JJ Abrams Talks Visual Effects

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

JJ Abrams Talks Visual Effects FOLLOW (/) NEWS (HTTP://WWW.IBTIMES.COM.AU/NEWS) J.J. Abrams Talks Visual Effects And 'Challenging’ Work On 'Star Wars: The Force Awakens' By Tanya Diente (/reporters/tanya-diente) @mystidrift (http://www.twitter.com/mystidrift) on February 09 2015 2:31 PM Director J.J. Abrams and his wife Katie McGrath pose at the Children's Defense Fund­California 24th Annual "Beat the Odds" Awards in Culver City, California December 4, 2014. Reuters/Mario Anzuoni During his acceptance speech at the Visual Effects Society Awards, J.J. Abrams admitted he was thrilled to have worked on “Star Wars: The Force Awakens.” He said it’s been a thrill working on “Star Wars: The Force Awakens.” The director also expressed his gratitude for Lucasfilm for making his lifetime dream of working on the movie a reality. According to Deadline (http://deadline.com/2015/02/j­j­abrams­star­wars­dream­come­true­ves­awards­1201366546/), J.J. Abrams was especially grateful for head of Lucasfilm Kathleen Kennedy for giving him the opportunity to direct the movie. “I want to thank Kathy Kennedy for saying the words, ‘Do you want to direct Star Wars?’ and actually being in a position to let me direct Star Wars,” he said. Abrams revealed that the past couple of years he’s spent working on “Star Wars: The Force Awakens,” “in the world of light sabers and tie fighters,” has reportedly been “absolutely challenging” for him. The movie has suffered numerous leaks in the past, from plot details to leaked concept art. However, this has not stopped the director from keeping mum on production details. Yet even with these challenges, J.J. Abrams admitted that working on the movie has been a “dream come true.” J.J. Abrams was awarded by the Visual Effects Society for his contribution on various movies including the three “Star Trek” films, two “Mission: Impossible” movies, “Cloverfield,” “Super 8,” “Lost,” “Fringe” and “Alias.” He was especially honoured for bringing back “Star Wars” to the big screen. During his speech, the director credited his award to the credible VFX artists he’s worked with who inspire him to work in the movies. In an interview with Collider (http://collider.com/star­wars­the­force­awakens­jj­abrams­interview/), Abrams revealed that some scenes or concepts in “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” used computer­generated practical effects. However, Abrams said an “old school” approach was done on the CG effects. The director revealed that more CG effects were done to remove things instead of adding them. Abrams said he credits this capability to the numerous tools available during this “age of filmmaking.” “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” relied heavily on visual effects and the creation of actual sets in order to produce a tangible and realistic interpretation of the galaxy. Oscar Isaac once said during an interview (http://insidemovies.ew.com/2014/09/23/oscar­isaac­star­wars­two­faces­of­january/) with Entertainment Weekly that J.J. Abrams actually built the sets during filming so viewers can be treated to a real galactic experience in the movie. To report problems or leave feedback on this article, email: [email protected]. Submit Correction .
Recommended publications
  • Movie List Please Dial 0 to Request
    Movie List Please dial 0 to request. 200 10 Cloverfield Lane - PG13 38 Cold Pursuit - R 219 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi - R 46 Colette - R 202 5th Wave, The - PG13 75 Collateral Beauty - PG13 11 A Bad Mom’s Christmas - R 28 Commuter, The-PG13 62 A Christmas Story - PG 16 Concussion - PG13 48 A Dog’s Way Home - PG 83 Crazy Rich Asians - PG13 220 A Star is Born - R 20 Creed - PG13 32 A Walk Among the Tombstones - R 21 Creed 2 - PG13 4 Accountant, The - R 61 Criminal - R 19 Age of Adaline, The - PG13 17 Daddy’s Home - PG13 40 Aladdin - PG 33 Dark Tower, The - PG13 7 Alien:Covenant - R 67 Darkest Hour-PG13 2 All is Lost - PG13 52 Deadpool - R 9 Allied - R 53 Deadpool 2 - R (Uncut) 54 ALPHA - PG13 160 Death of a Nation - PG13 22 American Assassin - R 68 Den of Thieves-R (Unrated) 37 American Heist - R 34 Detroit - R 1 American Made - R 128 Disaster Artist, The - R 51 American Sniper - R 201 Do You Believe - PG13 76 Annihilation - R 94 Dr. Suess’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas - PG 5 Apollo 11 - G 233 Dracula Untold - PG13 23 Arctic - PG13 113 Drop, The - R 36 Assassin’s Creed - PG13 166 Dunkirk - PG13 39 Assignment, The - R 137 Edge of Seventeen, The - R 64 At First Light - NR 88 Elf - PG 110 Avengers:Infinity War - PG13 81 Everest - PG13 49 Batman Vs. Superman:Dawn of Justice - R 222 Everybody Wants Some!! - R 18 Before I Go To Sleep - R 101 Everything, Everything - PG13 59 Best of Me, The - PG13 55 Ex Machina - R 3 Big Short, The - R 26 Exodus Gods and Kings - PG13 50 Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk - R 232 Eye In the Sky -
    [Show full text]
  • 2016 FEATURE FILM STUDY Photo: Diego Grandi / Shutterstock.Com TABLE of CONTENTS
    2016 FEATURE FILM STUDY Photo: Diego Grandi / Shutterstock.com TABLE OF CONTENTS ABOUT THIS REPORT 2 FILMING LOCATIONS 3 GEORGIA IN FOCUS 5 CALIFORNIA IN FOCUS 5 FILM PRODUCTION: ECONOMIC IMPACTS 8 6255 W. Sunset Blvd. FILM PRODUCTION: BUDGETS AND SPENDING 10 12th Floor FILM PRODUCTION: JOBS 12 Hollywood, CA 90028 FILM PRODUCTION: VISUAL EFFECTS 14 FILM PRODUCTION: MUSIC SCORING 15 filmla.com FILM INCENTIVE PROGRAMS 16 CONCLUSION 18 @FilmLA STUDY METHODOLOGY 19 FilmLA SOURCES 20 FilmLAinc MOVIES OF 2016: APPENDIX A (TABLE) 21 MOVIES OF 2016: APPENDIX B (MAP) 24 CREDITS: QUESTIONS? CONTACT US! Research Analyst: Adrian McDonald Adrian McDonald Research Analyst (213) 977-8636 Graphic Design: [email protected] Shane Hirschman Photography: Shutterstock Lionsgate© Disney / Marvel© EPK.TV Cover Photograph: Dale Robinette ABOUT THIS REPORT For the last four years, FilmL.A. Research has tracked the movies released theatrically in the U.S. to determine where they were filmed, why they filmed in the locations they did and how much was spent to produce them. We do this to help businesspeople and policymakers, particularly those with investments in California, better understand the state’s place in the competitive business environment that is feature film production. For reasons described later in this report’s methodology section, FilmL.A. adopted a different film project sampling method for 2016. This year, our sample is based on the top 100 feature films at the domestic box office released theatrically within the U.S. during the 2016 calendar
    [Show full text]
  • Larger Than Life: Communicating the Scale of Prehistoric CG Animals
    Larger than Life: Communicating the Scale of Prehistoric CG Animals Valentina Feldman Digital Media Antoinette Westphal College of Media Arts and Design Drexel University Philadelphia, PA 19104 [email protected] Abstract — Since the earliest days of cinema, toying with the This statement can hardly be applied to filmmakers, who perception of scale has given filmmakers the ability to create have historically paid great attention to differences of size. spectacular creatures that could never exist in the physical world. The perception of scale is one of the most widely manipulated With the flexibility of CG visual effects, this trend has persisted in aspects of “movie magic,” and has been so since the earliest the modern day, and blockbuster movies featuring enormous monsters are just as popular as ever. The trend of scaling days of cinema. Films featuring impossibly gigantic creatures creatures to impossible proportions for dramatic effect becomes have dominated the box office since the record-breaking problematic when filmmakers use this technique on non-fictional release of King Kong (1933) [LaBarbera, 2003]. Perhaps creatures. Prehistoric animals in particular have very few unsurprisingly, the trend of giant monsters has only continued scientifically accurate appearances in popular culture, which with the advancement of visual effects technology. Movie means that films such as Jurassic Park play an enormous role in monsters are growing bigger and bigger, and moviemakers determining the public’s view of these animals. When filmmakers arbitrarily adjust the scale of dinosaurs to make them appear show no signs of stopping their ceaseless pursuit of cinematic more fearsome, it can be detrimental to the widespread gigantism.
    [Show full text]
  • Promotional Websites in the Film Industry. the Case of the Spanish Cinema Las Páginas Webs Promocionales En La Industria Cinematográfica
    Promotional websites in the film industry. The case of the Spanish cinema Las páginas webs promocionales en la industria cinematográfica. El caso del cine español Sergio Jesús Villén Higueras holds a PhD in Audiovisual Communication and Advertising from the University of Malaga, receiving the European mention. He is a member of various research groups in which he analyses the promotional strategies of the cultural industries on websites and social networks; the ecosystem of Chinese social media and, particularly, the impact of Wechat on young Chinese students; and the cultural and technological transformations that the contemporary Chinese film industry has experimented. University of Málaga, Spain [email protected] ORCID: 0000-0002-6813-3614 Francisco Javier Ruiz del Olmo is a full professor at the University of Malaga. He develops his teaching and research work in the Faculty of Communication Sciences and the Faculty of Fine Arts. He has investigated the communicative models of audio-visual media and the representation of contemporary audio-visual forms, as well as the technical and social uses of them; a second research line is related to communication and new media. Both work lines have in common a significant interest in the qualitative methodologies. University of Málaga, Spain [email protected] ORCID: 0000-0002-1953-1798 ISSN: 1696-019X / e-ISSN: 2386-3978 Received: 09/06/2018 - Accepted: 18/09/2018 Recibido: 09/06/2018 - Aceptado: 18/09/2018 Abstract: Resumen: The development of web languages and the new communicative El desarrollo de los lenguajes web y las nuevas necesidades comuni- needs of the film industry have fostered the evolution of official cativas de la industria cinematográfica han favorecido la evolución movie websites.
    [Show full text]
  • The Participatory Networks of 9/11 Media Culture
    The Politics of Ethical Witnessing: The Participatory Networks of 9/11 Media Culture A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA BY Emanuelle Wessels IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Adviser: Ronald Walter Greene September 2010 © Emanuelle Wessels 2010 Acknowledgements First, I would like to thank my advisor, Ronald Walter Greene. Professor Greene consistently went above and beyond to guide me through this project, and his insight, patience, and encouragement throughout the process gave me the motivation and inspiration to see this dissertation to the end. Thank you for everything, Ron. Thank you to Professors Laurie Ouellette, Cesare Casarino, and Gilbert Rodman for conversing with me about the project and providing helpful and thoughtful suggestions for future revisions. I would also like to thank Professor Mary Vavrus for serving on my committee, and for assisting me with crucial practical and administrative matters. Professor Edward Schiappa, whose pragmatic assistance has also been much appreciated, has been invaluably supportive and helpful to me throughout my graduate career. I would also like to acknowledge the many professors who have inspired me throughout the years, including Karlyn Kohrs Campbell, Donald Browne, Thomas Pepper, Elizabeth Kotz, Greta Gaard, and Richa Nagar. Without the kindness and friendship of the many wonderful people I have had the pleasure of meeting in graduate school, none of this would have been possible either. A heartfelt thank you to my friends, including Julie Wilson, Joseph Tompkins, Alyssa Isaacs, Carolina and Eric Branson, Kate Ranachan, Matthew Bost, Kaitlyn Patia, Alice Leppert, Anthony Nadler, Helen and Justin Parmett, Thomas Johnson, and Rebecca Juriz.
    [Show full text]
  • Academy Invites 774 to Membership
    MEDIA CONTACT [email protected] June 28, 2017 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE ACADEMY INVITES 774 TO MEMBERSHIP LOS ANGELES, CA – The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is extending invitations to join the organization to 774 artists and executives who have distinguished themselves by their contributions to theatrical motion pictures. Those who accept the invitations will be the only additions to the Academy’s membership in 2017. 30 individuals (noted by an asterisk) have been invited to join the Academy by multiple branches. These individuals must select one branch upon accepting membership. New members will be welcomed into the Academy at invitation-only receptions in the fall. The 2017 invitees are: Actors Riz Ahmed – “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story,” “Nightcrawler” Debbie Allen – “Fame,” “Ragtime” Elena Anaya – “Wonder Woman,” “The Skin I Live In” Aishwarya Rai Bachchan – “Jodhaa Akbar,” “Devdas” Amitabh Bachchan – “The Great Gatsby,” “Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham…” Monica Bellucci – “Spectre,” “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” Gil Birmingham – “Hell or High Water,” “Twilight” series Nazanin Boniadi – “Ben-Hur,” “Iron Man” Daniel Brühl – “The Zookeeper’s Wife,” “Inglourious Basterds” Maggie Cheung – “Hero,” “In the Mood for Love” John Cho – “Star Trek” series, “Harold & Kumar” series Priyanka Chopra – “Baywatch,” “Barfi!” Matt Craven – “X-Men: First Class,” “A Few Good Men” Terry Crews – “The Expendables” series, “Draft Day” Warwick Davis – “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story,” “Harry Potter” series Colman Domingo – “The Birth of a Nation,” “Selma” Adam
    [Show full text]
  • Sean Stranks
    SEAN STRANKS Visual Effects Supervisor "I’m in my element at the earliest stages of development, conceptualising and designing approaches to the visual effects. For me, that’s the most creative part of the process." Sean joined Cinesite in January 2020 to deliver the final season of popular SELECTED CREDITS Netflix series Dark. He had previously provided on set supervision in South Africa for the Ridley Scott 10-episode HBO series Raised by Wolves. 2020 - Dark: Season 3 VFX Supervisor Beginning his visual effects career in the 1990s, Sean was a compositor and senior compositor at several studios, including GVFX, Hybride, ESC 2020 - Raised by Wolves VFX Supervisor and Technicolor. He joined Double Negative in London as VFX supervisor in 2007, where he remained for 10 years. Sean cites his 2008 work as 2D 2018 - The Cloverfield Paradox supervisor on Cloverfield as one of the stand-out moments of his career. VFX Supervisor “That is a great film,” he recalls, “The Brooklyn Bridge collapse still holds up today and I’m very proud to have been involved in creating it.” 2017 - Star Wars: The Last Jedi VFX Supervisor Sean received two nominations in the same year in 2016 at the VES awards as VFX Supervisor for Bridge of Spies and In The Heart of The 2016 - Star Trek Beyond Sea. The latter, recalling the sinking of a 19th century whaling ship by a VFX Supervisor giant whale, involved the creation of epic oceanic environments both 2016 - Jason Bourne above and below water. Spectacular underwater travelling shots with CG VFX Supervisor cameras mounted onto whales, included fluid simulations mimicking water currents and the addition of bubbles, krill and general detritus for 2016 - In the Heart of the Sea absolute realism.
    [Show full text]
  • Populating Categories Using Constrained Matrix Factorization
    Populating Categories using Constrained Matrix Factorization Read the Web Project Report Andreas Zollmann January 25, 2010 Abstract Matrix factorization methods are a well-scalable means of discov- ering generalizable information in noisy training data with many ex- amples and many features. We propose a method to populate a given ontology of categories and seed examples using matrix factorization with constraints, based on a large corpus of noun-phrase/context co- occurrence statistics. While our method performs reasonably well on some categories, it is outperformed by a simple nearest-neighbor based baseline. We demonstrate, however, that dimensionality reduction ap- plied to the baseline model improves performance considerably. 1 Introduction The task of macro-reading is to learn facts about the world, such as prop- erties of and relations between entities, from a large corpus of text. In this work, we restrict ourselves to the scenario of populating an ontology of pre- defined categories with noun phrases, and assume that the text corpus can be summarized by a matrix in which rows index potentially relevant noun phrases, columns index potential context phrases, and each entry expresses the number of times the respective noun phrases occurred in the respective context. Given a small number of `seed' example noun phrases for each cat- egory, our task is to find a given number of noun phrases for each category of the ontology with as high precision as possible. Matrix factorization methods are a well-scalable means of discovering generalizable information in noisy training data with many examples and many features. We propose to populate the ontology using matrix factor- ization with constraints, similar in spirit to singular value decomposition 1 (SVD).
    [Show full text]
  • Bear Mccreary
    BEAR MCCREARY COMPOSER AWARDS INTERNATIONAL FILM MUSIC CRITICS ASSOCIATON AWARD 2019 Film Composer of the Year ASCAP COMPOSER’S CHOICE AWARD 2016 TV Composer of the Year PRIMETIME EMMY AWARD NOMINATION OUTLANDER (2015) Outstanding Music Composition for a Series ASCAP COMPOSER’S CHOICE AWARD 2014 TV Composer of the Year PRIMETIME EMMY AWARD NOMINATION BLACK SAILS (2014) Outstanding Original Main Title Theme Music PRIMETIME EMMY AWARD WINNER DA VINCI’S DEMONS (2013) Outstanding Original Main Title Theme Music PRIMETIME EMMY AWARD NOMINATION HUMAN TARGET (2010) Outstanding Original Main Title Theme Music MOTION PICTURES FREAKY Christopher Landon, dir. Blumhouse Productions AVA Tate Taylor, dir. Vertical Entertainment THE BABYSITTER: KILLER QUEEN McG, dir. Netflix FANTASY ISLAND Jeff Wadlow, dir. Sony 3349 Cahuenga Boulevard West, Los Angeles, California 90068 Tel. 818-380-1918 Fax 818-380-2609 McCreary Page 1 of 5 BEAR MCCREARY COMPOSER MOTION PICTURES (cont’d) CRIP CAMP James Lebrecht, Nicole Newnham, dirs. Higher Ground Productions THE SHED (score produced by) Frank Sabatella, dir. A Bigger Boat ELI Ciaran Foy, dir. Netflix CHILD’S PLAY Lars Klevberg, dir. United Artists GODZILLA: KING OF THE MONSTERS Michael Dougherty, dir. Warner Bros. RIM OF THE WORLD McG, dir. Netflix THE PROFESSOR AND THE MADMAN Farhad Safinia, dir. Icon Entertainment International HAPPY DEATH DAY 2U Christopher Landon, dir. Universal Pictures WELCOME HOME George Ratliff, dir. AMBI Group I STILL SEE YOU Scott Speer, dir. Golden Circle Films HELL FEST Gregory Plotkin, dir. CBS Films TAU Federico D’Alessandro, dir. Bloom THE CLOVERFIELD PARADOX Julius Onah, dir. Netflix ANIMAL CRACKERS Tony Bancroft, Scott Christian Sava, dir.
    [Show full text]
  • The Functions of Apocalyptic Cinema in American Film
    Journal of Religion & Film Volume 21 Article 36 Issue 1 April 2017 4-1-2017 Global Catastrophe in Motion Pictures as Meaning and Message: The uncF tions of Apocalyptic Cinema in American Film Wynn Gerald Hamonic Thompson Rivers University, [email protected] Recommended Citation Hamonic, Wynn Gerald (2017) "Global Catastrophe in Motion Pictures as Meaning and Message: The unctF ions of Apocalyptic Cinema in American Film," Journal of Religion & Film: Vol. 21 : Iss. 1 , Article 36. Available at: https://digitalcommons.unomaha.edu/jrf/vol21/iss1/36 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by DigitalCommons@UNO. It has been accepted for inclusion in Journal of Religion & Film by an authorized editor of DigitalCommons@UNO. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Global Catastrophe in Motion Pictures as Meaning and Message: The Functions of Apocalyptic Cinema in American Film Abstract The ts eady rise in production of American apocalyptic films and the genre's enduring popularity over the last seven decades can be explained by the functions the film genre serves. Through an analysis of a broad range of apocalyptic films along with the application of several theoretical and critical approaches to the study of film, the author describes seven functions commonly found in American apocalyptic cinema expressed both in terms of its meaning (the underlying purpose of the film) and its message (the ideas the filmmakers want to convey to the audience). Apocalyptic cinema helps the viewer make sense of the world, offers audiences strategies for managing crises, documents our hopes, fears, discourses, ideologies and socio-political conflicts, critiques the existing social order, warns people to change their ways in order to avert an imminent apocalypse, refutes or ridicules apocalyptic hysteria, and seeks to bring people to a religious renewal, spiritual awakening and salvation message.
    [Show full text]
  • Westside Cities Report
    SUBREGIONAL MOBILITY MATRIX WESTSIDE CITIES Project No. PS-4010-3041-U-01 Final Report Prepared for: Prepared by: Fehr & Peers 600 Wilshire Boulevard Suite 1050 Los Angeles, CA 90017 March 2015 Final Report Westside Cities Final Report Subregional Mobility Matrix Westside Cities PS-4010-3041-U-01 Prepared for: Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority Prepared by: Fehr & Peers In Association With: Iteris, Inc. Arellano Associates, LLC Civic Projects, Inc. Quality Review Tracking Version # Date Reviewer Signature Description/Comments Internal Review Draft 2/9/15 FP Reviewer: Rachel Neumann RMN Draft 2/11/15 FP Reviewer: Sarah Brandenberg Submit Draft to Metro SUBREGIONAL MOBILITY MATRIX – WESTSIDE CITIES March 2015 Page i Final Report Westside Cities Table of Contents EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ................................................................................................................................................................................... ES-1 Mobility Matrix Overview ........................................................................................................................................................................... ES-1 Project Purpose ........................................................................................................................................................................................... ES-1 Process 3 Subregional Overview ...............................................................................................................................................................................
    [Show full text]
  • Don't Let the Future Pass You by Iterative Dystopias On
    DON’T LET THE FUTURE PASS YOU BY ITERATIVE DYSTOPIAS ON THE POSTMILLENNIAL SCREEN Blythe Victoria Chandler Submitted in total fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy December 2015 School of Culture and Communication University of Melbourne Produced on archival quality paper ABSTRACT In the decade 2001-2010, films which presented spectacular futures dominated the box office. In contrast, Code 46 (2003), 2046 (2004) and Inception (2010) conceived immediately recognisable tomorrows, pessimistic futures firmly rooted in the socio- historical present. Despite their divergent production backgrounds, differing story arcs and disparate aesthetics, this thesis contends that these texts are key, early examples of a new subcycle of films it titles Iterative Dystopia. Using a social science fiction criticism methodology, this thesis conducts an interdisciplinary investigation which draws on science fiction genre analysis, dystopian narrative theory and contemporary sociological concepts to define the formal characteristics of the collection and offers fresh readings of the texts. This thesis finds that Iterative Dystopias are defined by the theme of perpetual liminality, an original concept developed following the work of sociologist Arpad Szakolczai. Iterative Dystopia’s perpetually liminal protagonists trace iterative paths across their narrative arcs, searching for an alternative to the continuous transitions of lives lived in this in-between state. Their goal is personal. They just want a place to call home. In direct contrast to the conventional dystopian protagonist, these characters are seeking their utopia within the familiar. These characters are, however, thwarted in their attempts to find a sense of belonging. Through a close textual analysis, this thesis explores three of the narrative environments in which these characters conduct their quotidian existence: the home, the relationship and the mind; and establishes that Iterative Dystopia’s protagonists are frustrated by paradoxes.
    [Show full text]