Smoke & Mirrors New York (SMNY) moved into the animation realm with ‘Dinosaur’, a Denver Museum of Nature & Science spot featuring a playful brontosaurus skating around a frozen pond. fxguide talked to key SMNY artists Sean Broughton (Director/CD/Editor), Mike Donovan (Lead Sr. CG Artist), Steve Parish (Lead Sr. CG Artist/Lighting/Live Action Director) and Nic Seresin (Sr. Flame Artist) about the work.

Imageworks visual effects supervisor Scott Stokdyk gives Ian Failes a run down of his work for G-Force, a Hoyt Yeatman-directed feature about an elite troupe of guinea pigs who must save the world from an evil billionaire.

The new UK Shell Campaign uses a truly beautiful technical painterly technique. Key artists from Stardust Studios tell fxguide about the painterly ‘Get the most out of every drop’ spots created for Shell in conjunction with JWT London.

Day three – HDR Cine cameras, Renderman, GPU. Sphereon launched the hdrv camera at Siggraph. A new cine or video camera capable of filming HD footage with 20 stops of latitude making it the first serious HDR video camera. Also, Pixar had their Renderman User Group Meeting and Nvida proved that GPU capabilities are continuing to climb in creative and technical depth.

Day 2 meant the start of the exhibition and the job fair. Highlights included a killer ILM series of lectures showcasing their work on several major blockbuster films, anyone of which would have been enough for most studios. Siggraph is a great place to connect with the who’s who of the industry during the day and enjoy the parties each night – such as fxguide/fxphd’s gathering of the faithful at Lucy’s Retired Surfer Bar.

Day one: Siggraph got off to a good start in a city that is both extremely hot and welcoming. The trade show floor does not open until Tuesday, so the first day was all about the talks, with some brilliant presentations. Day One also saw a flood of press releases and the odd user group meeting.

fxguide talks to Rainmaker Entertainment’s Shea Wageman about the storytelling behind the cinematic game trailer for Ubisoft’s Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Conviction.

Life is hard, but it can work out in the end. That seems to be the basic theme behind ‘Caterpillar,’ a spot for Swedish pension company AMF featuring CG animation and visual effects by The Mill LA. fxguide looks at how The Mill enabled a hero caterpillar to meet his love, lose his love and then transform into a beautiful butterfly.