The Hunger Games – The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes: Adrian de Wet (Production VFX Supervisor) & Eve Fizzinoglia (Production VFX Producer)

Par

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30/01/2024

In 2020, Adrian de Wet and Eve Fizzinoglia talked to us about the visual effects on the first season of the See series. They then took care of the effects for Slumberland. Today they tell us about their work on the prequel to The Hunger Games.

What is your background?

Eve // I attended film school at Emerson & spent 10 years in episodic producing before starting in features.

What was your feeling to be back in The Hunger Games universe?

Adrian // Catching Fire and Mockingjays 1 & 2 hold fond memories for me, so it was great to be back in the dystopian world of Panem with Suzanne Collins’ compelling characters. I love world-building projects, and this is a new take on a previously established universe, which of course comes with new challenges.

How was this new collaboration with director Francis Lawrence?

Adrian // Francis is a great collaborator, and as is always the case with his projects, everyone is encouraged to bring ideas.

Eve // Planning big VFX sequences with Francis is a great experience. He is thorough, has a clear vision with story as the foundation, and his support for our process allows for more detailed refinement of the final shots in the end.

What are the main changes he wanted to do since The Hunger Games movies?

Adrian // Most importantly, this is a period piece, set 65 years before the events in the original Hunger Games movies. So, there is far less future-tech: no flying hovercrafts, and instead of a vast holographic arena with scoreboards in the sky, the spectacle of the « Hunger Games » – a much cut-down but still brutal version of what came later – takes place in an indoor Arena partially destroyed by bombs. And as for the Capitol itself: instead of a city made of gleaming towers, with grandiose ceremonial avenues and high-speed rail, our dystopian metropolis is in its “Reconstruction Era”, with bomb damage from the war still visible, the skyscrapers in a state of incompleteness, construction cranes and scaffolding defining the skyline as the Capitol rises out of the ashes of the war.

How did you organize between you?

Eve // The work is split traditionally, with Adrian managing the creative & technical direction, while I take on more of the organization & planning. But we collaborate on all aspects of the project, strategizing major decisions together, and providing support for each other’s roles. Adrian is an experienced and visionary VFX Supervisor, so the creative trust is an ideal starting point to focus on how to get the images on the screen.

How did you choose and split the work amongst the vendors?

Eve // This is like assembling a puzzle, and it starts with the first script draft. We section the film into sequences based on category of work, and by the technical specialties of the teams we know we want to include. Building the shot distribution plan is exciting because it sets the workflow for the whole film, and it’s the first step to seeing it all come together.

Where were the various sequences in the movie filmed?

Adrian // The Arena scenes were shot at Centennial Hall in Wroclaw, Poland, and the lake was in southern Poland. Everything else was in Germany. The Capitol locations were all around Berlin, and District 12 was filmed at Landschaftspark in Duisberg. Our on-set supervisor, Sean Stranks also shot plate elements for the countryside train traveling in Germany.

What was your approach to create this new version of The Capitol?

Adrian // For the environments in the previous Hunger Games movies, we always shot at locations which had something in common with how the environment should look in the final film. This movie was no exception. For the Capitol, we decided to shoot at locations in Berlin and augment them – even if it meant that a significant part of the background would be replaced. The big difference this time around is that this new – or rather, old – version of the Capitol is a much more old-world, retro version of what we designed for Catching Fire and Mockingjay 1 & 2.

Can you elaborate on the creation of the various environments of The Capitol and District 12?

Adrian // The scenes in The Corso, where we see Snow walking towards the fountain with the huge statue of Panem, were filmed in Karl Marx Allee, which is a wide-open boulevard in the former East Berlin. We changed a lot of the buildings by extending them to twice their original height, and added new facades and aged textures, cranes and skyscrapers under construction in the background, and the statue in the middle of the fountain was added, complete with bronze verdigris textures and digital water spray from the fountain. We also needed another iteration of this environment for the opening of the film which takes place ten years prior – during the height of the conflict, where the buildings are abandoned and half demolished, and the street is covered in snow.

For District 12, a similar approach was used. We shot scenes at a location called Landschaftspark near Duisburg in West Germany, which has real industrial structures. The team at RISE digitally extended environments and buildings, but the most complex vfx work was the addition of the train arriving from the Capitol – an art-deco influenced CG train hauling passenger cars which Snow and Sejanus disembark as it comes to a halt. For this, we built a partial set (basically the carriage door) and RISE built the CG train around it.

Can you tell us more about the Arena destruction?

Adrian // The Arena Bombing scene was a successful collaboration between VFX, stunts, SFX, and lighting. We previz’d and tech viz’d the arena bombing to get the camera moves, the locations and timings of each explosion down. On set, reactive lighting was used at the location of each bomb to provide a short-lived flash. The SFX department provided air-mortars to blast air at the actors in time with each bomb. In the CG world, Important Looking Pirates (ILP) modeled the large concrete debris based on the position that they had to end up in for the rest of the film, and reverse-engineered them to fall from above as the ceiling collapsed. We also shot stunt elements of mentors and tributes being blasted by the explosions. ILP provided everything else: fire, smoke, flying debris and glass, the destroyed arena walls, and the falling piece of concrete which pins Snow to the floor.

Which location was the most complicated to create?

Eve // There were nearly 500 shots in the Arena throughout the Games sequences, requiring a challenging shared workflow between 4 teams who collaborated brilliantly with each other. The destruction was designed by ILP based on their explosive Bombing sequence, with additional ceiling damage by Outpost, walls & ground debris enhancements by RISE, and further details by Ghost.

Can you explain in detail about the drones creation and animation?

Adrian // Outpost handled most of the drone sequences. The design is based on a practical drone from Art department – a brass colored, retro-looking old-world design. The challenge in animation was to get them to travel so fast that the characters couldn’t have avoided them, and they had to hit them so hard that they get knocked over, and at the same time be believable. On set, the choreography was designed by stunts, and everything was mimed, so we were locked into certain timings and speeds. This meant that the edit informed the animation, but then we had to speed up and alter the length of certain takes to get the animation to work, which meant the animation also informed the cut. We worked closely with our editor, Mark Yoshikawa, to get this right.

How did you work with the SFX and stunts teams?

Adrian // There was a lot of collaboration with SFX and stunts, especially in the Arena. The bombing sequence, and the drone attack, all had extensive stunt work. And later, at the hanging tree, with a lot of stunt rig removal.

Can you elaborate on the design and creation of the snakes?

Eve // Francis and Adrian were keen to bring to life the mutant « rainbow » snakes as described in the book, while also keeping them grounded in reality. The snakes were created by the team at Ghost, using references of real snakes with iridescent skin, and extensive R&D and lighting techniques to bring out the colors in a natural way.

How did you manage their animations?

Eve // Working with the Ghost team a few times before, they knew that the goal for Francis and Adrian is always realism. They used real snake footage as reference for the animation, adding digital sand and gravel for the snakes to create trails, interacting with the environment as they move.

What were the main challenges with the snakes?

Adrian // Ghost handled a huge amount of swarm simulations when we see thousands of snakes, moving as a wave, hunting down their victims, but as the scene progresses, the swarms are gradually replaced by more detailed hero animation until only Lucy Gray remains. The biggest challenge was integrating the snakes into the fabric of her clothing – her loose-fitting blouse and long skirt were made of layers of chiffon and tulle. This fabric would have to move and twist and cinch as the snakes slithered over it and wound themselves around it, so we decided that the most effective way to do this was to replace her clothing with digital cloth. This was one of the most challenging sequences in the film.

Did you want to reveal any other invisible work?

Adrian // There was a lot of invisible VFX on this show.

All the content on the monitors in the auditorium is added digitally. We had live playback on the day, which was helpful for the actors, but the realities of editing mean that things don’t always end up in the order that they were intended during shooting.

In the early scenes when Snow is in the shower: even though actor Tom Blyth lost weight for the role, Outpost VFX made him a little more emaciated and malnourished than he really was.

The rabies foam on Jessup’s mouth was created by the team at Ghost, and the foam on the rabid dog’s mouth in the beginning was done by ILP.

The Hanging Tree: the trunk and the lowest branches were constructed practically, but everything above that is a digital extension, by Ghost, who also animated the flock of Jabberjays, which disperses every time someone is hanged.

All the birds in the film are digital. And the eels that writhe around in the small pond in Gaul’s lab

RISE extended the landscape of the peacekeeper barracks in District 12, adding hills and factories in the background and extending the Quonset huts.

Which sequence or shot was the most challenging?

Adrian // The snakes scene, as so much of the realism depends on the interactions with the fabric of her clothes, and we only get to really see this near the end of the VFX process, because it’s so time consuming.

Is there something specific that gives you some really short nights?

Adrian // All the VFX sequences in this movie were being handled by talented and experienced artists, and we have an awesome production team led by our amazing VFX Producer, so, even though the work was very challenging, I always knew it was resourced in exactly the right way to do it all properly.

What is your favorite shot or sequence?

Adrian // I think what I love most is what RISE, Outpost, ILP and Ghost did to the Arena. Some of the shot design in that location is just beautiful.

Eve // I love the forest at the end, when Snow goes crazy on the Mockingjays. (There’s so much brilliant photography throughout, it’s a great pleasure to work with DP Jo Willems.) Also, when the mentors & tributes first enter the Arena, and the bombs go off – ILP did an amazing job with that sequence. And the snakes crawling on Lucy Gray while she sings was an absolute highlight from the Ghost team.

What is your best memory on this show?

Eve // Filming in Wroclaw, Poland during the summer was fun! And while postproduction & delivery can be stressful, seeing the final film at the end of a long road is the ultimate drug.

Adrian // Seeing it all come to life. The Arena, the Snakes. And seeing the Hunger Games fans’ reaction!

How long have you worked on this show?

It was a year and 8 months from script breakdown to final delivery.

What’s the VFX shots count?

1460.

What is your next project?

We’re working on something exciting – can’t wait to tell you about it soon!

What are the four movies that gave you the passion for cinema?

Oops, that’s 5! 🙂

A big thanks for your time.

// The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes – VFX Reel

// Trailers

WANT TO KNOW MORE?
Outpost VFX: Dedicated page about The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes on Outpost VFX website.
RISE: Dedicated page about The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes on RISE website.

Dashing Through the Snow: VFX Breakdown by Cinesite

Par

Vincent Frei

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30/01/2024

Curious how the cute reindeer for the Disney+ movie, Dashing Through the Snow, come to life on screen? Look no further than this VFX Breakdown by the Montreal team of Cinesite, where art and technology come together to create creatures that are both realistic and magical:

WANT TO KNOW MORE?
Cinesite: Dedicated page about Dashing Through the Snow on Cinesite website.

Animal Kingdom: VFX Breakdown by MPC

Par

Vincent Frei

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30/01/2024

Explore the art of transforming humans into animals with MPC in this VFX Breakdown from concept to realization, delve into the creative process that shaped every detail with remarkable precision for the film, Animal Kingdom:

WANT TO KNOW MORE?
MPC: Dedicated page about Animal Kingdom on MPC website.

Poor Things: Simon Hughes (Production VFX Supervisor) & Tallulah Baker (VFX Producer) – Union VFX

Par

Vincent Frei

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29/01/2024

Back in 2012, Simon Hughes told us about Image Engine‘s visual effects work on Safe House. He then joined the Union VFX team. He has worked on a large number of shows, including Everest, Annihilation, Cold Pursuit and The Power.

Tallulah Baker began her career in visual effects in 2015 at Azure VFX. She then worked at MPC before joining Union VFX in 2021. She has worked on films such as Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, The Lion King, Maleficent: Mistress of Evil and The Sandman.

How did you and Union VFX get involved on this movie?

We were put forward to the production by the team at Searchlight and pitched to the team in early 2021. We were instantly intrigued and eager to work on the project as projects like this don’t come around often.

How was the collaboration with director Yorgos Lanthimos?

Yorgos is a photographer as well as a filmmaker so is understandably all about the filmmaking process. Our initial meetings were very exploratory – questioning all the different possible approaches. He referenced a lot of period production techniques such as painted backdrops and miniatures. He wanted all the environments to have a ‘painted’ quality regardless of how they were created.

A lot of our conversations revolved around how to piece together these more traditional filmmaking techniques with our VFX approach to end up with something photoreal enough to sit in with everything else that was captured in camera while maintaining a miniature scale. We looked at a lot of films that had used miniatures, particularly those that had used water, including a 1953 version of Titanic and questioned what ‘felt’ miniature and which things we’d need to be on the lookout for to ensure our amalgamation of techniques was working.

What was your feeling about entering this particular universe?

From our first conversations in early 2021, it became very clear that Poor Things wasn’t going to be a typical world-building exercise. It was exciting.

What was his approach and expectations about the visual effects?

The director didn’t want to over-rely on VFX, but to find a perfect marriage between period film production techniques and VFX to create something original and unique.

How did you organize the work from a VFX Production point of view?

Tallulah Baker // We were involved with Poor Things from quite early in pre-production. We had a fair bit to do before the shoot as we had to plan, build and deliver the environments for the enormous LED screens as well as suggest and test approaches for the Hybrid animal work.

It was my responsibility to ensure the project was budgeted, resourced and managed as efficiently and productively as possible throughout. I worked very closely with the production’s team as well as our internal creative and senior management team.

The creative nature of this project required a lot of slightly out of the box thinking and trial and error, but was also a truly unique undertaking. We had a lot of fun breaking the normal rules of VFX and coming up with names for our hybrid animals.

Can you elaborate on the design and creation of this surreal world?

We were involved early and collaborated closely with the production designers Shona Heath and James Price and we worked together to develop their ideas and help envisage how they could be translated into achievable VFX. Shona has a fashion and set dressing background and has a very strong surrealist aesthetic. James is from the film world and together we made an interesting, creative team.

What kind of references and influences did you receive to create this world?

The team brainstormed a lot of approaches to the environment oceans and skies, which needed to be surreal and work at both miniature and ‘real’ scale. We presented some previous water tank and liquid experiments shot in slow motion along with similar examples from within the art world, to the production team leading to a collaboration with artist Chris Parks.

Did you use any miniatures?

There were miniatures of the ship as well as London Bridge, Alfie’s Mansion, Alexandria and Lisbon.

What was the most complicated thing or location to create?

The most complex location to create was Alexandria.

Alexandria is a real amalgamation of miniatures, with live action life size sets and CG environments. Initially, Bella looks down at the slums before running down the stairs. We then do a big long pullout reveal of the island. Both those key shots had miniature builds: the architecture that she’s in and the stairs that she and Harry are sitting on. There was also a set build for that specific section of stairs.

Marrying the worlds together–real-world scale and miniature scale–had some technical challenges. We used some re-projections, extracted the actors at a certain point and re-composited them onto a LIDAR-scanned version of the model set so that we could control the camera move. As much as we love the models, there’s a certain point where you want to give them more. They lack some definition in areas and we added some digi-doubles in there as well as palm trees, greenery and a cable car system running in the background. So, it starts as a miniature, but we scan that model, bring it into CG, work it up and add all these extra layers and then merge them together.

Additional details such as sprites of characters in the slums (including animals) CG people, CG oceans with a miniature scale, a different cable car system to Lisbon which also needed to have plates of cast members composited within. All of which was covered in a thin layer of dust and sand from the air to make Alexandria feel dirtier and hot.

Can you tell us more about the use of the LED walls?

We created sky and ocean environments for use on set, mainly for the journeys that take place during the film – we visit Poor Things versions of Paris, Lisbon, Alexandria and London. We came up with a series of 50-second ocean variations: choppy water, calm water and different versions for times of day etc. which could be called up on the LED screens. We also created 11 different sky variations, which were then set up with those same motions, so they reflected correctly. Those were 24K renders, which were projected onto 11 absolutely enormous (70m x 90m) wrap-around LED screens in Budapest at Origo Studios. It was quite a challenge just getting that footage rendered, set up and delivered to them in a way that everybody could actually use because 24K is quite intense.

On the creative side, they wanted a kind of bizarre underwater quality within the skies to fit into the surrealist world. Yorgos wanted to explore a hyperreal quality and different ways of making the skies feel surreal. I had previously done a slow-motion shoot of Dettol in fish tanks where we squirted it and observed how it moved. We showed these at slow frame rates to Yorgos and he really liked the idea.

I love how it moves because it feels like clouds, but there’s something weird about it that gives it a miniature kind of feel. We did a bit of research into artists using similar techniques and found that there are a lot of artists exploring this.

As mentioned, we collaborated with artist Chris Parks who has created a whole host of these strange liquid experiments. He allowed us to experiment with his work within our skies at low resolution. We’d drop them behind real skies and put them in the deep background. Once we worked out which things worked well, we could request them at higher resolution and work them up.

The choice to shoot LED proved a good one as the sets inherited their ‘natural’ lighting, but this was also challenging in some places as the LED footage needed re-composited to further augment ocean and sky movement – especially when sailing. We also had to address the inevitable fixes that come up when shooting this way: moiré, seams between screens, shooting offscreen due to the sizes achievable etc.

How does the specific frame aspect affect your work?

I won’t lie, it was definitely a challenge working with a fish eye lens. De-lensing those plates creates a huge resolution. There’s a certain point, when running a lot of the tools that we normally do, we were getting some quite strange distortions towards the edge of frame. Sometimes they were actually cropping off. There was a lot of head scratching to figure out how to get a decent de-lens so that we could matchmove things and get things sticking correctly.

Can you elaborate on the design and creation of the animals?

When we started talking with Yorgos most people were automatically suggesting it should all be done digitally, but he really didn’t want that. He wanted to know what he could get from real animals. How we could make that work.

One of the main reasons we were awarded the work on Poor Things was because we believed it could be done, but it was going to require a bit of trial and error as well as some risk. Animals do what they want to do, so we knew we were going to have to lean into their behavior a bit and work with it. Yorgos was all for that because it leaned into the surrealism of the whole project. He liked the unpredictable nature of the animals as it reflects the film’s ethos in many ways.

We suggested getting together with the animal wranglers and having them show us what they thought they could get the animals to do. Firstly, just walking from A to B, and then with somebody actually standing in front of them trying to hand them something.

We then did camera tests, trying to work out what would be the best combinations of animals while also pushing it – pairing animals that really shouldn’t be together so that it’s obvious that there are different connections. We were trying to find animals that are different enough, but at least have a certain point in their body that could act as a good connection point with their counterpart.

We basically overshot it, knowing these animals would just do whatever they wanted to do on the day. We got lots of variations of animals walking then we brought the footage into the edit and spent hours and hours trawling through trying to find those rare moments where you get a good connection.

We always knew there would be a CG requirement, but we wanted to go as far as we could with real plates. Quite early on, even with the early comps, we could see things were working. The technical challenge came when adding the surgical scars to the animals. We scanned all the animals, which is an interesting challenge in its own right.

We then brought the models into CG and rigged them. These were very unique rigs. We had the models of two different animals and then overlaid them over the image. We gave that to a rigger and they learned to create rigs for hybrid animals which were then passed to matchmove, trying our best to get a good rotomation of the combined animal. It had to be done in several stages: matchmove would do a pass, hand it back to comp, and then comp would do a pass on that to tighten things up until we got to a good place.

I’m really glad that we went down the photography route and totally agree with Yorgos’ inclination. If it had been done as full CG, people would be picking on them and questioning their movement etc. But we can always stand behind the fact that they are ‘real’ animals and behaviours. I think it’s really clever and love the final result.

There’s a lot of nuance in the way they move. You can do the best you can to recreate that, but there’s a lot of independent detail that you might not be aware of. To have that on film is great. I’m a big fan of it, personally.

The creatures were very popular in the studio where we affectionately named them: Goose Willis, Bark Wahlberg, Bill The Kid, Sirius Quack, Six Sox and David Eggham.

Did you want to reveal any other invisible work?

Paris involved set extensions up and out from the buildings around the brothel. We also needed to take the painted backdrops out and bring them back with additional signs of life and a more defined Eiffel Tower under construction in the distance.

Another set, not yet mentioned, is Alfie’s mansion, which is one of the standout examples of combining miniature set builds with CG, matte painting, plates of the cast, birds, trees, colourful smoke stacks, flags from masts all of which needed to remain in our miniature surreal colourful world.

There is a series of shots showing the surreal ferry boat travelling between locations. This again was a miniature build that we needed to augment and integrate with the live action plates and CG miniature scale water.

For the Lisbon cable cars, we had pole systems which ran the cable, so when they hit the poles and turned a corner, we had to work out the right feel for the wobble so that it still felt like it was a miniature. There were quite a few iterations on that to get it to where we were happy. In the big wide shot of Lisbon, when Bella is standing on the balcony and you see the whole world there, a significant part of the architecture was based on a miniature, but we also had to project a lot of that to add into the CG. It’s kind of tricky with the cable cars because you start with them in the real world and then travel into a false perspective, a kind of 2D world. It was a challenge to get the animation on that right as you transition from the real into the fake.

In the deep background, there were a lot of hot air balloons. We also had Zeppelins in London. Even though they sit in 3D space, it was fun to do a bit of cheating on them to maintain that ‘painted’ backdrop feel, even though you want things to move correctly. It’s quite a surreal challenge. It’s interesting for the artists working on it because we’re so versed in focusing on things being in perspective with everything correct, lighting correct, but then here we are asking the artists to break those rules.

Which sequence or shot was the most challenging?

There were two fundamental challenges on the show: creating the hybrid animals and building a world that maintained a miniature surrealistic feel while also feeling photo real. The latter is a contradiction in a way, making it incredibly difficult to know when it is working well and how far to go, but a really fun challenge that pushed us to set a new bar for the work we do at Union.

What is your favourite shot or sequence?

I’m really proud of all of our work on this unique project, but do have a soft spot for David Eggham (the Chicken/Pig) and Alexandria.

What is your best memory on this show?

This was such a unique project to be involved in and we really got to flex our creative muscles collaborating with the amazing creative team to produce such a stunning film. Everyone involved is at the top of their game and pushed even further to create the truly unique world that is Poor Things.

Union have a reputation for ‘invisible’ or ‘seamless’ VFX and this is quite a different representation of that. There are those who won’t think of Poor Things as a ‘visual effects film’ and there is quite a lot of debate around that at the moment, but VFX are a key piece of the puzzle in making almost all films and this project is a great example of how they can be part of getting such an imaginative vision onto the screen.

How long did you work on this show?

Tallulah Baker // We started talking to the team in March 2021. The shoot happened in the midst of Covid, which required additional planning and logistics. We also had to build and test the LED environments. We did five weeks of prep and testing in August and shot September to December. We didn’t start VFX in anger until late 2022 as Yorgos filmed another project and delivered in June 2023.

What’s the VFX shot count?

Tallulah Baker // All in all seventy artists worked on the show at various points during this long pre-to post-timeline and delivered 177 shots, 11 Led skies and oceans, and 60 assets.

A big thanks for your time.

WANT TO KNOW MORE?
Union VFX: Dedicated page about Poor Things on Union VFX website.

Semmelweis: VFX Breakdown by Ionart Studio

Par

Vincent Frei

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29/01/2024

Immerse yourself in the past with Budapest-based Ionart Studio, who reveal their work on the visual effects for the film Semmelweis:

WANT TO KNOW MORE?
Ionart Studio: Dedicated page about Semmelweis on Ionart Studio website.

Invasion – Season 2: Owen Braekke-Carroll – VFX Supervisor – Framestore

Par

Vincent Frei

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26/01/2024

Owen Braekke-Carroll began his career in visual effects in 2011 at Rising Sun Pictures, and also worked at Animal Logic before joining Framestore in London in 2013. He has worked on various shows including The Martian, Thor: Ragnarok, The Witcher and Lovecraft Country.

What is your background?

Originally from Australia, in 2013 I moved to the UK to work in the compositing department at Framestore film. After some years I was excited by the developing world of high end television visual effects, and in 2018 shifted to work in the then nascent Episodic division. Since then I have been involved in a variety of roles and projects, including The Boys, The Witcher and Lovecraft Country. Prior to Invasion I was working as the overall show supervisor on the HBO/Sky co-production The Baby.

How did you and Framestore get involved on this show?

Framestore’s fantastic Art Department and visual development teams had been contacted early in the process to help define the look and scope of this new creature, the alien Entity. Erik Henry (client VFX supervisor) and showrunner (SK) had a desire to explore and get creative in trying to make a new type of creature that really felt ‘alien’, and explore the possibilities and creative ideas around something that perhaps existed a little bit outside of, or bent our conventional rules of physics.

The Framestore VisDev team collaborated closely with Erik on this and came up with some very striking designs and movement to form as the creative base for the creature. It was at this point that they passed these images off to me and the London team, and we began to work on extending these original ideas into a full creative and visual language for the Entity.

One of the great parts of this process, beyond the initial creative shaping of the concepts, was that Framestore were able to provide a variety of visuals/colour reference to use in context on set. These were then able to drive LED panels on-set. Considering the emissive and colourful nature of the final creative, this was a fantastic help for those on-set and in post.

How was the collaboration with the showrunners and VFX Supervisor Erik Henry?

Erik is a fantastic supervisor who draws on a wealth of experience and knowledge. I admire his pragmatic approach to telling the story, and always is focused on what the VFX are adding to the narrative. Initial lookdev and discussions inevitably drew comparisons between the Entity and the water pseudopod from James Cameron’s The Abyss – which of course Erik had the insight on, having worked on that very movie! Framestore was given a great degree of creative freedom and input into the process, and we were able to pitch and develop a wide variety of ideas and solutions to the creature. It was a great process.

How did you organize the work with your VFX Producer?

The design and interactions the Entity went through were constantly evolving – meaning that the asset and tools used to create it were also constantly changing. Scheduling and organization-wise this meant that we had to continue our look development and FX development all the way throughout production – working almost up until the final pixels went out the door. Sean Francis, the Framestore VFX producer managed to find a way to maximise this and try to avoid any bottlenecks in delivery.

How did you split the work amongst the Framestore offices?

Framestore London took on the body of work relating to the Alien entity, the surrounding areas of Misuki’s storyline, and the climactic scenes in Idabel at the close of Episode 10.

Framestore New York completed the dramatic tunnel escape and set extensions in Episode 4, and the complex bioluminescent visions Mistuki experiences in Episode 8.

What are the sequences made by Framestore?

Framestore London worked on all scenes across the series of the Entity and Mistuki inside the Amazon ship, and the final scenes of the Idabel entity and portal that Trevante passes through to the mothership. Framestore New York completed the tunnel sequence in Episode 4, and the bioluminescent jungle scene in Episode 8.

Can you elaborates about the design and creation of the alien Entity?

I really loved the cymatic structures and organic shapes represented in the Alien surfaces and technology in Season 1, and when coupled with the Entity. It seemed like the unifying link we’d need to run through all the different elements.The Entities dynamic surface flow is controlled by a series of interlinked cymatic and chladni patterns, which allowed us to control its emotional state by adding more or less complexity or frequency into these shapes. This cymatic structure then began to influence the other parts of the Entity, such as the array-like brain structure we can glimpse inside the surface – which was again 3D chladni structure. Zybrand Jacobs, the London FX supervisor on the show managed to create this fantastic and interlinked cymatic and chladni system.

We ended up driving a lot of things in this fashion to subtly link all the pieces together – the erratic dance of the crack-like sliver of light representing the Entity before it manifests is driven by the same cymatic systems, and the structures of Entity interior from later episodes all manifest these design cues. When the entity is wracked by pain and begin to loose surface cohesion – we were able to increase the frequency overlap on the surfaces to generate this high frequency tearing, in a similar way to what Mitsuki was doing in the show itself.

What kind of references and influences did you receive for this alien?

Underwater creatures have a whole range of strange and alien forms to draw inspiration from, bioluminescent Medusozoa was a great inspiration for the internal structure and shading of the Entity while creatures like the Cone Snail helped us find shapes and movement.

Can you tell us more about his animations challenges?

We were initially unsure of how abstract the motion and performance would need to be,and how much of a role animation would need to play. We very soon realised it was essential (as always!). It was a challenging ask for the animators – they worked out a fantastic language using cues like the entity’s volume swelling or contracting to convey emotion. If these primary shapes and volumes were able to carry the shot and emotion through the basic rig before the FX surfacing, colour and other contextual cues – we knew we’d hit the mark.

Due to his changing shape, how did you handle the rigging?

With the Entity being so fluid and needing to be able to become any shape the rigging team came up with a complex rigging system made from a mix of deformers, rigid and sliding controllers. The sliding controllers allowed animators to predefine a shape that entity could slide through to become. Additionally rigid controllers allowed for more discreet movements of the Entity and deformers could be added to create macro wave forms on the surface.

The Rig also had a system of locators that could be used to generate the « spine » inside the entity that would become the basis for defining the Entity’s head, and where simulations could derive a direction, the surface had various attributes stored on caching such as colour changes and texture speed which animators visually dialed in and passed to the FX setup.

A huge thanks to the animation and rigging team for bringing so much passion and personality to what was an unusual character brief!

How does his luminous and transparency look affects your work?

One of the biggest challenges with refractive and semi-refractive surfaces is that so much of the look can be greatly affected by the space the surface is in, and something that looks amazing from one angle can nor have the same effect from a different direction. This was certainly the case with the Entity – we found ourselves having to constantly adjust and balance the relative detail/roughness of the surface and the amount of interior light in order to preserve the ‘feeling’ at various scales in camera. It was a case where the technically correct often didn’t look, so needed to be tuned in. The nice thing about the emissive light was that in most cases the Entity was the brightest object in the scene allowing us to make it the focus with a lot of nice lens effects to play up the dancing colour and intensities. Of course then in Episode 10 we had to move the Entity outside to full daylight, and start somewhat from scratch to get a balance and look that felt right.

Can you tell us more about his internal lighting?

The interior of the entity is lit by three main aspects – the ‘brain, the ‘veins’ and the ‘ribbons’. The ‘brain’ is an array like 3D chladni pattern that forms and restructures based on the entity’s interactions. This connects directly to the interior ‘veins’, similar to a neural network. The ribbons are emissive bending and phasing shifts of coloured light. All these combined under the refractive surface gave the entity it’s blown glass like look.

Caspian Graca Da Silva and Erik Weaver-Pronk supervised the lighting and CG teams across the project, and managed the complexities of rendering emissive volumes and particles through large refractive surfaces. To have these then and cast light on to the environment the ribbons would be separated into their own render pass with ray switching to reduce the complexity of the internal rays being refracted, while a separate proxy mesh of the ribbons was also generated for diffuse contributions to the environment.

These three components and their looks were then used to tie the different entity stages together. So when you see the pre-entity sliver, it is emitting directly unrefracted ‘ribbons’ of light. And when we pass through the entity to the inside space, we see clearly the veins and internal structure as emissive textures inside.

What was the main challenges with this alien?

Outside of the initial look development one of the main challenges was the sheer amount of variety and continual evolution the script called for. Every episode we saw the Entity it needed to progress and change, or do something new from the last time we saw it. Due to the volume of shots we were unable to approach each one as a bespoke setup, which meant a lot of work had to go into making a plausible system that could cover the required range.

Which shot or sequence was the most challenging?

In episode 8, Mitsuki finally makes full contact with the Entity, and it completely envelopes her. This sequence was particularly challenging as we had to move between a variety of states and looks in rapid succession. We shift from calm, gentle external contact with Mitsuki, before enveloping her and encompassing the room entirely. Once inside, we’re in a sort of beautiful dream-like liminal space that slowly turns dangerous and erratic. Eventually, the forces generated get so extreme the entities surface teams itself apart – like a storm or the surface of a balloon ripping and stretching.

This really put all aspects of the team to work. To convey the weightlessness and force of the storm, the client shot a variety of underwater wig element plates which were then added as hair replacements for Mitsuki in the storm. These were combined with a large amount of 2D/3D distortion effects to simulate the bending and distortion of reality as the entity is destroyed.

What is your favorite shot or sequence?

The scenes in episode 5 when Mitsuki is first truly communicating with the Entity is such a lovely nuanced scene. She takes her gloves off and makes first contact – it’s not the big action packed finale, but I think the animation, FX and comp teams really created something beautiful with a fantastic since of give and take between the cast and the Entity.

What is your best memory on this show?

Seeing the first surfacing setup and chladni patterns working on the surface of the entity – finally making that jump from pure concept and look development into something that can work in sequences and tell a story is always really exciting!

How long have you worked on this show?

All in, I worked with this show for about a year and a half

What’s the VFX shots count?

London delivered 366 finals, and New York: 93.

What was the size of your team?

At our peak we were working with somewhere around 75 people across offices.

What is your next project?

Unfortunately under NDA for this – but looking forward to showing you in the future!

What are the four movies that gave you the passion for cinema?

Solaris (Steven Soderbergh), Akira, Dune and Jurassic Park (of course!)

A big thanks for your time.

WANT TO KNOW MORE?
Framestore: Dedicated page about Invasion Season 2 on Framestore website.
Erik Henry: Here’s my interview of Erik Henry, Production VFX Supervisor.
Apple TV+: You can watch Invasion on Apple TV+.

Masters of the Air: Opening Title Sequence by Imaginary Forces

Par

Vincent Frei

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26/01/2024

The wait is finally over to discover the new Apple TV+ series, Masters of the Air! Let’s take a look at the beautiful opening title sequence of this series created by the Imaginary Forces studio, which was already at work on Band of Brothers and The Pacific!

WANT TO KNOW MORE?
Imaginary Forces: Dedicated page about Masters of the Air on Imaginary Forces website.
Apple TV+: You can watch Masters of the Air on Apple TV+.

Red Island: VFX Breakdown by MPC

Par

Vincent Frei

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26/01/2024

Explore the art of visual effects with this VFX Breakdown for Red Island, where the Parisian team of MPC transformed a comic book into a cinematic adventure:

WANT TO KNOW MORE?
MPC: Dedicated page about Red Island on MPC website.

Yu Yu Hakusho: VFX Breakdown by Scanline VFX

Par

Vincent Frei

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25/01/2024

Get a behind-the-scenes look at Yu Yu Hakusho with this VFX Breakdown as we delve into the world of visual effects created by Scanline VFX. Explore the meticulous design of supernatural powers, from epic action scenes to the massive creatures that populate the fantasy world of the series:

John Wick Chapter 4: Breaking Down The Breakdown – The Apartment Massacre by Rodeo FX

Par

Vincent Frei

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25/01/2024

Rodeo FX opens the doors of their visual effects work on John Wick Chapter 4 in the brand new Breaking Down the Breakdown focusing on excellent the apartment sequence. Discover the techniques used by FX Supervisor Dominik Kirouak and CG Supervisor Julien Forest to create an iconic scene:

WANT TO KNOW MORE?
Rodeo FX: Dedicated page about John Wick: Chapter 4 on Rodeo FX website.
Javier Roca: Here is my interview of Javier Roca, VFX Supervisor at Rodeo FX.
Janelle Croshaw Ralla & Jonathan Rothbart: Here is my interview with Janelle Croshaw Ralla (Production VFX Supervisor) & Jonathan Rothbart (Prep & On Set VFX Supervisor).