Legendary Hollywood Director

Los Angeles, Digital Domain Headquarters.

After two of the company's three founders had no intention of managing, all the burden was on Scott Ross.

In order to prevent the company from falling into a dangerous situation of bankruptcy, after reaching an agreement with the board of directors, the entire special effects team not only kept receiving orders, but also continuously streamlined team members and cut some unnecessary technical research and development.

Then, after Lehmann returned from France with the financing, he took a night’s rest and immediately visited the digital field.

After all, the special effects work of The Mist is still contracted in the digital field, so let's see how it works.

In the face of many troubles, Scott Ross also took the initiative to meet Lehman and his party at the headquarters.

...This is Benjamin Joseph, the president of Firefly, and this is Director Ryman... Following the introduction of the receptionist, several people greeted each other politely.

Mr. Ryman, I was not in Los Angeles for some trivial matters last time, and I'm sorry to see you now.

In the digital field at this time, every single business that can be obtained is extremely important.

It's all right, Mr. Ross, I think, let's take a look at the work entrusted to your company first.

Of course, we're almost done. Please...

A group of people came to a compartment in the warehouse, and Scott Ross personally demonstrated the special effects scene.

On the screen, a thick fog rose from the lake, slowly spreading, spreading, spreading again, until it covered the entire town...

In the thick fog, monsters similar to giant mantises, four-winged birds, terrestrial tentacle monsters, red-eyed locusts...

There is quite a rush of other world creatures, of course, this is very foggy.

The overall needs are roughly the same as Lehmann's requirements, and the texture is more refined.

It’s worth spending a lot of money. It’s really worth every penny. It doesn’t have the money-saving plastic smell of the original version. It’s much more real than the model shot.

However, it is still a long way from perfection...

Lehman read it several times, but still couldn't help frowning and said, Mr. Ross, the facial expressions of all the monsters in the picture are the same, don't they have any emotional changes? It's too stiff, can you change it? ?

Uh... Scott-Ross said a little embarrassedly: We can only be similar in appearance but not in spirit.

Why, isn't Gollum in The Lord of the Rings very expressive? What I need is similar agility.

Such a very layman's question, Scott can't help but explain, after all, the last payment from the big money master has not yet been paid.

...The technique of capturing facial expressions is very difficult. As for Gollum in The Lord of the Rings, Andy Serkis first went to the set with the actors to perform, and then returned to the motion capture studio of Weta Studios. Even if it is so troublesome, Gollum's facial expressions are drawn one by one by the animator, and the mapping data is remodeled...

All in all, according to Scott Ross, in addition to technology, the role of Gollum in The Lord of the Rings is more about Andy Serkis. At that time, the motion capture interpretation was that he was too open.

same scene,

He had to do it twice on set and in the studio to match the action, and it had to be consistent.

And the strength of the digital field lies in large-scale scene rendering, such as the process of dense fog diffusion, not how powerful the motion capture technology is.

Really awesome is the Weta Digital.

It is also worth mentioning that Robert Zemeckis, the director of Forrest Gump, has also become a diehard fan of motion capture. He plunged into the technical circle and couldn't extricate himself.

In 2004, the Polar Express produced by ImageMover Digital, the studio he founded, announced an animation that could be shot entirely using motion capture technology.

Of course, the problem of facial expressions is still a big problem, but Zemeckis has made great contributions to the promotion of motion capture technology. If the technology he developed, the original Star Wars 1 would not have spent on a single motion capture. More than 10 million, the cost of using the technology is greatly reduced.

Moreover, motion capture can only be carried out in a special studio, the sensitivity to light is too high, and the equipment will be interfered. However, it still cannot solve the problem of facial expressions. The later data processing stage requires a lot of manual intervention, which costs a lot, and the effect is not necessarily very good...

In other words, everyone is stuck in the improvement of facial expression technology. Also, the reason why the digital field was eliminated later was also in this technology competition, and it was a clean loser because of the management and financial failures. There has not been much development in technology research and development at all, but it has been surpassed by countless younger generations.

When Lyman heard these inside information, his first thought was that Weta was awesome.

Because the improvement of the technical reserve of Avatar in the future is the barrier that Cameron commissioned Weta Digital to build together, and this barrier was not broken by Industrial Light and Magic until 15 years ago...

Since it can't be improved, or it's not necessarily thankful to work hard, Lehmann doesn't ask for much.

In these scenes, except the monster is a little stiff and slightly flawed, everything else is good.

And if everyone can't do it, the audience won't have a lot of comparisons, so they won't care too much.

Furthermore, after the footage is edited, it is a big deal that there are fewer face-showing clips, and the scene material is sufficient for the needs of The Fog.

The same is true, Lehmann was very happy to accept the results, and did not say anything about rework.

Then, the next thing is much simpler, the contract is signed, and the balance is paid to the digital domain.

In the relaxed mood of everyone, Lyman stopped Scott Ross, who was about to leave, and offered an invitation to dinner.

Mr. Ross, I remember you just mentioned capturing animations? Are you bullish on this market?

At the dining table, Lyman said in a chatty tone.

Scott shook his head, I don't understand the animation industry, but there is no doubt that it will be the future of 3-D animation computer production, and motion capture technology should still be placed on live-action movies.

The digital field is just like its founders. He has never participated in animation production and is not very interested in it. However, the way of motion capture in animation production is indeed too narrow. Scott did not see this. wrong.

For a cash cow like Pixar, Lyman has been eyeing for a long time, but unfortunately he can't afford it at all.

After all, the market value of Pixar is more than 5.5 billion, which is close to two Firefly Films.

But that doesn't mean he doesn't have any ideas about animation.

Deploy early, and you will reap the rewards...

Of course, the focus now is to hold a considerable asset in the future wave of motion capture special effects...

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