We may earn a commission when you buy through links on our site, at no extra cost to you. Visual effects tools were vital to the telling of this story, particularly those created by londonbased vfx software development company foundry. Vfx is an evolving industry, and virtual production is shaping up to play a pivotal role in how studios will overcome the production challenges of tomorrow. He will report directly to fiona walkinshaw, framestores global managing director, film. The approach working alongside foundry, we spoke with oscarwinning vfx supervisor tim webber and members of the framestore vfx team about bringing director alfonso cuarons spectacular vision to life. Even if you dont need to understand the maths hidden in the software that the vfx industry use, webber feels it helps to understand the principles of what the equations are doing, pointing to his experience early in his career working on a 1996 channel 4 tv miniseries dramatizing gullivers travels and. The framestore also have a pretty comprehensive list of all the vfx breakdown articles that have been written about gravity so far. The global production pipeline as the vfx industry continues to grow worldwide, we are seeing how facilities are constantly discovering new means to do better, more inventive work, with tight timelines and, in some cases, shrinking budgets, said cospectives rory mcgregor, product manager of.
Tim webber, the films vfx supervisor, remembers feeling exhausted after the very first meeting with director alfonso cuaron. Tim webber of framestore far right on the set of gravity. The team talk about the challenges that the cgheavy film presented and discuss the. Industry standard software now includes physicsbased phenomena, such. It took that long for people just to understand what we were talking about. On the other hand, simply replicating real burn injuries would have just been a grossout.
If you want more proof, check out these great interviews with oscar and baftawinning vfx supervisors paul franklin and tim webber, and animation director eamonn butler, speaking to digital arts at the vfx festival in london. He is known for his work on harry potter and the goblet of fire 2005, the dark knight 2008, avatar 2009. Cfx artists used a program that was designed for the fashion industry to digitally. Having already triumphed with creatures created for previous potter films the basilisk and the hippogriff, to name but two framestore was once more invited to join the fun. Visual effects and filmmaking is all about the team, said gravity visual effects supervisor tim webber in his acceptance speech, taking time to. Great hollywood bakeoff ahead of oscars is the icing on. The team then had to produce a photoreal digital child being born, again in one long continuous shot, in a small room. Rising sun pictures completed 17 shots for this sequence. Fmx is very proud that chris defaria, president, animation, digital production and visual effects, warner bros. Fmx 2014 spotlights virtual production with gravity. From that point it became harder to make any changes as the render times were so long they had 15,000 computer cores running on the film. The discussion is moderated by film journalist bill desowitz. Maths and physics feature very heavily, says webbers framestore. Framestores vfx supervisor tim webber stated that 80 percent of the film consisted of cgi compared to james camerons avatar 2009 which was approx 60 percent cgi.
Framestore preproduction services launches for film and. The british technology behind gravitys oscarwinning visual effects the british production team behind gravity offer an exclusive insight into the creation of their awardwinning visual effects. Tim webber, physicist who is now chief creative officer at framestore in london even if you dont need to understand the maths hidden in the software that the vfx industry use, webber feels it helps to understand the principles of what the equations are doing, pointing to his experience early in his career working on a 1996 channel 4 tv miniseries dramatizing gullivers travels and starring ted danson. Oscar winning vfx supervisor tim webber and members the visual effects team at framestore talk about their experiences of creating the incredible awardwinning gravity. Framestore has produced truly remarkable footage and done more than just. Vfx super at uk effects house framestore, tim webber is the man behind twoface in the dark knight and the wild things in where the wild things are. The films climactic scene shows stone attempting reentry into earths atmosphere. Each pixel is made out of an led that we could control, explained framestores oscarwinning vfx supervisor tim webber. During the first day of the web summit, in dublin, we had the opportunity to interview oscar winning visual effects specialist tim webber. He is known for his work on harry potter and the goblet of fire 2005, the dark knight 2008, avatar 2009, and gravity 20, for which he received an academy award for best visual effects at the 86th academy awards.
A visual book for the visual artist, 3d filmmaking. The fantastic, frightening, fuzzy vfx faces of framestore. Fx guide also have a podcast interview with tim that you can listen to here. During the past four years, visual effects supervisor tim webber has concentrated largely on one film. The trio of cuaron, lubezki and webber soon concluded they couldnt make gravity as they wanted to by simply using traditional methods. Vfx supe tim webber on the challenges of gravity studio daily. The creative studio faced some of the toughest challenges yet thrown at it by a series that has consistently raised the bar on cinematic digital visual effects. It is the leading resource for post professionals world wide and provides free downloads, links to filmmaking resources, as well as tons of information about film and video editing, vfx, sound, colour, and animation. Paddington matt nettheimwarner bros 34 double negative. The faces were shot at shepperton by chivo emmanuel lubezki in his incredible lighting rig and then projected onto geometry. Once something starts moving, it doesnt slow down as it would on earth, explains vfx supervisor tim webber of londons framestore, which handled the. The filmography he and his studio have worked on include the dark knight, gravity. Things in gravity are animated ahead of the time and therefore, the faces of george clooney and.
Well be able to see for ourselves that levels of innovation in visual effects are as high as ever. Charting the lonely quest of an astronaut sandra bullock to survive after her spaceship is crippled, the. Techniques and best practices for stereoscopic filmmakers provides a comprehensive overview of the theory, language, and methods behind stereoscopic 3d filmmaking, all in one package. The creative effects supervisor of londons awardwinning vfx house framestore was talking about the. He was vfx supervisor for gravity, for which his team won a bafta for special visual effects, and an academy award for best achievements in visual effects. Oscar winning vfx supervisor tim webber and members the visual effects team at framestore talk about their experiences of creating the incredible. Tim webber joined framestore in 1988 after an outstanding academic record in maths, physics and art and has been guiding the company in new directions while supervising some of the most technically and artistically challenging projects. It had to look real on one level, otherwise it would jar an audience out of the generally realistic vibe that chris nolan was giving the rest of the film. Autodesk tim webber is an academy awardwinning visual effects supervisor who has worked on some of the most iconic films of the last decade including the visually arresting film gravity.
Tim webber was awarded both a bafta and an oscar in 2014 for gravitys visual effects. And jon landau, the academy award and golden globewinning producer from lightstorm entertainment, is coming to fmx. We came up with technical and creative solutions through talking to tim and alfonso, said tony clark, vfx supervisor and cofounder of rsp. Innovative studios are already combining cg, motion capture, and realtime rendering with more traditional production techniques throughout the production process to more efficiently bring.
Celebrated 3d filmmaker celine tricart explores every facet of the art, from the technical to the practical, including. Tim webber is an academy awardwinning visual effects supervisor who has worked on some of the most iconic films of the last decade including the visually arresting film gravity. Real conversations on reality computing tim webber, vfx. This all happened at framestore, working in parallel with tim webber on vfx. Surfing with guinness the criticallyacclaimed surfer for guinness won more awards than any other commercial spot in 1999, and has been deemed the most iconic ad of all time in. Top 15 movies with the best vfx visual effects of all time. We said if somebody can do it, its tim, lubezki recalls. Charting the lonely quest of an astronaut sandra bullock to survive after her spaceship is crippled, the film received ten oscar nominations, including one for best visual effects. The news, business, technology, and art of animation. Pictures, joins the set of presentations on academy awardwinning gravity, as does tim webber, who received the oscar for best visual effects. Tim webber, who took home the vfx trophy on oscar night, will present the amazing new techniques and innovations used to make the muchlauded film.
Tim webber is known for his work on gravity 20, the dark knight 2008 and children of men 2006. Autodesk 3ds max is used in designing popular games like world of warcraft, need for speed, call of duty. L r alex webster, cto tim webber, fiona walhinshaw. It was based on the technology used at that time, which in 201220 was most commonly putting images on screens behind rock bands or on screens at sports grounds. The new team is led by alex webster, who joins as md, preproduction services after running the third floor in london. Fmx 2014 announces session on the next avatar movie. So much about it was so different to any film before, webber told afp. Gravity tim webber, chris lawrence, dave shirk and neil corbould vfx supervisor, director the vfx team behind gravity didnt set out to invent cuttingedge techniques for filming but thats what the project demandedit was quite an extended process to work out how to do these effectswe werent setting out at the beginning to. The team talk about the challenges that the cgheavy film presented and discuss the unique blend of cinematography and postproduction. The quantity of shots, and the complexity of the many effects used to create the unreal worlds proved a giant success for the team, led by vfx supervisor tim webber.
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