Casinos, crowds & cut-off fingers: Argo to Vegas
The invisible crowd, city and casino vfx in Here Comes the Boom, Argo, Alex Cross and Vegas. Updated with new before and after images.
Faux Images: Michael Auerswald reports from Germany
“Faux Images” is a quarterly meeting in Berlin, where the animation, design and vfx scene meets to share ideas, present their latest work, network or just have a beer, Michael Auerswald (fxphd member) reports for fxguide.
Sharks might fly
In 2001, Jeremy Hunt ushered in an era of internet viral videos after creating ‘405’ with Bruce Branit, in which a passenger jet had a freeway close encounter. Read how Hunt has returned to that indie ‘get the job done’ approach for his latest project – a music promo for Billy Talent’s ‘Surprise, Surprise’. Includes a befores and afters clip.
Emmy Eng. Awards for ACES, Kodak, Colorfront, Filmlight
The 64th Primetime Emmy Engineering Award honorees include ACES, two Filmlight products, Colorfront On-Set Dailies, Eastman Kodak, the ASC Color Decision List and Toon Boom Animation for Storyboard Pro.
CVMP early bird registration now open
fxguide is excited to be a partner for the 9th annual Conference on Visual Media Production, to be held in London on December 5th and 6th. For a limited time, early bird tickets are available for £250 — that’s £100 off the full price.
SIGGRAPH Asia 2012 – sneak peek
fxguide is once again the official podcast of SIGGRAPH Asia, this year taking place at the Singapore EXPO from November 28th to December 1st. Here’s our preview of the courses, tech papers, speakers and other events at the conference.
Founders Series: Richard Chuang PDI to Cloudpic
We talk to PDI co-founder Richard Chuang, a pioneer in the computer graphics, visual effects and animation industry.
AMPAS reaches initial funding goal for new museum
This Academy Museum, to be located at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), will be the first major U.S. museum dedicated exclusively to the history and ongoing development of motion pictures. This museum could showcase Visual Effects work in new ways.
Rob Powers, the guy at the wheel of the new NewTek LightWave
We speak to Rob Powers, the new President of the restructured LightWave 3D Group.
Truth about the Dneg layoffs
We speak directly to Dneg about the layoffs and clear the air of mis-information.
VES Summit 2012
A report from the recent Visual Effects Society Production Summit. Scott Ross was the featured speaker and delivered a blistering critique of an industry he helped create, current Digital Domain CEO Ed Ulbrich answers the question “what happened?” and a whole lot more.
DD’s latest with Linkin Park
How Digital Domain and Mothership created the music vid for Linkin Park’s ‘Castle of Glass’. Includes making of clip.
A Journey with Johnnie Walker
We break down a new Johnnie Walker TVC with Alt.vfx. Includes making of video and behind the scenes on-set photos.
New versions of RenderMan Pro Server and Studio
Pixar has released both RenderMan Pro Server 17.0 and RenderMan Studio 4.0. The company says that Pro Server 17.0 includes object instancing, photon mapping enhancements and volume-rendering optimizations, while Studio 4.0 features include a new physically plausible shader library.
In your face: Dredd 3D
A future metropolis, slow motion gun battles and some literally head exploding scenes – the vfx of Dredd 3D.
Hotel Transylvania – bonus interviews
For our fxinsider members, we have bonus interviews from our visit to Sony Pictures Animation and Sony Pictures Imageworks for Hotel Transylvania. Also featured are behind the scenes breakdowns from the film.
Animal Logic buys Fuel VFX
In a sign of good news for the visual effects community, Sydney-based Animal Logic has bought Fuel VFX, which had been in voluntary administration.
Back to the future: Looper
An in-depth look at the visual effects in Rian Johnson’s Looper. Warning: contains major plot spoilers.
VES Inducts Seven New Fellows
VES has inducted seven Fellows to the Society based on their contributions to the art and science of visual effects.
Behind the scenes of Continuum
Artifex Studios VFX supe Adam Stern talks about the work behind sci-fi series Continuum.
VES Summit 2012 – registration open
The Visual Effects Society has opened registration for the 2012 VES Summit to be held October 13th at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Marina del Rey.
Exclusive: Foundry and Luxology merge
Exclusively and on the record fxguide can report that The Foundry is merging with Luxology, makers of Modo. We report the facts, interview the new management team and gauge industry reactions from ILM, WETA, SPI and more.
GRAPHIC 2012 at the Sydney Opera House
We preview the GRAPHIC 2012 festival at the Sydney Opera House in November, which includes talks from Pixar’s Lee Unkrich and Animal Logic.
Galloping Horse America & Reliance MediaWorks buy DD
Galloping Horse America & Reliance MediaWorks have jointly acquired the assets of Digital Domain & Mothership in DDMG bankruptcy auction. Here is the press release.
Resident Evil: Retribution – just add bacon
How Mr. X created the FX for the latest Resident Evil, and how bacon (yes bacon) inspired one of the main creatures.
Indy on blu-ray, and more
John Rhys-Davies, who played Sallah in Indiana Jones, talks to us about the Indy blu-ray release. Plus we check out some other blu-ray and DVDs with effects-heavy featurettes.
How to sell cars: dancing hamsters, singing robots
The Kia hamsters are back. We look at Method’s VFX in a new TVC, plus the work of The Embassy for a new Citroen robot spot. Updated with a Method breakdown reel.
Creative Arts Emmy Winners
The Primetime Creative Arts Emmy Awards were held tonight in Los Angeles. And the winners are… Plus we have breakdowns of Pixomondo’s GOT VFX, and Brainstorm Digital’s work for Boardwalk Empire.
Open letter response to David Cohen, Variety
An open letter to Variety’s David Cohen, who has suggested VFX today are boring.
Creative strength in advertising / behavioral change
What is the future of creativity in advertising? It may well be walking away from the 30 sec ad format and starting over with a whole new approach focusing instead on behavioral change. At the forefront of this is Naked Communications. Mike spoke in Sydney to co-founder Adam Ferrier.