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    Post, Visual Effects & Animation: Post Perspectives/Creative Challenges

    By SHOOT StaffUpdated:No Comments1246 Views

    2011 HPA Award nominees reflect upon their recognized work

    By A SHOOT Staff Report

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    A brief acceptance speech isn’t enough. And that’s a luxury afforded just for those who win. What about those who are “merely” nominated? The fact is that it’s a high honor to attain nominee or award winner status yet for both there should be a place to reflect on the work and share with others what made it special, what creative challenges were met, what was learned from the experience.

    That’s where our survey of nominees (and a couple of winners) comes into play relative to the 2011 HPA Awards which were presented last week (11/10) during a gala evening ceremony at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles. The Hollywood Post Alliance’s competition recognizes the achievements of postproduction artisans and their creative and technical contributions to the creation of motion pictures, commercials and television programs.

    Those receiving HPA recognition, who span such disciplines as color grading, editing, sound and compositing, are deserving of a chance to discuss their work. So we posed a couple of multi-pronged questions to select nominated artists:

    1) What was (were) the greatest creative and/or logistical challenge(s) posed by the work which earned you a 2011 HPA Award nomination, and how did you successfully meet those challenge(s)?
    2) Clearly one project informs others down the road. What lesson(s) did you take away from your experience on your HPA Award-nominated work?

    (See SHOOTonline, 11/11 for a full rundown of HPA Award winners.)
    Here’s a sampling of the feedback we received:

    Erik EmondErik Emond, editor, Outside Edit + Design, New YorkHPA-nominated work: Outstanding Editing-Commercial, Lenovo’s “Anthem”

    1) I would say the greatest challenge posed by the Lenovo “Anthem” spot was making it feel like a cohesive piece despite the variation in source footage. Once it was figured out what footage would be licensed and what needed to be shot, we worked in conjunction with the production company to compose the shots that we would be working into the edit. The spot is about “doing” and from an editing standpoint, this spot was truly about movement and relationships, and with that in mind I worked towards making “Anthem” a cohesive 60 second piece. In the end the footage, music composition and color all worked together to make it an emotional spot that could help set Lenovo apart from other computer companies.

    2) My biggest takeaway from this project is just a reinforcement of how important the creative process is in making something that people will react to. Working with talented people on what would become “Anthem” from nearly its inception is something that was invaluable in its realization.

     

    Siggy FerstlSiggy Ferstl, colorist, Company 3, Santa MonicaHPA Award-winning work: Outstanding Color Grading-Commercial, Nissan’s “Value of Zero”

    1) The “Value of Zero” spot was designed to show a rapid series of “zero”-shaped objects in order to promote the concept that the Nissan Leaf has zero emissions. We see all sorts of images that suggest that same shape–a manhole cover, pieces of machinery, a tire hanging from a tree, a pregnant lady’s belly. Everything was shot very cleanly and it was important for me to color that way too–pure and real, with colors that are rich and playful but not overly saturated.
    The challenge for me as a colorist was to help lead the viewer’s eye right to the “zero” shape so it would register immediately within the fast cuts but without getting too stylistic with heavy vignettes to make that work. I used the DaVinci Resolve to create keys and build a lot of windows around different portions of each image and that let me subtly push the background back and bring the “zero” forward.
    In the shot of the tire hanging from the tree, for example, the tire, which was in the shade, got a little lost because of the bright background. So I created a number of complex keys and windows to darken the background and bring up the tire just enough to shift the balance in the image without losing the natural, clean quality the job called for.

     

    Jason FotterJason Fotter, co-founder/VFX supervisor, FuseFX, Burbank,. Calif.HPA-nominated work: Outstanding Compositing-Television for No Ordinary Family, the “No Ordinary Double Standard” episode.

    1) The work on the mist man involved all the challenges of character animation combined with full fluid dynamic simulation. Fluid Dynamics, whether it’s Fire, Smoke, or Mist are always a challenge in visual effects. FuseFX had been fine tuning our in-house Fluid Simulation Software, and the Mist Man for No Ordinary Family was an excellent opportunity for us. We did match moving of the live action actor in many shots and then transitioned into a fully keyframed performance. We did many iterations and evaluated the character performance as base geometry before we ever generated any mist passes. Based on extensive testing and development, we had a good feel for how the mist simulation would behave before we actually did any simulations. In addition to the base model, the character was augmented with extra geometry and particles, which were animated both procedurally and through key framing. We also did substantial modeling of surrounding geometry and people to make sure the Mist interacted with its environment. In real life Mist does not have any mass, but this character needed the ability the attack and hold Stephanie (Julie Benz) against the wall, as well as escape through vents and doors, and come out of a shower head. We ended up with an anthropomorphic type of character for the “attack” scene. The human shape gave us the ability to hold Stephanie up against the wall and at the same time keep the Mist qualities of his character that matched the other more fluid like scenes.

    Once we had a sim, the task became about lighting, shadow generation, rendering and compositing. Realistic lighting on smoke (or mist in this case) is critical to making it look natural and fit into a scene. That includes volumetric lighting with self-shadowing, global illumination and shadow casting from the mist to objects and people in the scene. The tracking and modeling of surrounding objects and people allowed us to get shadow casting to work as well as global illumination. Multiple Mist passes along with velocity channels were rendered out to give maximum control in the composite. Very intricate roto was needed to get the mist to interact with the scene and other characters.

    2) The Mist Man was a fun project for us. Normally these kinds of visual effects are saved for features with long schedules and significant development time. Episodic TV is very fast paced and FuseFX is always pushing the envelope to what is possible for TV. Successfully creating a full CG Fluid Character is just one more thing that we are able to say, “yes we can do that.” We are now regularly providing CG Smoke and Fire for our clients. The Mist Man for No Ordinary Family helped us to streamline our Fluid Simulation Process, and what once was a “Let’s see if we can do it practically” conversation has turned into a “Let’s just make the element to have full control over what we want it to do.”

     

    Mitch GatesMitch Gates, CG supervisor, Encore Hollywood.HPA-nominated work: Outstanding Compositing-Television for Necessary Roughness, Pilot episode

    1) The series Necessary Roughness is about a sports therapist and portions of the pilot episode take place during a football game. The scenes were shot inside the Georgia Dome, an enormous stadium, and we at Encore were charged with turning a few hundred real-life extras into tens of thousands of spectators.

    I went to the Georgia Dome and worked in close cooperation with the first unit crew. While they shot the action on the field, the VFX team assembled the extras and positioned them in long rows in the stands with bluescreen material behind them. We had them do various actions, such as cheering, sitting, standing or holding up signs.

    When we returned to Encore in Hollywood, our technical directors Charley Carlat and Changsoo Eun used our 2D and 3D software to first separate out each shot of each extra, resize and reposition them all and randomize their movements. Then we composited these many thousands of “extras” together with the shots that first unit had taken of the football action against empty stands.

    2) Probably the most valuable lesson we learned was to watch out for extras who want to ham it up. When you’re doing work like this, you definitely do not want one person to stand out from the crowd!

     

    Chris RyanChris Ryan, partner/colorist, Nice Shoes, New York.HPA-nominated work: Outstanding Color Grading-Commercial, American Express’ “Curtain”

    1) The greatest challenge was coming up with a look that captured the cinematic nature of the piece without overshadowing the performance of Conan (O’Brien), the cinematography, the amazing screenplay, the sharp editing or the direction. Sometimes the color will have a tendency to overwhelm the other elements on a project like this which creates a creative imbalance. This piece was a great throwback to classic, big advertising and I wanted to make it look special.
    I used the Baselight to blend a Film Print curve into the natural image. I felt this allowed for a rich, classic movie look that was subtle at the same time.

    2) That I wish people still made commercials like this. Big idea, great locations, great writing amazing photography and crisp direction without the need to fall back on FX gimmicks or snarky humor.

     

    Tom SartoriTom Sartori, colorist, Fotokem, Burbank, Calif.HPA-nominated work: Outstanding Color Grading-Television, Breaking Bad, the “Box Cutter” episode

    1) Breaking Bad began with the pilot lensed by the Oscar-winning cinematographer John Toll, ASC. The visual approach has always been to make the show “striking and real.” When Michael Slovis, ASC took on the series, the goal was to “intensify the characters and situations” presented when the drug underworld meets suburbia. High contrast cross/backlighting, handheld camera, and disturbingly beautiful compositions all add to the strong visual statement. Shooting 35mm film from day one has been a must, enabling the clarity and contrast that is sometimes difficult to achieve with digital acquisition. My biggest challenge on the series is to color correct and match over 500 shots in an eight-hour day, so being “glued to the chair” is a requirement. After 28 years of coloring features and episodics, it is still a pleasure to work with the talented artists in the industry. And the team from Breaking Bad is stellar in every regard.

     

    Stephen SchafferStephen Schaffer, A.C.E., editor, Pixar Animation Studios, Emeryville, Calif.HPA-nominated work: Outstanding Editing-Feature Film, Cars 2

    1) Probably the biggest logistical challenge on Cars 2 was the shortened production schedule. We navigated this challenge by delegating a lot of the daily responsibilities that would normally fall in the director’s lap, to the department leads. This way we were able to considerably filter some of the smaller decisions down before they were put in front of our director.

    One of the biggest creative challenges on the film was the number of story changes throughout the production of the film. At Pixar we believe in doing what’s best for the film, which sometimes means making changes late in the game. These changes required all production teams to adapt their review and working styles, particularly in editorial. Fortunately, my personal working style as editor fit perfectly within this process, and I was able to work fast and effectively to make the necessary changes immediately in the Avid. As a result, our director John Lasseter was able to see re-edits quickly and almost instantly. This became very important, especially toward the end of the film, as John’s time was precious and critical.

    2) To me, the biggest overall lesson learned would be that each film needs to go through the full process, and that there are no shortcuts. Although a sequel would seem to be “easier” to make with pre-established characters, Cars 2 not only had numerous new characters, but this film was a completely different genre than the first Cars, with multiple worldwide locations that required the same, if not more, attention and time that any new project would warrant.

     
    Steven J. ScottSteven J. Scott, supervising digital colorist, creative director and VP of EFILM, Hollywood, Calif.HPA Award-winning work: Outstanding Color Grading using a DI process–Feature Film, The Help.
    1) There were a number of ways we could have gone with this 1960s’ era film, but [DP] Stephen Goldblatt opted for a straight forward color correction without period treatments. He wanted this story of times past visually grounded with the look of the here-and-now. The actresses had entirely different skin tones. The challenge in a situation of that nature is to balance out skin tones to showcase each actor equally, without them looking like they have a light window on them. I accomplished this by animating shapes for their faces to isolate and re-light on them in a natural way. This helped to bring out the subtleties in their eyes and the full range of expressions that were the heart of their performances. In one scene, Viola Davis’ character is on a darkly lit street, where she could have faded into the background. I brought the street lights and pavement down and opened her up so we could witness the angst and panic in her face. I learned the importance of subtlety and nuance in performance, and the careful work needed to light someone convincingly–all without showing your hand.
     

    Jun ZhangJun Zhang, lead compositor, Brainstorm Digital, Brooklyn, NYHPA-nominated work: Outstanding Compositing-Television, Boardwalk Empire, the “Family Limitation” episode.

    1) The biggest challenge for us on this project was probably how we could create such a large complex Atlantic City boardwalk set extension convincingly in a 2 and 2.5D compositing realm. Ideally, we would use our fully built 3D environment and probably add a crowd system. But given that we had a very specific schedule and budget to finish a large shot, that became impractical. Instead, we carefully examined each shot and only used 3D for the most problematic areas. For the rest we utilized Nuke’s powerful 3D system and basically rebuilt the set with projections. It took some time to set up initially, but by reducing the 3D render time and putting control in the hands of our compositors, we were able to get a much faster turnaround for revisions.

    2) The complexity of post production is that no matter how well you plan when shooting, there are always unexpected circumstances when it comes to post. What we have to do is plan to the best of our abilities, but always keep an open mind and be prepared to alter our approaches. With the right details in the right places, it doesn’t always take the most elaborate setup to produce an outstanding scene.

    Category:Features



    L.A. Location Lensing Declines In 2024 Despite Uptick In 4th Quarter

    Wednesday, January 15, 2025

    FilmLA, partner film office for the City and County of Los Angeles and other local jurisdictions, has issued an update regarding regional filming activity. Overall production in Greater Los Angeles increased 6.2 percent from October through December 2024 to 5,860 Shoot Days (SD) according to FilmLA’s latest report. Most production types tracked by FilmLA achieved gains in the fourth quarter, except for reality TV, which instead logged its ninth consecutive quarter of year-over-year decline.

    The lift across all remaining categories came too late to rescue 2024 from the combined effects of runaway production, industry contraction and slower-than-hoped-for post- strike recovery. With just 23,480 SD filmed on-location in L.A. in 2024, overall annual production finished the year 5.6 percent below the prior year. That made 2024 the second least productive year observed by FilmLA; only 2020, disrupted by the global COVID-19 pandemic, saw lower levels of filming in area communities.

    The continuing decline of reality TV production in Los Angeles was among the most disappointing developments of 2024. Down 45.7 percent for the fourth quarter (to 774 SD), the category also finished the year down 45.9 percent (to 3,905 SD), which placed
    it 43.1 percent below its five-year category average.

    The two brightest spots in FilmLA’s latest report appeared in the feature film and television drama categories. Feature film production increased 82.4 percent in the fourth quarter to 589 SD, a gain analysts attribute to independent film activity. The
    California Film & Television Tax Credit Program also played a part, driving 19.2 percent of quarterly category activity. Overall, annual Feature production was up 18.8 percent in 2024, though the... Read More

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