Oscar VFX Short list Announced
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences today announced that seven films remain in the running in the Visual Effects category for the 82nd Academy Awards®. The films are listed below in alphabetical order: “Avatar” “District 9” “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” “Star Trek” “Terminator Salvation” “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” “2012” On […]
Read the Article
Mumbai Nuke Master Class Recap
As Nuke has increased in popularity around the world, The Foundry have been holding master classes around the world to help build up the user base. Their recent Nuke Master Class in Mumbai attracted over 250 visual effects artists from as far afield as Hyderabad and Chenai. Attendees were treated to sessions on customization, colour […]
Read the Article
The Mill creates the world for Guinness
Mountains, forests and oceans come to life in ‘World’, a Johnny Green-directed spot for Guinness, with visual effects by The Mill. Lead 2D and Flame artist Rich Roberts gives fxguide an insight into The Mill’s work for the epic commercial.
Read the Article
fxpodcast: Michael Taylor, CEO Rising Sun Pictures
In this weeks podcast we talk with Michael Taylor, new CEO at Rising Sun Pictures. Michael has a rich history in visual effects starting with an engineering background, becoming a visual effects supervisor and then moving into in senior management at Rhythm and Hues, Digital Domain and Ascent Media. This journey has taken him from […]
Read the Article
Ben 10: Alien Swarm
Ben 10: Alien Swarm is the second live-action film from Cartoon Network based on their popular animated series Ben 10. The film is directed and executive-produced by Alex Winter, who also directed Cartoon Network’s first Ben 10 live-action movie. We take a look behind the scenes at what it took to pull off 600 vfx shots, nearly triple the number of the first film.
Read the Article
Genarts announces pricing for Sapphire 5
GenArts has announced pricing for Sapphire™ 5 licenses for Autodesk systems. A new Sapphire 5 license for Linux Flame, Inferno, Flint HD and Smoke HD will be priced at $8,499, a $1,500 decrease from Sapphire 4. Upgrades from Sapphire 4 to Sapphire 5 will be priced at $3,499. In addition, new Sapphire 5 burn licenses […]
Read the Article
Smoke on Mac Part 1: Overview
Autodesk announced the release of Smoke on Mac 2010 today and it’s a big move for Autodesk, as traditionally their system products have been bundled software/hardware packages.
Read the Article
Brisbane Colorist training
Warren Eagles, (one of our online fxphd Profs.) is heading up a “Colourist Strategies” live training course in January, 2010. The 3-day course will take place in Brisbane, Australia. “Colourist Strategies” will provide colourists with the toolset to maximise their abilities and gain an edge on their competition. It provides students with an opportunity to […]
Read the Article
15 films selected for Visual Effects Oscar
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences today announced that 15 films have been selected as semifinalists for Achievement in Visual Effects for the 82nd Academy Awards®. In early January the Visual Effects Branch Executive Committee will narrow this list to seven films, which will compete in the “Bake-Off”, after which three films will […]
Read the Article
fxpodcast: Scott Ross
When we talk about the history of visual effects we tend to take digital for granted, yet this transition occurred in our lifetime. Scott Ross is an industry pioneer, from his time at ILM, to founding Digital Domain, he was at the center of the birth of the digital age of visual effects. In our […]
Read the Article
Framestore Joins the Nuke Crowd
The Foundry announced today that Framestore, the largest visual effects and computer animation studio in Europe, has invested in a Nuke site license. Adoption of Nuke at major facilities seems to have hit the tipping point, as Framestore joins Sony Pictures Imageworks, ILM and Weta Digital as Nuke site license holders. For the full press […]
Read the Article
Nuke User Group at SIGGRAPH ASIA
The Foundry is holding a Nuke User Group at SIGGRAPH ASIA on Wednesday 16th December at The Pacifico, where Siggraph Asia is being held. The event starts at 5pm (registration from 4.30pm) with beer and nibbles afterwards. There will be presentations by JL Design, Beijing Wonderstar, OLM Digital and Animal Logic plus The Foundry team […]
Read the Article
fxpodcast: Talking Color Management with Technicolor Creative Bridge
In February the Visual Effects Society (VES) and American Society of Cinematographers (ASC) held a joint meeting to discuss Image Quality. At the time we wrote that it was clear that “DI and the workflow from image capture to release is not one workflow”. At the VES Production Summit Fred Chandler (Senior Vice President Post […]
Read the Article
The Spine: Style as a Storytelling Technique
Chris Landreth is a unique director with a unique style. His previous short films Ryan, Bingo and The End showcased complex characters using an almost surreal approach to computer animation. Landreth talks to fxguide about his latest animated short, The Spine, which focuses on the tumultuous lives of married couple Dan and Mary.
Read the Article
red centre: Nov. 30th RED Announcements
The end of November brought another slate of announcements from the folks at RED, including details on Scarlet as well as a potentially cool new product called RedRay Pro. Instead of wasting your time surfing the web culling through post upon post of misinformation, take a moment and download the latest red centre and get […]
Read the Article
Star Trek: Digital Domain and Svengali FX
In the second of our holiday weekend reading ‘DVD’ stories we share an extra double interview with Digital Domain and Svengali FX’s work on the JJ. Abrams directed Star Trek.
Read the Article
Angels & Demons
The Thanksgiving holiday weekend in the U.S. is a great time to catch up with some great vfx movies. With iTunes now providing not only HD movies but DVD style entire films with extras, we figured it was time to highlight a few films that have recently been released with great visual effects. We start by talking to CIS Vancouver and Dneg discussing Angels and Demons.
Read the Article
Amelia flying with Mr X
For Amelia, director Mira Nair called upon Mr. X to deliver photorealistic planes, clouds and crowds to help tell the story of the famous American aviator. Mr. X visual effects supervisor Wojciech Zielinski talks to fxguide about the production.
Read the Article
Circus is Ringleader for Grenelle Spot
An environmentally friendly approach to urban development is the subject of this spot for Grenelle, a French neighbourhood near Paris. Circus, co-founded by Jérôme Bacquet and Julien Villanueva, worked with director NoBrain to transform industrial landscapes into greener areas for the spot. Bacquet tells fxguide about his studio’s work. Interview by Ian Failes View QuickTime […]
Read the Article
Asylum turns the world upside down
Floating people, couches and fruit are all part of World Upside Down, an Ad Council spot with visual effects by Asylum. Directed by Derin Seale for agency Cramer-Krasselt, the :60 spot is aimed at raising awareness for disaster preparation. Asylum Lead VFX/Inferno Artist Rob Trent takes fxguide through the compositing work.
Read the Article
fxguidetv: Smoke on Mac
At the Inter BEE 2009 conference in Tokyo Autodesk showed a technology demo and announced Smoke on the Macintosh platform with a price of $14,995 (U.S. suggested retail price). We take an exclusive first look at Smoke on the Mac and talk with the product managers and developers to answer all the questions you may […]
Read the Article
2012: Disaster Porn
To bring general world-ending mayhem to his latest disaster film, 2012, director Roland Emmerich relied on a contigent of effects vendors under the supervision of Volker Engel and Marc Weigert. In this article, we focus on the work of two of those vendors: Digital Domain and Sony Pictures Imageworks. In this week’s fxpodcast, we discuss Double Negative’s work on the film.
Read the Article
fxguidetv: Another Killer Nuke Segment
Right on the heels on the incredibly popular segment in our last fxguidetv, we have another feature from IBC featuring work in Nuke. In episode #71 Shervin Shoghian, compositing supervisor at Image Engine, shows off some insane 3D tricks from work they did on District 9. This is another great example of how to use […]
Read the Article
smoke on mac: yes, it’s for real
We haven’t been able to say anything up until now as we strongly respect our Non-Disclosure agreements as beta testers, but the rumors are true: there is definitely smoke for mac in Autodesk’s future. According to Autodesk, they will be “showing a technology preview of its industry leading Autodesk Smoke editorial finishing software running on […]
Read the Article
Tsnumai in South Korea thanks to Polygon, CA.
For Haeundae, South Korea’s first large scale disaster film, Polygon Entertainment assembled a team of filmmaking and visual effects specialists to realise massive tsnumai waves and daring water rescues. Polygon founder and CEO Hans Uhlig and visual effects producer Jeff Olson talk to fxguide about the challenges of setting up a new studio that offers an entire filmmaking experience.
Read the Article
The Proposal
In its first feature film project, Brickyard VFX was called upon to create more than 300 invisible effects shots for Anne Fletcher’s The Proposal. Brickyard visual effects supervisor Sean Devereaux talks to fxguide about adding mountains, roto-ing hair and puppeteering an eagle.
Read the Article
fxpodcast: AICP Digital
In July we posted a press release from the Association of Independent Commercial Producers (AICP) announcing their digital initiative. We wanted to learn more about this so we sat down with Ed Ulbrich (Digital Domain) who is heading up AICP Digital. The AICP has been around since 1972, this new initiative is designed to tackle […]
Read the Article
fxguidetv: rise | fx Nuke Presentation from IBC
This year’s Foundry booth at IBC had several fantastic presentations by artists who use Nuke at their facilities and our next two fxguidetv episodes have two of those killer presentations. Episode #70 features the work of rise | fx, the biggest vendor for vfx in Berlin. vfx supervisor Florian Gellinger shows off the work they […]
Read the Article
Wondertouch bought by GenArts
In a key strategic move, GenArts have bought Wondertouch, makers of the particleIllusion software. Not only does this perfectly balance with GenArts current product line with almost no overlap, but Wondertouch is about to release particleIllusion for After Effects, the result of several years of work by founder and Wondertouch cornerstone, Alan Lorence. We spoke to both Wondertouch and GenArts about what this means to their over 10,000 users.
Read the Article
Bridgestone by RedCartel
‘Hotel’, a Bridgestone Australia spot created by Sydney collaborative outfit RedCartel, features a recurring Gecko character realized entirely using the open source Blender 3D software. click below to read our interview with RedCartel producer James Neale, as he explains how Blender made the spot possible. RedCartel started in May 2008 as a collaborative effort between […]
Read the Article