Just when you thought Hollywood couldn’t create VFX on a larger scale than Cloverfield or Transformers, this trailer is released, for ‘Pacific Rim’, and it really takes the biscuit!

Directed by the world renowned Guillermo del Toro, this is a tale of wait for it, giant robots made by humans, fighting giant monsters that have arrived through a time portal at the bottom of the sea - Sounds crazy right? Check out this trailer and if you plan to go to see this at the cinema, be sure to prepare yourself for some bone crushingly epic VFX sequences.  

This was the 9th iteration of the CVMP conference, and it certainly lived up to its billing. The conference struck just the right balance between academic research and commercial production, providing a hugely rich and diverse array of ideas, challenges, successes and future endeavours.

With Christmas fast approaching, and many people dreading the inevitable high street conquest, my colleagues and I have decided to put together a string of blog posts, enlightening our readers to some unique presents for technology, film and games fans, that will hopefully put a bigger smile on the recipients face AND save the buyer from the perils of the high street hoards.

What sets 2D and 3D visual effect artists apart? Most would say, not a lot. Both teams of artists are necessary in the creation of stunning CG visuals. But have you ever wondered why someone would choose one path over another? What makes the ultimate Compositor or 3D VFX artist?

Some good news for VFX fans this week, as VES announce that a complete documentary film about the legendary Ray Harryhausen, will be shown at a number of festivals early next year, and better still, those who can’t make these screenings, will be able to get their hands on ‘RAY HARRYHAUSEN: SPECIAL EFFECTS TITAN’ (quite the title, eh?) as soon as March 2013.

Being an avid Harryhausen fan, I own a signed copy of his classic book ‘The Art of Ray Harryhausen’, and have had the great pleasure of attending an intimate lecture held by this ‘Special Effects Titan’ back in 2009.

Something Pixar are always great at is sharing their wealth of wisdom with fellow artists. Having come across this wonderful snippet of inspiration the other day, I felt it needed to be shared with all you compositing and VFX artists out there. It’s important to know that even the guys at the top have a tough time!

We've invited Head of 3D at Framestore Commercials and Escape graduate, Diarmid Harrison-Murray, to kick off the New Year with a live interview, speaking about his latest work on the Skyfall opening title sequence, and his overall journey as a VFX artist.

Having started a VFX course here at Escape Studios, I've been keeping a diary to share how I’m getting on so far. And here's an update on week five.

Last Monday, November 19^th, we ran a very popular webinar with Victor Perez, a master when it comes to using Python inside NUKE. A whopping ninety nine people attended this live webinar to hear what Victor had to share, and we’ve had an incredible number of requests from people who couldn’t attend to share the webinar recording. For us, this interest has been very encouraging, and we look forward to bringing you more webinars like this.

Despite popular disbelief, deeming the world created by author Yann Martel in his novel ‘Life of Pi’, as “unfilmable”, the guys at Rhythm & Hues Studios have put together a mind blowing piece of cinema that is sure to visually stun audiences around the globe.