We also removed over a thousand rigs digitally." This included five hundred and thirty-one digital assets, three hundred and twenty-five digital puppets. We had one-thousand four hundred and eighty-six effects shots, which were two-hundred more than Kubo. "The goal was four seconds of completed film a week. Again, the amount of time it takes to create a film like Missing Link is near unfathomable: Our final presentation at Laika Studios was from Steven Emerson, Laika Visual Effects Supervisor, on Missing Link. The craftsmanship and detail to the Missing Link sets were astounding. I'll skip describing them to avoid plot spoilers. Nelson Lowery also showed several smaller sets specific to integral parts of the movie. We were also shown massive sets of the Himalayan forest, Yeti temple, an ocean steamer, and ice bridge. They took up an entire sound stage, and were designed to be broken apart thus allowing filming from every angle. There were mammoth sets, a frontier town, train station, and railroad. They were introduced by production designer Nelson Lowery. The rigging team is largely forgotten by audiences because all of the rigs are digitally removed during post.ĭan Pascal took us to several other sound stages to see the sets from Missing Link. Not only were the puppets controllable, a bevy of different knobs moved the curtains to simulate wind. We were also shown a specially designed rig for a scene in a wagon. One especially cool rig was a giant recreation of Mr. Then there were huge rigs designed for specific scenes. Every puppet had a rig mechanism built in the back to control general movements. He took us to another sound stage to show us the various rigs used to move the puppets. Next up was Ollie Jones, Head of Rigging. The printing demo was jaw-dropping, but just a warm up to the amazing second half of our tour. This 3D printer prints at sixteen microns! For example, a human hair has a width of seventy-five microns. An interesting note is that the process takes the same amount of time no matter how detailed the printed structure. The rapid prototype machine takes ninety minutes to print a row of faces. The finished product is hard to the touch and astonishingly detailed. The printer also sprays down a support material. He had the machine print a few demo faces for us to inspect.
#Laika films produced full#
Now we have a full color, voxel precision printer, a Stratasys, that can print in sixteen micron layers." The second printer used powder, then spray-on color glue for ParaNorman and Kubo. "The first printer used liquid resin for Coraline. Brian McLean broke down the evolution of 3D printing at Laika with three machines: The parts are printed rapidly on a 3D printer, then filmed interchangeably for each emotion or action. Each puppet has to have a different face or hands for movement.
This was next level, mind-boggling technology. Our next presenter was Brian McLean, Laika's Director of Rapid Prototyping. Particularly impressive was the studios focus on precise facial expressions. Link puppet weighed 3 kg and had thirty different replacement skins for the puppeteers. We even put in a breather, so we can see his avocado-shaped belly move."Įach Mr. Link puppet has two-hundred and fifty components. "Eighty-six teams worked on manipulating the puppets, from wireframe, to concept, to sculptures. The film is truly bigger than anything we've seen in stop motion animation. Missing Link has sixty locations with different backgrounds, sets, and color schemes. Their previous film, Kubo and the Two Strings, had twenty locations. This includes a year of pre-production and script work, two years of filming, and then two years of post-production. The film is a roller coaster, kaleidoscope, and travelogue."Ĭhris Butler and the wizards at Laika spent five years making Missing Link. "I wanted the Indiana Jones of stop motion. He wanted to break boundaries, push the medium to new heights: Chris Butler directs a grand adventure on an epic scale. Missing Link's characters and settings are on a scope we've never seen before. The footage was eye-popping and very funny. Chris Butler, Missing Link's director/writer and Arianne Sutner, Head of Production, showed us four completed scenes from the film, and the second international trailer. We were shepherded into a screening room for our first presentation.
0 kommentar(er)
