bonami then had to take that footage and voxelize it to get the 3D hologram appearance. We also had Territory Studio spending months creating volumetric assets for signage and displays in the city and pairing it with our footage.” Photographic elements further helped make up the city buildings themselves, thanks to a photogrammetry shoot of scaled miniatures built by Weta Workshop. “What they built,” says Rocheron, “was more for prototyping and creating a kit-bash library that we could photograph from multiple angles and then have as 3D assets. We never used one of those miniatures in a shot directly, but it was a good choice to design them that way.”

Robot Geisha featured in the film included contributions from Weta Workshop, which created several masks worn by performers as well as a standalone animatronic head for a later scene. “Rupert had this idea that the actress Rila Fukushima could play all of the geisha,” says Workshop Senior Art Director Ben Hawker. “So we replicated her face and 3D printed the mask, so the performers all looked identical.” “It’s a very polished suit – it’s meant to look like highly finished ceramic or porcelain on the outside,” describes Workshop Supervisor Rob Gilles. “The actual masks were semi-rigid, so they did have a little bit of flex in them. We tried to keep that surface quite hard so we could get a really nice paint finish on it. And then we had a silicone neck cowl and silicone arms and gloves.” At one point, a Robot Geisha head is examined. An elaborate on-set prop was made by Weta Workshop to spring open and reveal an elaborate concoction of internal clockwork-like mechanisms, crafted to look as if the geisha had been tampered with.

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CRAFTING KUZE

The Major’s nemesis Kuze (Michael Pitt) is himself a cybernetic being, but not as elite as the current model. “Rupert wanted him to look like he was a broken piece of porcelain,” says Gilles, “and that he had tried to repair himself with different body parts. He’d become this enigma of knowledge and didn’t really associate himself with a physical form. So we made prosthetics down his face and neck and these transformed into a costume element with ceramic panels that were like moving plates that articulated when he moved.” “We’d then use CG to create all the negative space where you would see into muscle and skeleton for Kuze,” details Rocheron. “In post we also started just keeping certain things like his eyes, or

his hair or just parts of his face. We re-created an entire body above the torso and animated it based on Pitt’s performance and then had all this exposed translucent and transparent muscles with these skin plates cladded on.” DIVING IN

When The Major combines her brain with that of a cyborg to look through its memories, she moves into what was termed the ‘Deep Dive’. “The fun part of that,” suggests Dykstra, “was getting to highlight the differences between the way the cyborg thinks and the way the human thinks and you also get to give The Major a different point of view about exactly what she is.” After falling through a seemingly endless amount of black liquid, The Major walks through the Yakuza Club where clubgoers are frozen and de-grading into digital noise, the idea being that memories are unstable. “You could see their faces but not the back of their heads to give the idea that The Major was navigating memories from a different point of view,” says Rocheron. The visuals were realized by blocking out camera moves and recording their positions, then shooting a clean plate. Later, a 150 DSLR photogrammetry rig was used to re-film those actors in the same poses. “That way, I would get a scan and textures of everyone exactly the way they were supposed to be featured in the club to then send to MPC for treatment and degradation,” he explains. During the Deep Dive, Kuze sees he is about to be uncovered and hacks into the memories to unleash a series of black figures who try to drown The Major. Part of that scene employed some relatively inexpensive, yet innovative, approaches to the effects, as Sanders recounts. “I got wardrobe to make some plastic suits for our extras. We covered them all in black oil and had them slipping around and grabbing at The Major. Later, we used the same people in Kuze’s lair and they were in those same suits and linked with

TOP: In a fight sequence in a flooded slum area, The Major demonstrates her camouflage abilities, donning a thermoptic suit that allows her to go into camouflage mode. TOP LEFT: Robot Geisha in Ghost. Weta Workshop created several masks worn by performers.

“I use visual effects to embellish and do things that aren’t achievable in-camera. I try and do everything else in-camera. We built a lot of animatronics, we did a lot of prosthetic makeup, we built a lot of sets and we did very little full greenscreen environments. I always wanted Ghost in the Shell to be a tactile world that you felt really existed.” — Director Rupert Sanders

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COVER

WORLD BUILDING

BEWARE THE ROBOT GEISHA

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CRAFTING KUZE

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cables and generating his network, but I was thinking, how do we make them different? So we Vaselined over their eyes and then we doused them in flour.” INVISIBLE EFFECTS

Another iconic moment from the original anime film is a fight sequence in a flooded slum area, in which The Major demonstrates her camouflage abilities. “I think that was one of the scenes from the original that I felt had to be in there,” comments Sanders. “We built a water tank in New Zealand and that’s one of the few things that we filmed almost entirely greenscreen. Then we tiled a lot of Hong Kong apartment blocks and then Guillaume and I started to design it slightly more sci-fi.” The water fight was filmed with Johansson and her stunt performer in and out of frame, so that the themoptic look could be achieved in CG. “For that look,” says Rocheron, “we wanted to get away from any kind of magnifying glass effect. What we did was create an animated version of The Major and then she was completely voxelized. It’s as if she was moving through a volume and the voxels would displace depending on her movements.” BATTLE OF THE GHOSTS

A final tank battle, again inspired by the original film, sees The Major use her hybrid cybernetic-human brain to outsmart the six-legged machine. The scene was filmed on a backlot area and required significant set extensions, a CG tank, pyrotechnics and digital double work for The Major and Kuze, with The Major

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“At the Workshop, we don’t think digital is the enemy, far from it. But there is no doubt for us that our passion is the physical feel of practical effects.” — Weta Workshop CEO Richard Taylor

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ultimately compromising her physical body to defeat the tank. “We spent a lot of time giving personality to the tank to give a sense of a relationship between it and The Major,” says Dykstra, “but also to show how The Major’s biggest strength is her ability to reason. The bottom line for this story is the idea of a ‘ghost in the shell’ and how that is better than a cyber-being in terms of the depth of its free will and the ability of it to be creative and imagine something that doesn’t necessarily follow a reasonable route.” For Sanders, the tank battle typified his general approach to the film – it was something that paid homage to the original anime, that took advantage of the existing impressive visual elements and continued to leave the audience engaged on several levels. “I think what attracted me to Ghost in the Shell overall,” says Sanders, “was the opportunity to exist in both worlds where you had a big spectacular action-packed film, but also you were left with something resonating beyond just spectacle. “There’s so much in that original film to borrow from about technology and humanity that would make it a richer and more memorable experience.”

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Congratulations to the Visual Effects Society on the premiere issue of VFX Voice.

Heralding a new global spotlight on the art and innovation of VFX.

We are so proud to work with you.

Naomi Goldman nlgcommunications.com

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INDUSTRY Q&A ROUNDTABLE

VFX FACILITIES AT THE BEGINNING OF ST THE 21 CENTURY

“It is a vibrant industry that has bulked up on steroids, and while its sheer size makes it seem new and different, I think much of its underlying DNA is still the same, and the model that has been with us since ‘Star Wars’ persists.” —Jim Morris, VES

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“Trends may appear to favor decentralization… However, in order to continue to innovate and reshape our industry, we need critical mass of resources working together to allow for creative invention and the development of new techniques.” —Neishaw Ali

In his new book Thank You For Being Late: An Optimist’s Guide to Thriving in the Age of Accelerations, New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman (The World Is Flat) discusses the fast-moving forces upending the world – technology, globalization and climate change. Similarly, much is happening quickly in the VFX cosmos. VFX Voice caught up recently with industry veterans for a worldwide virtual Q&A Roundtable discussion about changes in the visual effects production universe. They include: Jim Morris, VES, General Manager and President of Pixar Animation Studios; Sam Nicholson, Founder/ CEO Stargate Studios; Anthony Hunt, Cinesite Group CEO; Dan May, President, Blackmagic Design; Alex Mahon, CEO, Foundry; Andrew Bly, CFO/Executive Producer, The Molecule; Neishaw Ali, President/Executive Producer, Spin VFX; Devin Sterling, VP Global Operations, Long Form, Deluxe Creative Services; Sébastien Moreau, President of Rodeo FX; Weyron Henriques, Director of Software Development, Deluxe Creative Services; Jacki Morie, Founder and Chief Scientist, All These Worlds, LLC; Neville Spiteri, CEO and Co-founder, Wevr; David Stinnett, Co-founder, Blur Studios; Ed Ulbrich, President and GM of VFX and VR at Deluxe; Pierre Raymond, President, Co-founder and Head of Operations, Hybride; Andrea Block, CEO and Producer, LUXX Studios; Adam Stern, VFX Supervisor/Owner, Artifex Studios; Namit Malhotra, CEO, Prime Focus World; and Parvinder Bhatia, Head of Entertainment, Plowman Craven. Q: Given the sweeping importance of visual effects in all media production, how do you see the model for production of VFX evolving in the future? In other words, will traditional VFX facilities persist in some form, or do you envision some other model will emerge? Morris: The visual effects world has changed dramatically over the past couple of decades. Unbelievably so. Digital approaches have almost entirely supplanted the photochemical techniques (motion control, miniature shooting, optical

compositing, etc.) that were at their height when I joined Industrial Light & Magic in the mid-’80s. And the number of people working in effects has probably grown 20 fold. The growth of the effects-fueled tent pole film has grown explosively as well. Once upon a time, a 350-shot show was considered a huge one, and there would only be a couple of those a year. Now there might be 20 films each having one to two thousand shots. And the quality of the work is staggeringly good. But I’m not sure the basic model of effects production has changed that much. Yes, once upon a time a visual effects facility like ILM might do the effects work in an entire film all by itself. Given the size of films now, and the fact that many shows have production-side effects supervisors and producers to oversee the show’s vendors, single facility shows are a rarity. But there have always been small, medium and large shops out there doing effects work. Now there are just more of them. And each of them plays a valuable role in the filmmaking process. And while small shops can do an awful lot these days, projects of huge scope, scale and variety still rely on the pipeline and capacity of the larger shops, as they always have. Visual effects of superb quality are now common in television work, games, VR and attractions as well as in cinema. It is a vibrant industry that has bulked up on steroids, and while its sheer size makes it seem new and different, I think much of its underlying DNA is still the same, and the model that has been with us since ‘Star Wars’ persists. Nicholson: Today’s VFX business model will continue to evolve as we respond to the ever-increasing creative demands and the rapidly evolving technologies which are reshaping media production and distribution. Tomorrow’s VFX business model will be less centralized, more collaborative and more globalized, offering limitless scalability and extreme horsepower at a reasonable price. We are developing this business model into a very diverse group of internationally-networked artists with unlimited access to extensive cloud- based software and off-site rendering. Challenging VFX work deemed

impossible today will be achieved by virtual communities of decentralized yet integrated artists networked through efficient digital delivery pipelines to meet the demands of tomorrow’s media. Ali: VFX facilities will persist in the foreseeable future because visual effects is all about creating and achieving the director’s vision. This unique challenge cannot be commoditized or ‘manufactured’ and is often prone to subjectivity, as we try to create the ‘impossible’ – that which cannot be achieved in camera. As always it is a team sport and requires creative talent and a group of experienced knowledge-based team members through all facets of production from prep to post. A successful production is one that has a reliable pipeline that can operate at the speed, volume and quality level demanded by clients and even more importantly a collection of experienced core-talented artists capable of synergistically deconstructing very complex creatives, technical directors that can script solutions at a moment’s notice, and experienced producers that understand the strength and challenges of the team and can mitigate the production’s liability. This is not something that can be organized or achieved within weeks of a project being green lit. Newer tools will continue to allow artists to do more faster. Cloud computing is lowering barriers to entry on the cost and technology side and, the talent pool is growing internationally. So those trends may appear to favor decentralization and that may well exist in one form or another. However, in order to continue to innovate and reshape our industry, we need critical mass of resources working together to allow for creative invention and the development of new techniques as we continue to pioneer into the ever-evolving, challenging and inspiring creative marketplace that we work in. May: The stakes have been raised for VFX and post professionals. In today’s landscape, they have to do more in less time. There are new consumption platforms (streaming, mobile, etc.), new standards (the jump from SD to HD and beyond with 4K/ Ultra HD), and new technology and systems (high frame rate, high dynamic range, etc.)

“Bigger does not always mean better. Mid-sized facilities will prosper if they focus on some key principles: people, projects, pipeline and partners.” —Anthony Hunt

“New media forms will include the best of what has gone before as well as incremental advances in techniques we have used to great effect to provide entertaining, thought-provoking and meaningful works of art.” —Jacki Morie

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VFX FACILITIES AT THE BEGINNING OF ST THE 21 CENTURY

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“Bigger does not always mean better. Mid-sized facilities will prosper if they focus on some key principles: people, projects, pipeline and partners.” —Anthony Hunt

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“Challenging VFX work deemed impossible today will be achieved by virtual communities of decentralized yet integrated artists networked through efficient digital delivery pipelines.” —Sam Nicholson

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“We expect to see the efficiency of process and creative collaboration between previsualization, production, VFX and post improving significantly as cloud technology and automation tools become increasingly necessary and accepted among content producers and independent VFX producers alike.” —Weyron Sterling and Devin Henriques

to keep up with. This all means that siloed workflows are no longer viable for today’s VFX facilities. Collaborative workflows are now crucial because they allow post professionals across disciplines to work together in tandem on the same project or even the same shot, regardless of if they are in the same suite or different studios across the world. Collaborative workflows require an interoperable and flexible toolset so the VFX artist, editor, colorist, etc. can seamlessly interface with each other without time-consuming round-tripping or any of the other pitfalls that can add time rather than eliminate it. These toolsets are critical as post professionals expand their skill sets to help with various parts of the post process that typically were outside of their purview – for example, VFX artists using color grading software to color correct VFX plates, or editors using VFX software to enhance actors’ performances when cutting together scenes. VFX facilities need to invest in and build collaborative workflows that empower their VFX artists and breed creativity as they step outside their comfortable zones and take on new skills. This will help them remain competitive as the VFX production model continues to evolve. Mahon: Technology advancements will shift the concept of ‘VFX facilities’ in the years to come. The sheer amount of data required for VFX and post-production work has meant that film companies have become adept at producing their own network facilities to manage it. However, cloud technology is now reaching the point where the advantages it offers, such as scalability, beat the question of its cost. As the media production industry adopts cloud tools, you’ll see smaller studios and production houses become far more competitive with the big names. Previously, small outfits were held back by affordability to engineer their own cloud and data storage, an issue that cloud adoption removes. Now they can take on certain parts of a film project, for example, just by scaling up their cloud needs for that specific piece of work. As a result, you’re going to see a higher quality of competitive work from smaller operations, as they are able to produce the same level

of VFX content that features in Hollywood blockbusters. We recognize the benefits this type of technology can offer the industry, and are already looking at a project that would enable anyone – whether it’s a small studio or a single artist in their own home – to access a well-equipped VFX facility through a web browser. This is the power that cloud offers our industry, and the great news is that it will only improve the quality of VFX work that is undertaken over the coming years. Hunt: Envisaging the future of the VFX industry is always a challenge. Technology is constantly changing, as are the VFX location hotspots. At this moment in time, a truly worldwide post production industry exists, fueled in part by an explosion in big-budget comic book and sci-fi films, animated features, and TV visual effects, but bigger does not always mean better. Mid-sized facilities will prosper if they focus on some key principles: people, projects, pipeline and partners. People should be the priority and the core of studios. They are the talent behind the tools, and while there are many similarities between the global VFX houses, the cultures and environments differ. We have a company culture that supports our crews and helps them develop into the best artists. This sounds simple and obvious but it’s incredibly important to keep at the forefront of all our operations. By having both a service and IP approach a studio can put a stamp on the big, fun blockbusters, but also tell more rich and complex stories. Tellingly, Cinesite is working on Otto Bathurst’s first studio feature film with Lionsgate ‘Robin Hood: Origins,’ after having recently completed work on ‘Assassin’s Creed’ for Fox and ‘Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them’ for Warner Bros. This neatly demonstrates the wide range of VFX projects we’re now working on. This runs alongside our increasing feature animated content, including our four-picture deal with 3QU Media on films such as ‘Gnome Alone’ in addition to service contracts with big studios like Sony Pictures Animation, who we’ve partnered with to bring ‘The Star’ to the big screen. Development of our animation slate

is also well underway. Project variation within studios will ensure the work remains interesting for crews, whilst helping them adapt to market trends and shifts with greater ease as a business. Having a solid pipeline is integral to any studio in this industry; it’s the backbone within any facility. Cinesite has worked hard to integrate the sophisticated techniques that we developed over the last 20 years in visual effects into a state-of-the-art and robust animation pipeline that’s been road tested on 200-plus movies. This allows us to push our standards for creative excellence. The on-going investment and development has allowed us to progress from being just a VFX facility to a multimedia studio that can handle multiple projects from a centralized and stable pipeline. Filmmaking is a collaborative process; studios’ partners must continue to reflect the ever-changing industry if they are to prosper. They must cross genres and borders to strengthen opportunities for artists and ultimately deliver benefits and opportunities for all involved. Cinesite has had long-lasting relationships with all major Hollywood studios, independent production companies and broadcasters, however we are also forming new partnerships with multinational entertainment companies. In recent years facilities have grown on the back of rising global demand and transformed from a niche footprint to a multinational industry. Our acquisition of Image Engine in 2015 has resulted in a fantastic partnership, positioning us to deliver worldclass visual effects and animation services to a mutual global customer base. Bly: With the ever-increasing importance of VFX I would hope that the relationship between productions and visual effects will evolve into the dynamic seen more in earlier days of the industry. Efficiency and creativity will flourish when VFX functions as a production-side department collaborating immediately with film and episodic crews. Imagine the potential magic if a DP who just left a production meeting stopped by the VFX department to run some camera simulations. There was a great talk two years ago at the VES Summit about how the feature

“I do hope that the industry and technology will continue to evolve so that one day, in the near future, we’ll not only be able to generate entirely photoreal CG environments but we’ll also be making films completely in CG with CG actors as well.” —Pierre Raymond

“I think the big will get bigger. It will be harder to be a mid-sized shop because a global network of talent and resources is essential to play at scale.” —Ed Ulbrich

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“I think the big will get bigger. It will be harder to be a mid-sized shop because a global network of talent and resources is essential to play at scale.” —Ed Ulbrich

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“As new entertainment forms emerge (VR, I’m looking at you), things will continue to get interesting, and VFX facilities will need to adapt.” —David Stinnett

“The day is coming where it will make much less sense for smaller facilities to invest in infrastructure, and more sense putting that capital into web-based services such as ZYNC and FTRACK and remote artist pools.” —Adam Stern

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‘HUGO’ used this framework and it resulted in a more streamlined creative process. The big question is how well would this work for episodic? With regard to the structure of visual effects facilities, I do believe they will remain, but they won’t look exactly how they do now. As one of the co-founders of The Molecule, I’ve gotten to watch the size and shapes of VFX facilities evolve over the past 12 years. With episodic driving a big portion of this new influx, the prevalent qualities of a VFX facility now tend to be reliability, speed and cost. Scalability has also become crucial for smaller facilities due to the seasonality and inconsistent shot orders per episode. Couple this with recent tech advances and people finding themselves to be more productive while working from home, I definitely expect to see a shift in the traditional brick and mortar approach to forming a studio. First we’ll see groups of collective artists working from home linked remotely as a virtual facility. Eventually, however, I can see these artists wanting to connect more in person and going together on a small shared workspace. Yes, that sounds exactly likely. It went full circle but I see the last iteration being a blend of the current facility setup and artist collectives patched in remotely. All they will need is a cheap workstation and internet connection while all the processing power will be held in the cloud. Moreau: Movies are now being made globally and post production isn’t done only in California, Vancouver or London. Small- to medium-size studios now have the technical and artistic abilities to compete with the major ones at every level and raise the bar of visual effects across all mediums. Rodeo FX has always strived to create a culture that focuses on our artists. Whenever we’ve expanded, our first consideration is that artists like to work with other great artists in an environment that encourages them and gives them space to grow. Our LA and Quebec offices are examples of how we have built that culture beyond our base in Montreal. Rodeo FX will continue to open offices globally wherever we can find the talent and enthusiasm that helps enrich our company culture. Block: After more than 10 years in the

industry I often get the impression that we have shifted to a mere technical team of production, which needs to work extremely efficiently with little artistic freedom. This neglects a huge potential of improvement for each show. Often VFX work is squeezed in at the end of a production to add garnish & glamour and raise the monetary success of movies. Some producers, directors and VFX supervisors still allow enough time for thinking, planning, experimenting and creative input. On those occasions, we are not only the mechanical, technical, skilled partners of the film but creative partners that add real value to a movie. Those are the best productions with results we are proud of. But some have gone extinct during this rewarding process, because the budget did not match the added value of their work. Therefore, sustainable pricing for VFX is key for business development. Regarding the fields where professional VFX and animation are executed, they have widened and will be even more various in the future. Effects will become more important, needed on many fields from research to production, VR, games, fun-parks and film. The tools we will use to do so will change our daily routine a lot. There are real-time engines that now render light and physics simulations for dust, water and even explosions on the spot. This will be a vast improvement for decision-making processes and enhance our visions for non-real settings and creatures. At the same time the artist with knowledge, imagination, creativity and wide technical skill will become even more important, while the tool skills will change tremendously. Virtual reality adds a new perspective to VFX and animation in filmmaking. The immersive experiences will propel storytelling, increase our possibility of taking part in movies as observers or even as actors, and question our perception of audience and film separated by screens. This will be a big challenge for the VFX industry since the framing and camera angles are not static anymore. Overall, the technical skills will shift towards instant, photoreal programming which enables us to have easier and more natural interaction with filmed elements on a high technical level.

Soon we will be able to discuss within virtual conferences a shared model or setting, set light and camera moves interactively in a studio, discuss and modulate animation in cinesynch sessions in virtual 3D space, create characters and sets on the spot with our hand and VR goggles. The creative team gets back their artistic interfaces, like pens and brushes. Maquettes and models will be chiseled and placed in space by hands and fingertips, and eye movement will drive cameras which will send data simultaneously to VFX facilities. Our work could become more intuitive, artistic and allow for easier communication if we can all afford to invest in new techniques. Raymond: I think the industrialization of the VFX industry will keep increasing. Studios no longer work in competition with one another but are now working in collaboration, sharing technical expertise and assets, which makes the process more complex. I do hope, however, that the industry and technology will continue to evolve so that one day, in the near future, we’ll not only be able to generate entirely photoreal CG environments but we’ll also be making films completely in CG with CG actors as well. Sterling & Henriques: The two of us live on the post side, so our perspective is based in that world. We don’t see VFX facilities going anywhere other than growing in importance. From where we sit, VFX leads the development of the post workflow today. The VFX Supervisor is one of the key drivers in this phase, and that leadership will likely continue to extend into other arenas. We expect to see the efficiency of process and creative collaboration between previsualization, production, VFX and post improving significantly as cloud technology and automation tools become increasingly necessary and accepted among content producers and independent VFX producers alike. Ulbrich: I think we are going to see a domination of the major VFX studios, with more consolidation, and a continued move toward broad capabilities and away from niches of expertise. We’ve all seen the statistics – the highest-grossing movies are VFX and CG animation movies. They are the only ones that consistently play globally, and they

“Small- to medium-size studios now have the technical and artistic abilities to compete with the major ones at every level and raise the bar of visual effects across all mediums.” —Sébastien Moreau

“Being amongst the best in the VFX world is not just about having the most talented creatives. It is also about having the best production support, the latest technology infrastructure and the most intelligent financial solutions. And in today’s world, that also means having global capacity and scale.” —Namit Malhotra

“We continue to work with these global VFX facilities and production companies to be an important partner in the digital data capture process, as the industry progresses to service the increased number of ‘Windows’ to view media.” —Parvinder Bhatia

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“As new entertainment forms emerge (VR, I’m looking at you), things will continue to get interesting, and VFX facilities will need to adapt.” —David Stinnett

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“There is room for, say, a studio to develop and sell a B2B or directto-consumer visual effects service.” —Neville Spiteri

“Our work could become more intuitive, artistic and allow for easier communication if we can all afford to invest in new techniques.” —Andrea Block

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increasingly dominate global box office. So there’s a focus on blockbusters across the industry. Studios appeal to their shareholders by putting release dates on movies years in advance, so we now have visibility into their pipelines that we didn’t necessarily have before. We’re also seeing the evolution of the blockbuster – from CG-effects-heavy in the ’90s to the explosion in animated features, to more CG actors, to where we are now, with features that are hybrids of CG and live action – like ‘Avatar’ and ‘The Jungle Book.’ To create those kinds of movies, the demand is for studios with world-class talent in multiple geographies that can scale and expand their capacity dynamically anywhere in the world, with the depth of resources to ensure security. The ability to have integrated global production capacity that can optimize favorable local economics, low-cost labor centers, technology centers, and move work around the world seamlessly to optimize talent, costs and drive utilization of those facilities is the model that serves the studios’ needs while enabling VFX companies to run viable businesses. I think the big will get bigger. It will be harder to be a mid-sized shop because a global network of talent and resources is essential to play at scale. Morie: We live in exciting times for the development of new media forms. We are seeing the birth of fully immersive, agency-driven Virtual Reality (VR), for example, as well as new forms of Augmented Reality (AR) that allow a seamless blending of imaginary, custom built or replicated elements with our immediate physical world. Any production pipeline created for new forms of media will require many of the same skills and techniques that we have developed over the past several decades to enhance all forms of moving image media. New media forms will include the best of what has gone before as well as incremental advances in techniques we have used to great effect to provide entertaining, thought-provoking and meaningful works of art. These new forms will also invent additional techniques, innovative methods of production, new ways to blend realities in ways almost unimaginable today. They will bring in the participant as an active partner in creation, and involve

ingenious and original ways of supporting this change in our traditional audience. The same inventive spirit that created computer graphics, motion capture, blue and green screens, rotoscoping, compositing, digital characters, miniatures, simulation techniques and more are in the DNA of our industry. Stern: I do believe traditional VFX facilities will persist, but I think one potential model could be that of VFX ‘hub’ facilities, where a core studio manages some level of infrastructure, client meetings, internal concept department, review session capability, and a small core team of artists, but that the same facility takes advantage of new technologies to increase artist rosters and rendering capacity on the fly. This seems like something smaller studios might be able to take better, immediate advantage of. Tent pole projects will require higher levels of secure, controlled infrastructure and staffing for years to come, and I can see it being quite difficult to move away from that model. Smaller studios, however, may be able to take faster advantage of burst-rendering and ‘burst-staffing’ by bringing in remote artists on the fly. Particularly when it comes to independent film projects and episodic television. This is obviously not without challenges, especially regarding security and bandwidth. But the day is coming where it will make much less sense for smaller facilities to invest in infrastructure, and more sense putting that capital into web-based services such as ZYNC and FTRACK and remote artist pools. Bhatia: Visual effects and animation continue to play a very important role in enhancing cinematic experience, and creating visuals, which are able to take the director’s vision to the next level. With content production going global, VFX facilities have created pipelines to service these demands. We continue to work with these global VFX facilities and production companies to be an important partner in the digital data capture process, as the industry progresses to service the increased number of “Windows” to view media. Malhotra: The VFX facility business model is here to stay. As VFX becomes more and more integral to an ever-expanding

universe of media production, so does the need to deliver at a highly professional level of quality. Clients, whatever the medium they are producing for, are looking for assurances not only of quality, but also the ability to deliver on time and on budget. Being amongst the best in the VFX world is not just about having the most talented creatives. It is also about having the best production support, the latest technology infrastructure and the most intelligent financial solutions. And in today’s world, that also means having global capacity and scale. Spiteri: The visual effects industry has largely operated on a work-for-hire, service-oriented business model since the early days of media production. Studios both big and small will likely continue to work that way as long as movies, television shows and the like continue to require those services, though there is room for, say, a studio to develop and sell a B2B or direct-toconsumer visual effects service. Stinnett: I think facilities that are content with doing exclusively classic visual effects for film and television will always be around, and at least for the near future can continue to operate within the traditional facility model. Film and episodic production aren’t going away any time soon, even if the delivery platforms are changing. That being said, business models in VFX are changing. There has always been a constant demand to deliver better, faster and more cost effectively, but that hill always seems to be getting steeper. Advances in rendering (GPU, cloud) are helping many in the industry work more efficiently and iterate more frequently. Flexibility and adaptability have been the key to our longevity. We have never been a “traditional” VFX facility because in addition to traditional film/television VFX, we have always worked in special venue, games, advertising, and design as well. While creative workflows and pipelines developed to produce projects across these arenas tend to be complementary, our ever-evolving pipeline is flexible enough to allow us to take whatever projects that we find interesting and challenging. As new entertainment forms emerge (VR, I’m looking at you), things will continue to get interesting, and VFX facilities will need to adapt.

“As the media production industry adopts cloud tools, you’ll see smaller studios and production houses become far more competitive with the big names.” —Alex Mahon

“VFX facilities need to invest in and build collaborative workflows that empower their VFX artists and breed creativity as they step outside their comfortable zones and take on new skills.” —Dan May

“I definitely expect to see a shift in the traditional brick and mortar approach to forming a studio.” —Andrew Bly

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“There is room for, say, a studio to develop and sell a B2B or directto-consumer visual effects service.” —Neville Spiteri

“Our work could become more intuitive, artistic and allow for easier communication if we can all afford to invest in new techniques.” —Andrea Block

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“As the media production industry adopts cloud tools, you’ll see smaller studios and production houses become far more competitive with the big names.” —Alex Mahon

“I definitely expect to see a shift in the traditional brick and mortar approach to forming a studio.” —Andrew Bly

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SFX

JOHN RICHARDSON: ON BOND, POTTER, REALITY AND MAGIC By DEBRA KAUFMAN

BOTTOM: A large explosion for the film Aces: Iron Eagle III, directed by John Glen. Filmed in Arizona, Richardson was responsible for the liveaction effects, directing the model unit and effects and also some of the second unit.

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John Richardson – the man who supervised special effects for all the Harry Potter films and nine James Bond movies – was born to be a special effects supervisor. His father, Cliff Richardson, was one of special effects’ pioneers, starting in the business in 1921 and working with Alfred Hitchcock and Ealing Studios in their early days. “My father was absolutely my first mentor,” says Richardson. “I grew up with special effects, going to film sets whenever I could as a small boy.” During school holidays, Richardson went on location with his father, first when he was 13, for Exodus with Otto Preminger and then for Lawrence of Arabia with David Lean. On Exodus, he was soon assisting with special effects, helping out in accounting and appearing as a kibbutz guard “extra.” But SFX was what stuck. “All those explosions and fires and exciting things got it in my blood,” he says. Not that Richardson Sr. approved: “Dad felt that I was going to come into the industry over his dead body,” says Richardson. “He didn’t feel the film industry was stable enough. But I won in the end.” Carl Foreman’s The Victors in 1962 was Richardson’s first film after leaving school; he next went to Malaysia with his father to make The 7th Dawn. “These were all big-budget movies,” says Richardson. “My father was doing the effects and his assistant was me, a 16-year-old boy.” Richardson continued to assist his father on movies that included Battle of Britain, and had his first solo

outing as a SFX supervisor on Duffy. “My dad got a nice letter from [director] Bob Parrish, which pleased him enormously,” he says. Father and son continued to work together until 1970 and The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, directed by Billy Wilder. Richardson credits his father for much of his education as a special effects artist. “I learned a lot of things from my dad, none more important than how to blow up things safely,” says Richardson. “Anything to do with explosives, you really have got to know what you’re doing because peoples’ lives are at risk.” Richardson Sr. also schooled his son in model work. “There’s a real learning curve to models,” he says. “You need to know about camera speeds and all the tricks to make it look real. My father had done a lot of that back in his time, and I learned a certain amount from him.” Richardson also notes that he had a natural leaning towards mechanical engineering. “Although I was never fully trained in it, it came pretty naturally to me, and that was a large part of the special effects job,” he says. His work on Ken Russell’s The Devils and Sam Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs, both in 1971, were a turning point for his career. “They were both very hard directors to work with, but interesting and I learned a lot,” says Richardson. “And it got me an awful lot of publicity.” Over the next five years, the movies rolled in: The Day of the Jackal (Fred Zinneman); The Little Prince (Stanley Donen); The Great Gatsby (Jack Clayton); Barry Lyndon (Stanley Kubrick); Rollerball (Norman Jewison); Lucky Lady (Donen); The Omen (Richard Donner); and A Bridge Too Far (Richard Attenborough) are just some of his credits from that era. With 1967’s Casino Royale he began the first of nine James Bond movies, for some of which he was named visual effects supervisor, since all the effects were done in camera. “Back in the 1980s, we did live action with models, foreground miniatures, front projection, back projection,” he says. “And I used to be responsible for the model unit, which I directed myself and sometimes also did some of the 2nd unit helicopter work. I had, I would say, a very good knowledge of the whole effects world.” He took that comprehensive role on Octopussy, A View to a Kill, The Living Daylights and License to Kill. (In the 2000s he also was SFX and model FX supervisor on James Bond films Tomorrow Never Dies, The World Is Not Enough and Die Another Day.) He also took on that more comprehensive role on several other blockbusters, including John Glen’s Aces: Iron Eagle III, Ron Howard’s Far and Away, Renny Harlin’s Cliffhanger and

TOP: John Richardson fronts the effects crew gathered on one of the last of the Harry Potter series. BOTTOM LEFT: Richardson discussing a Potter shot with, left to right: David Yates, Tim Burke, John Richardson, Ricky Farns. BOTTOM RIGHT: Richardson testing a modified 2nd World War flamethrower on A Bridge Too Far. George Gibbs, assistant, is behind Richardson.

“With storyboards, you still had flexibility around them, a little more freedom to be creative. With previs, which is basically a cartoon, it somehow translates as that down to the movie. So, you’ll see a plane flying straight towards the camera, and it flies straight towards the lens. You lose the reality.” —John Richardson

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JOHN RICHARDSON: ON BOND, POTTER, REALITY AND MAGIC By DEBRA KAUFMAN

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SFX

TOP LEFT and RIGHT: James Bond’s boat jammed on a rock at the top of the Iguazu Falls in Brazil. The boat got stuck while filming on Moonraker and somehow it fell to Richardson, the FX Supervisor, to try and find a way to shift it. Richardson says the worst part was listening to the stitches on his harness breaking while he was dangling over the boat. Fortunately, John Morris, part of the FX team, was on the helicopter winch and he managed get Richardson up into the helicopter before anything broke completely. Richardson says they did get rid of the boat in the end so that they could continue filming. BOTTOM LEFT: Richardson driving a Jaguar car with a Polearm mounted in the middle. The Bede Jet could bank from side to side controlled by an air-pressurized hydraulic rig. Richardson was able to drive through the hangar at about 75 mph for the opening sequence of Octopussy. The plane flying into and exiting the hangar was filmed with FG miniatures in front of the real hangar. Richardson says that with Bond films he and his team tried to do as much as possible in camera. BOTTOM RIGHT: Richardson standing on a camera platform for filming plates and live action for A View to a Kill. He says if you look very closely you can probably see how white his knuckles were!

Glen Gordon Carron’s Love Affair. “Back in the 1960s through 1980s, effects budgets were much smaller,” recalls Richardson. “Consequently crews were a lot smaller, and one had to be a lot more inventive. Things started to change after the first Star Wars, but it was very gradual and didn’t change a lot until the 1990s.” The change was gradual, in part, because digital effects were constrained by the limited abilities of hardware and software – and the cost of burgeoning technology. “Initially, because it was an expensive process, we would always get asked by directors and producers if I could do it for real, because it would be cheaper,” he says. “That’s something that’s slipped in the last 15 years.” Some directors still have a preference for doing as much as possible in-camera. Richardson notes that both Alfonso Cuarón and Christopher Columbus wanted to do as much in-camera as possible on their Harry Potter films. He adds that SFX supervisor Chris Corbould works with Christopher Nolan, who also creates as many in-camera effects as possible. Richardson declares he isn’t decrying CGI work – “it’s a wonderful tool” – but still believes that in-camera effects have advantages. “Actors have got something they can react to,” he says. “A director has something in front of him he can see, and has an opportunity to move around it with the camera and choose other angles.” He believes that the transition from storyboards, which he

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always worked from in the past, to digital previsualization plays a role in changing the feeling of the movie. “With storyboards, you still had flexibility around them, a little more freedom to be creative,” he says. “With previs, which is basically a cartoon, it somehow translates as that down to the movie. So, you’ll see a plane flying straight towards the camera, and it flies straight towards the lens. You lose the reality.” “CGI does some brilliant work, but it needs to be looked at very carefully,” he says. “My maxim is, whatever the effects you’re doing, first, can you do it for real? If you can’t do it for real, how much of it can you do for real? And then, what you can’t do, CGI can help you.” He’s well aware of the fact that he’s going against the current. “Sadly the art of SFX is being lost,” he says. “There are a few guys out there who do great work, but they can only do as much as they are asked to do or allowed to do.” Among his favorite films he’s worked on, Richardson is proud of all the James Bond titles and also picks 1986’s Aliens with director James Cameron. “We didn’t have CGI back then,” he says. “It was all done with in-camera models and live-action effects. We used every trick we had on that film – and huge credit to Jim Cameron. He is a hard taskmaster but one of the best directors I’ve worked with, and Aliens still stands out.” (Richardson won a special effects Oscar in 1986-87 for Aliens.) Another director he enjoyed working with was Richard Donner whom he dubs “probably my favorite director of all times.” “He was fun to work with,” says Richardson. “As a director, he gets more out of the crew than with anyone else I’ve worked with.” Although, Richardson finds it difficult to pick a “favorite” among his long list of credits, because his work covers such a vast swath of genres and techniques, one standout is Lucky Lady, which was shot entirely at sea. “Working at sea is not the easiest at the best of times, but when you’re blowing up boats day after day, it becomes challenging,” he says. Raise the Titanic, although not a big box-office hit, required underwater work with models, and Deep Blue Sea, with Renny Harlin, was another film that involved underwater work, with a director who loved in-camera effects. The Harry Potter films are an example of the evolution of digital effects, says Richardson, who notes that SFX played a bigger role in the first films, The Philosopher’s Stone (2001), The Chamber of Secrets (2002) and The Prisoner of Azkaban (2004), than the later ones. “I’m really proud of all eight Potter films,” he says. “It’s such a classically well-made piece of filmmaking and great kudos to be a part of that.” The future of special effects is unknown. Although the industry is busier than ever with bigger pictures and bigger budgets, Richardson says SFX is a dying art unless more directors choose to do in-camera work. But he says, special effects still offers two crucial qualities in an era in which the “how they did it” of digital effects has become more widespread. “Reality and magic are two words that keep coming up for me,” he says. “Special effects puts reality into movies and keeps the mystery of the magic, so the audiences are still trying to work out how you did it. As soon as they know, the magic is gone.”

“Reality and magic are two words that keep coming up for me. Special effects puts reality into movies and keeps the mystery of the magic, so the audiences are still trying to work out how you did it. As soon as they know, the magic is gone.” —John Richardson TOP: Richardson with father Cliff in his “Laboratory” at home (mum is showing a little interest there, too). The time is 1951. BOTTOM: For a scene in Octopussy, a hangar was blown up on the backlot at Pinewood Studios.

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VES AWARDS

VISUAL EFFECTS ARTISTRY IN THE SPOTLIGHT

Captions include all members of an Award-winning team. For more show photos and a complete list of nominees and winners of the 2017 VES Awards visit visualeffectssociety.com (All photos by: Danny Moloshok and Phil McCarten) 1. Anticipation builds as the 15th Annual VES Awards is about to begin. 2. The view of the International Ballroom at the Beverly Hilton Hotel, Los Angeles, at the 15th Annual VES Awards. 3. Patton Oswalt hosts the VES Awards show. 4. VES Chair Mike Chambers announces nominees and winners in the compositing field. 2

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On Feb. 7, 2017, the Visual Effects Society held the 15th Annual VES Awards, the prestigious yearly celebration that recognizes outstanding visual effects artistry and innovation in film, animation, television, commercials, video games and special venues. Comedian Patton Oswalt served as host to the more than 1,000 guests gathered at the Beverly Hilton Hotel, Los Angeles, to celebrate VFX talent in 24 awards categories and herald the VES’s 20th anniversary. The Jungle Book was named photoreal feature film winner, earning five awards. Kubo and the Two Strings was named top animated film. Game of Thrones was named best photoreal episode and garnered five awards. And John Lewis: Buster the Boxer won top honors in the commercial field. Director Taika Waititi presented the VES Visionary Award to acclaimed producer and Marvel Studios Executive Vice President of Physical Production Victoria Alonso. Jim Morris, VES, President, Pixar Animation Studios, presented the VES Lifetime Achievement Award to multiple Academy Award®-winning visual effects pioneer Ken Ralston. Awards presenters included directors Gareth Edwards and Albert Hughes, Yara Shahidi, Auli’I Cravalho, Jessica Parker Kennedy and Brenton Thwaites.

5. Eric Roth, Executive Director of the Visual Effects Society, heralds the 20th Anniversary of the organization. 6. Victoria Alonso accepts her VES Visionary Award. 7. Ken Ralston receives his Lifetime Achievement Award. 8. Presenters Jeffrey A. Okun, VES, and director Albert Hughes greet the crowd. 9. The VES Award for Outstanding Visual Effects in a Photoreal Feature went to The Jungle Book and the team of Robert Legato, Joyce Cox, Andrew R. Jones, Adam Valdez and JD Schwalm.

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VES AWARDS

VISUAL EFFECTS ARTISTRY IN THE SPOTLIGHT

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VES AWARDS 10. The VES Award for Outstanding Visual Effects in an Animated Feature went to Kubo and the Two Strings and the team of Travis Knight, Arianne Sutner, Steve Emerson and Brad Schiff. 11. The VES Award for Outstanding Compositing in a Photoreal Episode went to Game of Thrones; Battle of the Bastards Retaking; Winterfell and the team of Dominic Hellier, Thijs Noij, Caleb Thompson and Morgan Jones.

12. The VES Award for Outstanding Effects Simulations in an Episode, Commercial, or Real-Time project went to Game of Thrones; Battle of the Bastards; Meereen City and the team of Thomas Hullin, Dominik Kirouac, James Dong and Xavier Fourmond. 13. The VES Award for Outstanding Created Environment in an Episode, Commercial or Real-Time Project went to Game of Thrones; Battle of the Bastards; Meereen City and the team of Deak Ferrand, Dominic Daigle, Francois Croteau and Alexandru Banuta.

14. The VES Award for Outstanding Visual Effects in a Photoreal Episode went to Game of Thrones; Battle of the Bastards and the team of Joe Bauer, Steve Kullback, Glenn Melenhorst, Matthew Rouleau and Sam Conway. 15. The VES Award for Outstanding Animated Performance in an Episode or Real-Time Project went to Game of Thrones; Battle of the Bastards; Drogon and the team of James Kinnings, Michael Holzl, Matt Derksen, and Joseph Hoback. 16. The VES Award for Outstanding Effects Simulations in a Photoreal Feature went to The Jungle Book: Nature Effects and the team of Oliver Winwood, Fabian Nowak, David Schneider and Ludovic Ramisandraina. 17. The VES Award for Outstanding Model in a Photoreal or Animated Project went to Deepwater Horizon; Deepwater Horizon Rig and the team of Kevin Lau, Jean Bolte, Kim Vongbunyong and Kevin Sprout.

18. The VES Award for Outstanding Visual Effects in a Special Venue Project went to Pirates of the Caribbean; Battle for the Sunken Treasure and the team of Amy Jupiter, Hayden Landis, David Lester and Bill George.

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VES AWARDS

19. The VES Award for Outstanding Supporting Visual Effects in a Photoreal Episode went to Black Sails; XX and the team of Erik Henry, Terron Pratt, Aladino Debert, Yafei Wu and Paul Stephenson.

26. The VES Award for Outstanding Compositing in a Photoreal Commercial went to John Lewis Buster the Boxer and the team of Tom Harding, Alex Snookers, David Filipe and Andreas Feix.

20. The VES Award for Outstanding Virtual Cinematography in a Photoreal Project went to The Jungle Book and the team of Bill Pope, Robert Legato, Gary Roberts and John Brennan.

27. The VES Award for Outstanding Animated Performance in a Photoreal Feature went to The Jungle Book; King Louie and the team of Paul Story, Dennis Yoo, Jack Tema and Andrei Coval.

21. The VES Award for Outstanding Created Environment in a Photoreal Feature went to Doctor Strange; New York City and the team of Adam Watkins, Martijn Van Herk, Tim Belsher and Jon Mitchell.

22. The VES Award for Outstanding Animated Performance in a Commercial went to John Lewis Buster The Boxer and the team of Tim van Hussen, David Bryan, Chloe Dawe and Maximilian Mallmann.

28. The VES Award for Outstanding Visual Effects in a Real- Time Project went to Unchartered 4 and the team of Bruce Straley, Eben Cook and Iki Ikram. 29. Awards Duo: Lifetime Achievement recipient Ken Ralston and Visionary Award recipient Victoria Alonso share a moment.

23. The VES Award for Outstanding Compositing in a Photoreal Feature went to The Jungle Book and the team of Christoph Salzman, Masaki Mitchell, Matthew Adams and Max Stummer. 23

24. The VES Award for Outstanding Supporting Visual Effects in a Photoreal Feature went to Deepwater Horizon and the team of Craig Hammack, Petra Holtorf-Stratton, Jason Snell, John Galloway and Burt Dalton.

25. The VES Award for Outstanding Effects Simulations in an Animated Feature went to Moana and the team of Marc Henry Bryant, David Hutchins, Ben Frost and Dale Mayeda. 25

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