Those of you who have seen Robert Rodriquez’s grindhouse (destined to be) cult classic, ‘Machete’, will agree that after 105 minutes of semi naked women, full blown gun fights and next level gore, the best part of the film comes at the very end.
NYCC 2012
We are less than a month away from New York Comic Con, “the East Coast's biggest and most exciting popular culture convention”, an event that attracts fans of film/TV/graphic novel (and the rest!) in their hoards, last year’s convention drawing 105,000 punters!
Winning in Westeros
As you can tell from the numerous blog posts, we here at Escape are pretty big fans of HBO’s Game Of Thrones and I can honestly say that if there were a parade I would be leading it.
Wild VFX
VFX talent can be found all over the globe. We saw this lovely advertisement, the wild brainchild of New Zealand based Clemenger BBDQ, that has been brought to life by CG wizards Psyop and MPC.
Partysaurus Rex!
Like many other film fans, my journey with Pixar’s original animation classic Toy Story, has been an emotional one. From the age of 5 I’ve watched every instalment of the Toy Story trilogy, each time within a week of its release at the cinema, even the third, which as a 20 year old I saw in 3D, twice.
Robocop-out?
Pictures surfaced yesterday from the set of the Robocop remake, to be released in August 2013 - "very exciting!" I hear you say. Well for most of us it is!
An overwhelming amount of unhappy Tweeters, Facebookers and bloggers alike, took to their keyboards over the weekend - unleashing a tirade of distain on the new costume design, placing it firmly in the shadows of the iconic suit from the original 1987 film.
WoW - the mists of Kung Fu Pandaria
MMO game (that’s massively multiplayer online game, for those who don’t know) World of Warcraft sometimes has a bad rep outside of, well, the world of World of Warcraft. However with the recent release of a trailer for this September’s add on, ‘Mists of Pandaria’ even loyal fans are starting to dish out criticism. Many of whom are insinuating that WoW has taken a turn for the worst, in an attempt to appeal to a mass market of gamers, turning their back on their real audience in the process.
Weird Wins!
With the US release of Paranorman last month (UK release 14th September), sporting giants Nike have released a one of a kind edition of their synonymous, ‘foamposite’ sports trainer. Only 800 of these Paranorman themed pumps were made and get this - they could only be won by weirdos.
Badboy Cowboy reboot on the way!
Being the one and only up to date source of information in this modern age, the internet has pleasantly informed me that not only is there going to be a remake of classic western series the Lone Ranger (in film form), but none other than Johnny Depp will be starring as the Rangers Native American sidekick Tonto. And despite him looking a bit like Jack Sparrow with face paint on, the buzz online is palpable, given that they’ve finished shooting this bad-boy cowboy boots and spurs reboot this week, according to producer Jerry Bruckenheimer's blog.
An insight to VFX with escapee Chris Chadwick
If you’ve not had access to the internet over the last week, (why else wouldn’t you be keeping up to date with the hottest VFX blog on the planet?) as well as some highly informative, highly entertaining, VFX related internet titbits, you’ve missed out on a few smashing success stories.
Dragons are cool, right?
In pursuit of some new blog material, I managed to stumble across this über cool, VFX heavy advertisement. For the most extravagant collection of watches I think I’ve ever seen. And as far as product shots go, this one is a pretty elaborate example.
Konami announce plans for Metal Gear Solid Movie
If you, like me, were the owner of a PS1 back in the late 90’s, (or as we called it back then, simply ‘the Playstation’) there’s quite a high chance you would have owned stealth action game ‘Metal Gear Solid’, the successor to Konami’s MSX2 tactical action espionage game, ‘Metal Gear’, which this week celebrated its 25th anniversary.
Oggy Oggy Oggy, Ouya Ouya Ouya!
Living rooms all over the planet best prepare themselves over the next few months, for the arrival of the world’s first ‘fist sized’ games console… ‘Ouya’.
Everything is just Vine...
Over the past six months we have been working with Michael Illingworth, founder of Vine Post Production to expand his studio. Michael has worked at The Mill and Cinesite and has been involved in post-production, compositing and visual effects supervision on some of the biggest film names in the industry including the Harry Potter franchise, Gladiator and Black Hawk Down.
Mortal Kombat: Legacy
Mortal Kombat (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mortal_Kombat) is a franchise everyone's familiar with. Along with Street Fighter (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Street_Fighter) and Tekken (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tekken), it's one of the classic beat 'em ups of early arcades and game consoles, pitching several outrageous competitors against each other in an excessively violent fight to the death for who cares what the reason was it was awesome. Spawning a huge list of games from 1992 all the way to the present day, MK has helped taint innocent childhoods for 20 years. It had two major films, one acceptable (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0113855/), one classically woeful,(http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119707/) and last year, around the release of Mortal Kombat 9 (http://www.ign.com/games/mortal-kombat/ps3-14317281), came a pleasant surprise; Mortal Kombat: Rebirth. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9YUeTTaVqo)
Rebirth was a 8 minute short film from director Kevin Tancharoen(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Tancharoen), who wanted to create a 'proof of concept' for a MK movie. It retold the MK story in a style that focused on realism, without the Outworld or any of the supernatural elements from the game, and was used as a way to convince Warner Brothers (http://www.warnerbros.com/) to reboot the MK film franchise. While they didn't immediately agree, they did help Tancharoen create his webseries Mortal Kombat: Legacy. (http://www.youtube.com/show/mortalkombatlegacy?s=1)
Legacy was the follow up to Rebirth, telling the stories of several different MK characters, mostly in the same gritty, real world fashion, with some others taking a less grounded approach. Although both had famous actors in them, you can see through the series that they've spent their modest budget wisely, even though there are some episodes that rely more of VFX than others. While the story of Jax, Sonya and Kano focused more of acting and gunfights, Kitana and Mileena's episodes were heavily supernatural and involved both 2D and 3D animation. My favourite of the bunch is Raiden's (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5tWh4Z42SJk&list=SL) story which is both raw and stupendous at the same time, and packs an emotional punch.
It's another example of how webseries' are evolving to incorporate brilliant visuals with real production and producing something that is legitimately worth watching. Its worth noting that the series did so well that Warner Brothers have now agreed to let Tancharoen helm a new MK feature film! Keep your eyes peeled for my next Webseries spotlight, where I'll show my favourite web show. And if you have anything that you think should be covered, sound off in the comments below!
Mortal Kombat is a franchise everyone's familiar with. Along with Street Fighter and Tekken, it's one of the classic beat 'em ups of early arcades and game consoles, pitching several outrageous competitors against each other in an excessively violent fight to the death for...well who cares what the reason was, it was awesome! Spawning a huge list of games from 1992 all the way to the present day, MK has helped taint innocent childhoods for 20 years. It had two major films, one acceptable, one classically woeful, and last year, around the release of Mortal Kombat 9, came a pleasant surprise; Mortal Kombat: Rebirth.
The Decisive Moment Winners Announced
We announced back in May that the Chaos Group in association with CG Society, NVidia, MAXON and BOXX would be running the “Decisive Moment” competition. The challenge was to create a single image, using any application and V-Ray to render, that tells a decisive moment in time.
The One Man Nostalgia Show
I don’t think there’s much to be said about this clip from Pixar’s Nick Pitera, apart from the fact that it just grabbed me by the scruff of the neck and dragged me down to euphoric depths of my childhood. I do have a couple of questions though…
Having hit Youtube in 2011, am I the only person not to have seen this?
HOW DOES HE DO THAT?
and last but not least… Is he available for birthday parties?
I don’t think there’s much to be said about this clip from Pixar’s Technical Director, Nick Pitera, apart from the fact that it just grabbed me by the scruff of the neck and dragged me down to the euphoric depths of my childhood. I do have a couple of questions though…
Fubar Redux - A must watch!
Escapee Hasraf Dulull's fifteen-minute film is a true work of art! Set in an alternate reality with cats and dogs, it mixes some intense action with some serious drama, all emphatically enhanced by a unique animation visual style.
The Walking Dead Season 3
Despite all its woes over the first season, AMC's The Walking Dead amassed a huge following during its second season. Even though the story has arguably dragged at times, there is no doubting the fantastic special effects work that goes into each and every episode of the zombie thriller. Based on Robert Kirkman’s popular zombie apocalypse comic book series by the same name, The Walking Dead has captivated TV audiences for two seasons and is already whetting appetites for its highly anticipated third season, scheduled to air in the UK in October. The story follows a group of survivors, lead by police officer Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln), who band together in the midst of a gruesome zombie apocalypse. The creative concoction that is The Walking Dead blends real-world and CG elements, characters, and environments. Artists at Stargate Studios, an international production services and postproduction company, merge that which is real and imagined, as well as dead and undead, into a convincing, cohesive whole on a rather impressive weekly basis.
Cartoon Yourself?
So we’re really busy here at Escape, which is why I’ve been playing around on the internet, making a cartoon of myself… all in the name of research of course.