Digic Pictures, the Imaginative VFX Studio Behind Some of the Most
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GAME Digic Pictures, the imaginative VFX studio behind some of the most high-profile videogame cinematics, discusses its extensive portfolio and looks ahead at the challenges of a rapidly evolving medium alo, Mass Effect, Assassin’s Creed, level of quality seen in Blizzard’s cinematics OUR aiM IS ALWAYS TO Castlevania, Prince of Persia – for Warcraft 3, which was considered to be Hthese are among the most visually the industry standard at that time.” CREATE SOMETHING THAT groundbreaking and recognisable The first challenge in the formation of the IS MORE THAN JUST COOL videogame franchises of recent years. studio was to dip into the talent pool of the But in today’s industry of big-budget Hungarian capital, recruiting a team of AND VISUALLY PRETTY tentpole releases, being among the most experienced artists disciplined in realistic iconic brands doesn’t guarantee success. computer animation. “These artists and – wE WANT TO MAKE OUR Publishers are increasingly turning towards developers had to build a pipeline to deal TRaiLERS MEMORABLE VFX houses to conjure cinematic with such content,” says lead modeller Alex Sándor Rabb, producer showcases to artistically demonstrate the Tamás Varga. “They also had to develop themes and style of upcoming products, workflows and tools to create the with pre-rendered promotional trailers and characters and environments, animate in-game intros becoming synonymous with them, add effects, render it all and then top-tier videogame titles. That’s where composite everything. Perhaps even more Digic Pictures comes in. The pre-eminent importantly, Digic had to learn about Budapest-based 3D animation and visual movie-making in a format very different effects studio has, in the last decade alone, from 30- to 60-second commercials; produced some of the most celebrated and staging scenes, using cameras and basically award-winning in-game and promotional telling a meaningful story in this new way.” sequences for companies such as EA, The gamble paid off, as the success of the Ubisoft and Konami. shorts would earn the studio the distinction Digic specialises in emulating the flourish of becoming the first Hungarian project ever of a Hollywood blockbuster, using its to graduate for selection at the SIGGRAPH world-class artistry to sell the idea of Electronic Theatre. “There are probably cinematic bombast within the boundaries of many different ways to gauge success,” each vividly conceived virtual world. It responds Sándor Rabb when asked whether started in 2003, when the studio was there’s a formula to the studio’s continued founded to produce five fully animated 3D prosperity. “It could be the number of views shorts for a new real-time strategy game. on the internet, or sales figures for the game “Digic was originally formed for the sole itself, but our aim is always to create purpose of creating the cinematics for something that is more than just cool and Armies of Exigo,” reveals producer Alex visually pretty – we want to make our Sándor Rabb. “The goal was to reach the trailers memorable.” 32 l 3DArtist Images courtesy of Digic Pictures © All rights belong to their respective owners 3DArtist l 33 Game changers THE BIGGEST CHALLENGES FOR US HAVE ALWAYS BEEN TRaiLERS THAT NEED TO Halo-developer 343 Industries is just one of ENCOMpaSS AN EpiC SCOPE the big-name studios that Digic has worked Péter Svéd, project director with on breathtaking cinematic sequences “We want to deliver quality films to our clients while maintaining a comfortable workplace for our team – a place where everyone is happy to arrive in the morning and do their best,” says Svéd The studio has worked within some of the biggest brands in modern entertainment, including Warhammer, Halo, Assassin’s Creed and Mass Effect For a series of in-game cinematics in Halo 4, Digic utilised developer 343 DIGITAL WORLDS middle-eastern dustscapes and vast Industries’ in-game assets, blendShape nodes for some non-linear encompass that epic scope. A good There’s little doubt anyone will forget Digic’s Mediterranean cities in Civilization V’s epic rebuilding them with an even deformations like sticky lip corners.” example is our Mass Effect 3 campaign work on The Secret World. Digic embraced cinematic, the studio had already greater level of detail “Although the end results work well, this trailer, where we had to create shots at the the massively multiplayer game’s attempt to established a precise animatic process. “For completely manual process takes a long scale of a ladybug on a blade of grass, open break free from the limitations of its genre, us, the animatic is not just a pre-vis phase to time,” adds Varga. “For this reason, on more that up to a field of sunflowers, then entire delivering a series of character shorts that be discarded later, it’s actually where all of recent projects we’ve moved towards using cities getting destroyed – finally all shown showcased the title’s Lovecraftian themes the camera work and major layout elements image-based facial capture to provide a from outer space.” and invited viewers to enter the rich, dark, are finalised,” states Rabb. “Indeed, the good basis for our animators to start out Delivering both the pre-release and fantasy world through the perspective of a animatic is where directing as such with. What this means is that video footage announcement trailer for Mass Effect 3 was range of distinctive personalities. “Funcom happens. Therefore, the aim is to get the is taken of the actor’s face (usually from a a daunting task for the studio and its work approached us with a well thought-out animatic as close to final result as possible small head-mounted camera during motion on the sequel easily ranks as its highest- overall brief, the concept being to introduce in terms of the edit, the angles and the capture) and the key features of the face profile project to-date. “We always feel each of the main characters in their own timing of all key action. We do our best to (eyes, mouth, brows) are then tracked pressure to deliver top-notch work, dedicated shorts,” says project director have our mocap sessions as early as frame-by-frame. An algorithm then regardless of the client or project,” Svéd Péter Svéd. “We actually took the possible so that we can incorporate at least converts this data into animation curves explains. “We really do put pressure on opportunity to experiment with integrating all of the hero characters’ performances into The challenge for Digic on each videogame project is conveying that can be applied to our facial rigs, which ourselves to make each of our films better the tone of a product rather than the actual gameplay, thus some live FX plates we filmed into some of the animatic. This helps us lock the cameras creating a leaping point for the player’s imagination then essentially drive all the available facial than the last. It is also equally important to our shots. On the ‘Grifter’ piece, for as soon as possible, which then makes the blendShapes we’ve created for the us to keep improving our methods.” This example, we recorded water tinted with ink rest of the layout work and shot-specific DIGIC MOTION DISCUSSES character. A lot of hand-tweaking is still philosophy paid off in the case of Mass Effect running down an improvised greenscreen setup decisions possible.” THE STUdio’S ON-SITE required on top of the raw automatic 3, with the announcement trailer being – this was used for the spooky fluid running The Civilization V project was notable for solution to get decent end results. listed for screening at SIGGRAPH, up the walls in the toilet scene at the end of its expressive and authentic facial MOTION-CapTURE STUdiO Nonetheless it’s still very helpful in Vancouver, 2011. Svéd recalls the vast the film. Similarly, we used real milk in our animation, which was completed Established four years ago, Digic Motion is a motion-capture establishing a realistic timing for the technical challenge of the ensuing campaign live FX plates for the milkshake blender painstakingly by animating intricate key facility that not only enables Digic Pictures to keep all of its gestures and lip-sync. It saves the animators trailer – due in part to it being Digic’s first mocap work on-site, but offers a high-resolution and accurate shots in the ‘Firestarter’ piece. However, frames. “Our face rigs are technically not a lot of time, which they can then spend on project produced in stereo 3D. There were a performance-capture for a range of feature film, television, we’ve moved away from this approach since too complex, so we can quickly rebuild them commercial and interactive markets. getting the nuances right.” number of unique hurdles this posed for the then. These days we aim to create all of our when necessary,” explains Svéd. “We try to “We established Digic Motion in 2009, right next-door to Digic studio: “I remember the main simulations in FX in full 3D. This way we can maintain keep all of the deformations in a single Pictures,” says project director Péter Svéd. “Obviously, it makes a EVOLUTION IN ACTION the shot with the skyscrapers collapsing more artistic control and have no issues blendShape system and focus on the quality huge difference to us to not have to travel for mocap sessions and “Scope is a key word for us at the beginning right on top of the camera were achieved with integration.” of the shapes themselves instead. For be able to easily record pickups and so on. At the moment we of every project,” says Svéd, musing on the using Houdini,” says lead technical director, As Digic’s portfolio was starting to gather example, the old chieftain’s neck skin is not have 16 of Vicon’s T160 cameras and use Blade 2, which enables challenges that come with conveying scale Szabolcs Horvátth.