Blog

Nice to see our friends at Rhythm & Hues getting such great coverage in this Animation Magazine article.  

US Escapee Todd Williams went to NAB this year to help our friends at Autodesk with their booth on the floor. Here is his coverage of his time there. We hope you enjoy!

It's summertime, and that means loads of new movies in the theaters.  This LA Times article outlines what we all know - great movies contain great visual effects! And they cost money to make.

How do you take an old chestnet and make it new again? You put together a timelapse based on actual footage and stitch it together in After Effects to tell the story of "Rear Window" in a single pane. Welcome to Jeff Desom's world - this appears to be the only thing like this he's done. Part Editorial, part Compositing, part Projection, this 2 minute piece tells the story from the window's POV very nicely.

What do Avatar and the health of our oceans have in common? Why, James Cameron, of course!

The talented folks over at Psyop recently won a well-deserved Annie award for their work on Twinings "Sea" in the category of "Best Animated Television Commercial". They actually beat themselves out of the award, as well as others (they were also nominated for Norton "Stuff").  You can read some making-of information here - just click the "details" tab.

Well done, Psyop!

When people want to start a new career, time and time again the age old question asked is – how do I get started when I have no experience? The answer to this question can be addressed under three main topics, which we refer to raffishly as:

We’re having a gathering at Escape Studios on March 15, 2012 for students and recent graduates who are curious and interested about VFX workflows in the Commercial/Advertising industry. John Leonti, head of 3D at The Mill, will be our guest speaker and he has some fantastic stuff to show us. He has promised a behind-the-scenes look at the work for the VES award-nominated spot “Immersion” for Mattel’s Hot Wheels, and the backstory behind Playstation’s cult-phenomena “Michael”. 

Have you always wanted to learn more about Houdini? Are you in Los Angeles? Does the idea of attending a two-day boot camp float your boat? You're in luck!

Super Bowl approaches – do you have your snacks at the ready? Have you chosen your team? More importantly, have you set your DVR to record the commercials? 

This week’s mashup consists of some Super Bowl sneak peeks – we have a “Twilight”-like tailgating party for Audi courtesy of The Mill, takes 2 and 3 for VW and the “Star Wars” enterprise involving Man’s Best Friend, a couple of car spots steeped in fantasy complete with bikini-clad extras, the Coca-Cola polar bears (Giants v. Patriots) up their game and “The Avengers” trailer.

I remember when you actually had to wait for Game Day to see the spots! 

This year’s previews are kind of light on VFX  - I suspect everyone’s still rendering. 

Let us know which ones you liked – and we hope your team wins!

Hello again!  It’s mashup time! This week’s goodies include some nice spots from our Advisory Board members over at Psyop, some behind-the-scenes with Fincher, a history of Lucas’ latest (well, it turns out, not-so-latest, just lately completed), a great “rise from the ashes” story, a Keanu Reeves documentary of analog v. digital filmmaking, a great interview with Terry Gilliam, Wes Anderson’s newest trailer, a look at the year in VFX and a reel breakdown for “Hugo”. Did we miss anything? As always, we welcome your feedback and comments.

I love and loathe Math. I refer to myself as a "numerophobe" and a frequent comment can be heard when Math rears its ugly head in my everyday life, "I was told there'd be no Math?" Although I find Math repugnant, I also embrace it, because at heart, I'm a puzzle solver.

The Academy met last night to cull the list of films in the running for a Visual Effects Oscar nomination to a mere ten. The list is below, in alphabetical order.

A bit late today, but heck, better late than never. Here is my mash-up for the week. Next week’s will be the last of the year! I would love to hear from you if you have something unusual or interesting to share. Have a great weekend!

Are you interested in learning more about compositing? The VES Education Committee is hosting a presentation on Basic CG for Compositors at Escape Studios on December 17, 2011 at 10:00 am. Guest speaker Martin Hall will present some basic techniques that he used on recent projects including passes engineered in Vray and Mental Ray to complete his composites.

In this trailer for "Keloid", BLR offers a very grim view of our future - an AI experiment contained by one man. Will that man let the experiment loose and undermine mankind? The 2:00 trailer is very nicely done - yes, the content looks familiar, but the overall look of the piece has me intrigued. I look forward to seeing the finished product!

Another week has gone by – I sat out last week due to the holiday, but here, for your reading pleasure is a mashup of the good, the bad and the absurd. I hope you find some interesting reading within!

And here it is, Friday again. I found some pretty cool stuff – not all strictly VFX-related but very groovy nonetheless. I hope you enjoy following these links!

Turn on your 'way back machine' and check out Dream Quest's reel from 1980 -1984. I have a renewed appreciation for the folks doing visual effects in the days before computer graphics, and I find Scott Squires' voiceover incredibly helpful in uncovering the multi-pass in-camera world from the days of yore. I especially enjoy when Scott throws out the measurements of the models and miniatures, and goes into detail about compositing (which was more than likely painting on the original camera neg - no opportunities for mistakes!) and in-camera "mattes" for the matte paintings.

On Thursday last week, our friends from Digital Domain came by to breakdown their work on "Real Steel". The house was packed to capacity, and the Q&A sessions were lively as Erik Gamache, Geoffrey Baumann, Justin van der Lek and Blake Sweeney explained the process behind animation, environments, crowd duplication and lighting.

We have two news instructors on board at Escape Studios in Santa Monica. We are really excited too. If you haven’t read about Rick Makoul and Vicky McCann, you should—just click on their names and you’ll get the details.

Want to take a sneak peek behind the scenes to see how the movie “Real Steel” was made? Join Escape Studios in partnership with Digital Domain, The Foundry and Chaos Group at our Santa Monica campus to hear this unique story.

Hello Everyone! Here are some digital tidbits to get you through your last day of the workweek and into your weekend. Hope you will find some of these interesting. Feel free to comment or add your own finds.

The Foundry's new application "MARI" is on everyone's lips these days. Would you like to learn how it works? Join us for a FREE workshop at our Santa Monica office on October 24 or 25.

I love this article called "Using OSHA Checklists To Improve Your Work Station" and its product guide link which offers up useful statistics for monitor size, desktop size, chair height and other factors that go into making your workstation a place for comfort and maximum work output.

FX Guide has kindly provided a detailed overview of the science behind fluid simulations, with an overview of the latest hybrid approach to solving fluids by Exotic Matter with Naiad.

I loved watching this project unfold. It combines a lot of my favorite things about art - clever usage of outdoor public space, collaboration, a great soundtrack and some pretty neat visual tricks.  For extra fun, check out the making-of documentary on the same page.  Note that you can purchase your own miniature MÖBIUS kit to make your own installation!  Let us know if you do - we'd love to see it.

This piece called "Yes I Know" from Memory Tapes, is so very nice. Director Eric Epstein did not use any 3d applications in the making of this video - just After Effects and careful camera work by his brother, Aaron Epstein. If you can, just enjoy the look of the video. If you must (and I just "had" to) check out the making of here.

For the third year in a row, Ntropic and Wild Plum have teamed up to create 12 spots for American Idol and Ford Focus. The spots will be rolled out one each for the next 12 weeks.

All I can say is this is very very cool. I wonder what kind of core you need to be able to accomplish this. I'm going back to Pilates - NOW!

I love this making-of Old Spice "Scent Vacation" piece I found on youtube. Our friends at The Mill had a hand in making this look pretty for sure - the real mastery is in the acting and the practical gags used to make this all happen in one take. The Old Spice spots are hilarious anyway - I recommend watching the making-of, then appreciate the final spot. Well done all!

I love this video!! Soon to be available in STEREOSCOPIC 3D!!! Get your old school fix and relive those minecraft and teris days. And hum the tune for days.

Wow! I just finished watching this video. No - it's not a 1.5 minute commercial for Lexus - it's an incredible demonstration of tenacity and forward thinking.

Boing Boing has an article about two grad students from Pratt spending 30 hours to build a device that takes your photo in 30 seconds. How long, do you think, before this idea will be stolen for a commercial? See my recent post. What fascinates us about doing very simple things in a complicated way?

Pay close attention to this guy - he has invented a remarkable visual tracking tool called the "Predator". Watch the full video as he demonstrates its prowess - there are some videos at the end that show this tool's full potential for uses in police work, zoology, object centric stabilization and usage as a virtual mouse.

Spring has arrived and it's that time of year again to decide what stays and what goes. Are you ready to upgrade your phone, donate clothes to Salvation Army or archive your classic movie collection and favorite video games?

Here is a nice tutorial for a Web GL enabled real-time fractal renderer. Check out the tutorial, then go to this site with your newer graphics card and render out some gorgeous imagery using your Firefox 4 beta or Google Chrome browser. Show us your results!

Check out the real-time capabilities of the CryENGINE 3 from Crytek.

Time Magazine has submitted a nice "Cliff's notes" version of the history of "Special Effects" in the movies. It's all here - cell animation, stop motion, explosions, water effects, CG characters, bullet time and even stereo are covered in brief here. It's always very interesting to note which movies are chosen to represent key innovations in visual effects, and this article covers "old school" versus "new school" ways of achieving effects. For example in the "doubling" section, the visual the iconic shot of twins Susan and Sharon in "The Parent Trap", wherein Disney employed some optical gadgetry to make Hayley Mills her own twin. The paragraph then goes on to explain how doubling was achieved in "The Social Network" with more complicated face replacement to create the twins Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss out of a single actor.

I was sent a link to this music video today. Animated by four people, including the guitarist from the band, the video tells the story very sweetly of a mommy turtle laying eggs, and the babies' struggles to get to the ocean. Very sweet song, and beautiful stop-motion work with a not-very-easy-to-work with medium. Tell us what you think!

Escape Studios attended the ninth annual Visual Effects Society Awards at the Beverly Hilton.  

Early this morning the Academy announced the final five films nominated for an Oscar for Visual Effects:

I can't stop watching this video simply called "Surface Detail". It was posted by someone named SubBlue on vimeo. There is some serious math involved in this piece - mesmerizing and richly textured landscape. Curious, I googled SubBlue and found his home page. It seems that he is an ex-physicist who whips up these amazing fractals when he's not working at 55degrees in Glasgow. Very inspiring work - my knitting hobby pales in comparison.

This should be required viewing for all FX artists. Gorgeous, in-camera effects with water. I am always blown away by people who look for the extraordinary in the every day (provided you think "every day" means a high speed camera an an all white room).

I am mesmerized by this music video from Denki Groove, directed by Hideyuki Tanaka.

The Los Angeles FX scene is abuzz with the news that Guillermo Del Toro has joined forces with Motion Theory's Matthew Cullen (a director), cinematographer Guillermo Navarro and producer Javier Jiminez to create a production company called Mirada.