Gods of Mars Becomes First Feature To Fully Embrace Virtual Production
Signs of life for the movie industry have just been spotted on Mars. A group of veteran Hollywood filmmakers have announced plans for Gods of Mars, a feature-length sci-fi epic, to be produced through a blend of revolutionary virtual production technology and special effects artistry from the original Star Wars era. Providing a blueprint for filmmaking’s future, the hybrid technique allows productions to move at rocket speed, and at a fraction of the cost of today’s $200+ million studio blockbusters.
Produced through a Mega-Grant from Epic Games, Gods of Mars is leveraging Epic’s Unreal Engine, powerful video processing cards, huge LED walls and super high resolution LIDAR scans to create expansive three-dimensional environments and breathtaking visual effects. These are combined with miniature rocket ships, robots and fighting vehicles, meticulously crafted by master artists. Inverting the traditional visual effects workflow, the novel approach results in drastically reduced production time and costs while delivering cinematic magic of astonishing realism and beauty.
Gods of Mars is directed by Peter Hyoguchi (First, Last and Deposit, Dwelling) and written by Emmy Award-winner Jonathan Schriber (Dateline NBC, Living Dangerously, Deadline Discovery) and Donald H. Hewitt, WGA (Spirited Away, My Neighbor Tortoro). Others principals include Academy Award®-winner David Stump, ASC (American Gods, The Morning Show), VFX Supervisor/Co-Director of Photography; Michael Franks (All That, Girl Meets World) Co-Director of Photography; Christopher Barrett (Metropolitan Talent Agency), Producer; Fon Davis (Monsters & Fables, Wizard School Dropout), Producer/Production Designer; Larry Layfield (Sony Pictures/Cross Wars franchise), Line Producer; and Joan Bevan Webb (Roninfilm), Producer/Production Manager. Production sponsors include EPIC GAMES, Epic MegaGrant, Creative Technologies, Lenovo, NVIDIA, Cooke Optics, ASUS, Wacom, Blackmagic Design, Stratasys and Artec 3D.