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Leading visual effects studio Rodeo FX helped to bring the marmalade-loving bear to the big screen in the recently released family adventure Paddington 2. The sequel to the beloved family film finds Paddington settled at home with the Brown family. There, he finds a unique pop-up book that would be the perfect present for his Aunt Lucy’s birthday, and embarks upon a series of odd jobs to pay for it.  But when the book is stolen, it, leaves Paddington in a precarious jam. Rodeo FX was tagged to help bring the delightful bear to life, in a first for a Paddington movie.

Said VFX Supervisor Arnaud Brisebois, from Rodeo FX, “Given the incredibly short timeframe, and the fact that we were the first ever auxiliary vendor to work on Paddington, there was uncertainty at the beginning, but the moment the creative team saw our first animation shots, everything settled into place.”

The VFX studio’s shots for the film center around one main sequence lasting 2 minutes 10 seconds, with additional shots granted to Rodeo FX while work was underway, for a total of 50 shots. Rodeo FX’s primary sequence for Paddington 2 shows the bear trapped underwater, shots that called on not only an expertise in creature work but also water effects. The complexity of the VFX work only added to the challenge that Rodeo FX already faced in creating work that matched the rest of the film. Ultimately, the work delivered by Rodeo FX is indistinguishable from the rest of the CG shots in the film.

In order to deliver flawless shots on a strict timeline, Rodeo FX’s Development and CFX departments created a proprietary tool that enabled a hyper agile process, a project led by Guillaume Laforge and Guillaume Baratte. The new tool, which was built using Houdini and is known as HAROLD (HAD) within Rodeo FX, has been implemented for current and future creature projects.

Paddington 2, currently in theatres, was produced by David Heyman’s Heyday Films and distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures.

About Rodeo FX
Founded in 2006, Rodeo FX has grown to more than 400 accomplished artists and professionals with studios in Montreal, Los Angeles, Quebec City and Munich. The company has delivered award-winning visual effects for over 100 feature films, including Blade Runner 2049, IT, Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, The Fate of the Furious, Kong: Skull Island, Arrival, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, and the Academy Award®-winning Birdman. In 2017, Rodeo FX won three VES Awards for episode 9 of Game of Thrones Season 6. VES Awards recognized the studio’s VFX work on Game of Thrones (2016) and Birdman (2015). Emmy^® honors include three awards for Game of Thrones (2014, 2015, 2016). More recently, Rodeo FX has won an Animago Award in Munich for Best Visual Effects for Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, as well as a Hollywood Professional Association Award for Black Sails. For more information, visit rodeofx.com.

About the film
Paddington 2 stars Hugh Bonneville, Sally Hawkins, Brendan Gleeson, Julie Walters, Jim Broadbent, Peter Capaldi, with Hugh Grant, and Ben Whishaw as the voice of Paddington.  The film was directed by Paul King from a script written by King and Simon Farnaby, based on the best-selling books by Michael Bond, creator of Paddington Bear. The film was produced by David Heyman.  Serving as executive producers were Rosie Alison, Jeffrey Clifford, Alexandra Ferguson Derbyshire, Ron Halpern, and Didier Lupfer. The director of photography was Erik Alexander Wilson; production designer, Gary Williamson; costume designer, Lindy Hemming; and editors Mark Everson and Jonathan Amos.  Visual effects were provided by Framestore, led by animation director Pablo Grillo and VFX supervisors Andy Kind and Glen Pratt.  The score is composed by Academy Award winner Dario Marianelli. 

Warner Bros. Pictures and STUDIOCANAL present, in association with Anton Capital Entertainment S.C.A., a Heyday Films Production, Paddington 2.  The film will be distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures, a Warner Bros. Entertainment Company. Paddington 2 is rated PG for some action and mild rude humor.

©2017 StudioCanal S.A.S. All rights reserved. Paddington Bear^TM, Paddington^TM and PB^TM are trademarks of Paddington and Company Limited.