http://www.thepixelists.com/projects daily 0.75 2021-05-25 https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5746df7e3c44d8296dfebb49/t/60ace9461ac1f5618a0a4dfc/1621944628230/ Shots - Mindhunter Promo Shot This promo shot was produced as part of a social media campaign for Director, David Fincher’s Netflix Series ‘Mindhunter’. Although the shot was designed to be viewed primarily on phones and tablets, It was worked up to be film quality at 3K resolution. The shot involved extensive clean up work. The foreground camera equipment and dolly tracks were removed, cleaned up and replaced with a concrete floor texture. Position markers were removed from the tabletop and although the shot was filmed with a real microphone base (primarily for the actors to interact with) it was decided to remove this completely and replace with CG. The cage/fence on the right-hand side of the shot was completely removed and repositioned more centrally. A matching fence was then added to the left-hand side in order to balance the shot and give it more symmetry. The end of the shot had to be completely reprojected on to geometry in Nuke to allow for the extreme camera move through the front of the microphone. Lastly, the CG microphone was carefully graded, depth queued, and grained, over the duration of the shot, to match the original footage. https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5746df7e3c44d8296dfebb49/t/60ace963dd32c77cc07ffd3a/1621944666799/ Shots - Outlander Palace of Versailles This series of shots was completed for the STARZ network's fantasy time travel drama 'Outlander'. Due to filming restrictions the series makers were unable to shoot at the real Palace of Versailles. Our challenge was to make a rainy car park in Scotland convincing look like the real palace around the year 1745. The live action plate was shot using a green screen background and painted green tarmac. Many different keying techniques were required to produce a good matte. Fortunately I had some help rotoscoping the horseman in the areas where they were not covered by the green screen. However, lot of additional work was needed to rebuild the edges of the actors and remove any trace of the original background showing through. The palace and gates were 3D renders created using photogrammetry. Additional AOV passes were supplied in order to add directional lighting, reflections and specular hits. Matte passes were also supplied so that the different materials such as the roof, brickwork and gilding could be individually graded and tweaked. Some of the live action actors were repositioned to help with the composition and extra soldiers were keyed from supplied green screen footage and placed around the palace doors. Finally, I was able to salvage the actor's shadows from the original plate and then add some depth hazing and light wrap and other optical effects such as chromatic aberration, halation and vignetting etc. https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5746df7e3c44d8296dfebb49/t/60ace9b4b4e7d46a98cb09bb/1621944695765/ Shots - Total Recall This series of shots was completed for Len Wiseman's 2012 reimagining of 'Total Recall'. The live action plate was not shot with a blue or green screen in the background so I had to rotoscope the cars to separate them and fully rebuild the edges where the original background showed through. The buildings below the cars are entirely CG. Extensive manipulation and grading of the AOV passes was required in order to achieve the sense of light and shade and stay consistent with the rest of the shots in the sequence. Holographic signs were added to some of the buildings using 3D cards within Nuke and 2D matte painting elements were also positioned and rendered in the far BG, beyond the end of the CG environment to help fill out any gaps. Additional CG cars were supplied by the 3D department and the live action and CG cars were graded to match. Flashing lights and headlight glints and glows were added to both in order to help tie the two together and some interactive blue light was also added to the tunnel interior. Finally, some depth hazing and defocus was added to help add a sense of scale to the shot. https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5746df7e3c44d8296dfebb49/t/60ace9e12a9402548fb50a83/1621944785585/ Shots - Inception This series of shots was completed for Christopher Nolan's 2010 film 'Inception'. They were all about clean up. The live action plates were shot with a huge hydraulic rig holding up the actors to make them appear weightless and wires hanging the props in place for the actors to interact with. Unfortunately these shots were all completed before Double Negative had crossed over from Shake to Nuke so tracking data had to be generated in Maya and imported into Shake as a 4 point track. Still frames of the corridor's walls and ceiling were cleaned up and tracked in much the same way as a card works in Nuke now. Additional clean up and paint work was required where the rig was attached to Joseph Gordon- Levitt's waist. https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5746df7e3c44d8296dfebb49/t/60acea11a83cae2dabad9f31/1621944821902/ Shots - Scott Pilgrim vs. the World These shots were completed for the 2010 film 'Scott Pilgrim vs. the World' directed by Edgar Wright. The challenge was to take the creative ideas from the Director and Editor and turn them into polished final shots. These shots were completed before the crossover to Nuke so tracking data had to be generated in Maya and imported into Shake's 4 point tracker. The Graphics/Text were supplied by the client along with a reference frame for me to match position to. A number of versions with different timings were shown to the client so that they could choose their favourite. https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5746df7e3c44d8296dfebb49/t/60acea47b36f310f8317b9ce/1621944862601/ Shots - Paul These shots were completed for the 2011 film 'Paul' directed by Greg Mottola. The main challenge for these shots was creating a lead character that could look entirely convincing in a live action film. The Director and VFX Supervisor were very specific about the way they thought Paul's skin should be. This meant that extensive manipulation and grading of the AOV passes was required in order to achieve a consistent look and feel for Paul in a number of varied lighting conditions throughout the film. Many versions were produced trying to get the right balance ensuring that Paul didn't cross over into becoming too beige, too mint green, chalky or plastic looking whilst also making sure that features such as his mouth and eyes retained the correct wetness. It was obviously also important that Paul was fully integrated into the live action plates so a lot of time was spent on his interaction with real life objects and making sure his shadows were correct. Finally, light wrap, grain and chromatic aberration were added to increase the sense of realism. https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5746df7e3c44d8296dfebb49/t/60aceab06c78af0037522790/1621944924438/ Shots - John Carter Woola (The alien dog). These shots were completed for Disney's 2012 film 'John Carter'. The live action plate for this shot was filmed with Taylor Kitsch (John Carter) standing on a small portion of stone flooring in front of a green screen. This green screen element was cleaned up and then keyed using a number of different techniques. The background environment and stone steps were all textured and rendered in Nuke. Flambeaux torch elements were keyed, placed on cards and added along the walls to introduce a little more realism. Extensive work was carried out on Woola by manipulating the individual AOV passes to get him to sit into the pools of light in the live action plate. The cool blue key light on his back was graded to match the plate, as was the warm torch light on his side. The glints in his eyes were enhanced and adjustments were made to his inner mouth, teeth and gums so that they looked wet, shadowy and realistic. Late on it was decided that the John Carter element looked too pedestrian so I retimed the plate and added an additional 2D move so that his jump appeared to be more 'super human'. https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5746df7e3c44d8296dfebb49/t/60aceacff4d73272016736b7/1621945030892/ Shots - Halo: Nightfall Zealot. These shots were completed for Ridley Scott's 2014 TV series Halo: Nightfall. They were all about clean up. The live action plates were shot with a lot of tracking markers and a stand in actor walking around on stilts whilst holding a fluorescent tube. It soon became clear that the CG Zealot would not fully cover the actor and that the animators would be severely restricted by having to do so, so the decision was made to remove him. A number of techniques were used to remove the actor and the clean up was extremely challenging due to the ever changing/moving light direction and position. The CG Zealot was added to the shots and I used the various AOVs passes to adjust the colour of his skin and armour, grade his specular highlights and boost and add glows to his sword and armour lights. https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5746df7e3c44d8296dfebb49/t/60aceaede5234855859356ab/1621945059653/ Shots - Legend These shots were completed for Brian Helgeland's 2015 film 'Legend'. Tom Hardy was playing both of the Kray twins and as a result had to shoot each scene twice in the role of each character. Both the foreground 'Reggie' element and the background 'Ronnie' element were shot with eye line guide poles. These had to be removed and a lot of work was done on fixing edges and removing the refracted poles from the champagne flutes etc. The foreground element was then keyed and despilled and laid over the background element. Subtle grade tweaks and transforms were required to get the two plates to seamlessly match. The cigar smoke from the 'Ronnie' element was then keyed off the background plate and laid over the foreground gangsters. https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5746df7e3c44d8296dfebb49/t/60aceb168cd3054c75dcd9ab/1621945092153/ Shots - Fast and Furious 6 These shots were completed for the 2013 film 'Fast and Furious 6'. The live action scans were shot with a large metal pyrotechnic rig and the original plan was to fit the CG Antonov plane over the top of this however, in reality the rig was mostly used only as reference and had to be painted out The foreground cars were rotoscoped off the original plate and the runway was replaced with a faster CG one to give the shot more speed and impact. Lights were added to the edge of the runway as well as in the distance to also help with the sense of speed. Extensive work was carried out on the CG Antonov plane to sit it correctly in to each shot and multiple FX passes of debris, fire, smoke and sparks were all graded to match the intensity and values of the real pyrotechnic rig. Lastly, the cars headlights were enhanced by adding additional glows and glints and camera shake and lens dirt was added to make the viewer feel as if they were in the thick of the action. https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5746df7e3c44d8296dfebb49/t/60aceb5c6c78af00375231ce/1621945137820/ Shots - Mank This sequence of shots was created to be played on an LED screen behind Gary Oldman and Rooney Mara for the David Fincher film, ‘Mank’. Although the film is black and white, the sequence was created in full colour. Each shot in the sequence is well over 1000 frames long. It was a massive logistical challenge to incorporate all of the regular updates from the 3D department and to keep the work creatively progressing smoothly. All of the buildings, streets, cars, and people in the sequence are fully CG. Everything beyond that, including the sky, distant hills, and views were all created and comped using Nuke. The Nuke particle system was also used to create hundreds of distant trees which really helped sell the scale of the scene. Dust, smoke, and haze passes were also generated and comped within Nuke. Extra detail was then added using the 3D toolset. Signage was added to storefronts, decals on shop windows, and murals on walls. We also built multi-dimensional window displays that we dropped into various buildings along the street. Finally, everything was finished and polished in Nuke. Heat haze, depth haze, glints, light wrap, and other optical effects were added to give everything as realistic a feel as possible. http://www.thepixelists.com/new-gallery daily 1.0 2021-05-20 https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5746df7e3c44d8296dfebb49/t/60a66e71a7a01358d9f787bf/1464263063810/ Showreel https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5746df7e3c44d8296dfebb49/5746e1883c44d8296dfec3bd/5746e1ca57bf4235870a9f1a/1464263063810/ Showreel https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5746df7e3c44d8296dfebb49/5746e1883c44d8296dfec3bd/60a66de77e461d4b0948cc24/1621519985632/ Showreel - Ben Hicks Showreel 2021 http://www.thepixelists.com/about-me daily 0.75 2021-05-25