Page 87 - 3D World - October 2017

industry
Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets

Left: Alpha space station which Below: the pearls are a highly
is populated by a thousand evolved androgynous species that
different worlds and species emote through chromatophores
was constructed by rodeo Fx on top of their skin

worlds and make them seem quite different. “we wereN’t shy at doiNG all CG shots, aNd mixiNG live-
Inherently there’s a geometric textural aCtioN aNd diFFereNt elemeNts. it was whatever made the
complexity. We have to make it clear what
world that you’re in and make it complex visual eFFeCts soup more iNterestiNG”
but not distracting. The more you load into Scott Stokdyk, Production VFX Supervisor
a screen sometimes it can desensitise you to
what you should be looking at. I had to work and the animation style.” A science-fiction hard on the visual effects vendors in terms
with Luc, Philippe Rebours and the ILM franchise that pushed the boundaries of of tracking if we hadn’t got amazing quality
team to figure out when we should defocus futuristic technology gets referenced. “Luc metadata out of the camera.”
backgrounds, add a blue tourist treatment had Mikros FX do an homage to Star Trek “Luc had an edit of the movie a year
effect on actors, and pull out items that were at one point, where people materialise in the before release so we were able to turn over
distracting, and add things into empty areas background. Rodeo FX is so good at design shots early to our visual effects vendors,
that were weirdly distracting because they and took the lead on the feel of the motion and give almost a year’s worth of post-
were bare. It was definitely a shot-by-shot graphics but there were also cases where we production,” states Scott. “We had the
design challenge, which was fun.” had Mikros FX and Weta Digital come up luxury of having some of the best visual
As well as creating environments from with different ideas.” effects companies in the world so I don’t
scratch, the team soon realised it was also think after we got going there was a worry
creating new rules. “When I came onto the efficient techniques about the work looking beautiful. The
movie and saw the early pre-vis I asked “We chose to work in 2K instead of 4K as biggest challenge was making sure there
where the gravity was coming from,” we wanted all of our VFX money to go into was a cohesive feel to all of the visual effects
chuckles Scott. “Within about one day I more iterations and designs”, remarks Scott. that were in Luc’s world.”
realised that we were making up our own “3D was a post conversion so we weren’t Valerian and the City of a Thousand
rules on Alpha. There’s something about having vendors working on two different eye Planets has its own unique spin on the
sci-fi technology which is so far ahead deliveries.” The camera of choice was the science-fiction genre. “There are scenes in
that you can’t wrap your head around the ALEXA XT. “Luc shot with a single camera. here, like when Laureline puts a jellyfish on
concepts, so you have to let go of some of the occasionally, for action shots he would her head to have a psychedelic flashback,
things that you know now.” The Skyjet was use a second camera or go to a Steadicam that I’ve never seen anywhere else. I want to
co-designed with Lexus. “It was brought operator. Luc operated using a zoom lens watch audiences react to the Pearl sequence
to visual effects life by Rodeo FX, which as a variable prime so that he could work at the start of the movie. It’s a powerful
pieced together some 3D files and practical efficiently; he could do a close-up on the emotional scene with synthetic characters.”
scans for the CG model and designed details actors then for a second take keep rolling Valerian and the City of a Thousand
like the weapons system, motion graphics and go wider. It would have made things FYI Planets is in cinemas now.

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