VH1 | December 2011

"Hugo" and "The Artist" Lead With 11 Nominations Each for the 17th Annual Critics' Choice Movie Awards

LOS ANGELES, Dec. 13, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- The Broadcast Film Critics Association (BFCA) has announced the nominees for the 17th annual Critics' Choice Movie Awards. The winners will be announced at the Critics' Choice Movie Awards ceremony on Thursday, January 12, 2012 at the Hollywood Palladium. Hosted by Rob Huebel and Paul Scheer, featuring Fitz and The Tantrums as the house band, the show will broadcast live for the fifth year in a row on VH1 at 8:00 PM ET/PT.

"Hugo" and "The Artist" each received an impressive 11 nominations for the 17th annual Critics' Choice Movie Awards, one short of the record 12 nominations for "Black Swan" last year. Martin Scorsese's "Hugo" garnered nods for Best Picture, Best Young Actor for Asa Butterfield, Best Director for Martin Scorsese, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction, Best Editing, Best Costume Design, Best Visual Effects, Best Sound and Best Score. Michel Hazanavicius' "The Artist" received nominations for Best Picture, Best Actor for Jean Dujardin, Best Supporting Actress for Bérénice Bejo, Best Acting Ensemble, Best Director for Michel Hazanavicius, Best Original Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction, Best Editing, Best Costume Design, and Best Score.

Martin Scorsese could have a very big night at the Critics' Choice Movie Awards. In addition to the 11 nominations for his film "Hugo," he directed the Best Documentary Feature nominee "George Harrison: Living in the Material World." Last week it was announced that Scorsese will also be honored with the Critics' Choice Music+Film Award at this year's show.

"The Help" and "Drive" earned 8 nominations each, and "The Descendants" and "War Horse" both garnered 7 nominations. "Drive" was honored in the Best Picture and Best Action Movie categories while "Midnight in Paris" was recognized in Best Picture and Best Comedy categories. "The Tree of Life," "Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close" and "My Week With Marilyn" also scored multiple nominations. "The Muppets" received four nominations, three of which came in the Best Song category for "Life's a Happy Song," "Man or Muppet," and "Pictures in My Head," the fourth for Best Comedy.

George Clooney received three nominations as part of the Best Acting Ensemble nominees for "The Descendants" and "The Ides of March," along with his Best Actor nomination in "The Descendants." This gives Clooney a record 13 Critics' Choice nominations over the years, having received 10 prior nominations in addition to winning a special Freedom Award for "Good Night, and Good Luck."

Meryl Streep will be seeking her third Critics' Choice Movie Award as a Best Actress nominee for "The Iron Lady" while Charlize Theron will be after her second award in the category. Streep previously won Best Actress for "Doubt" and "Julie & Julia" while Theron took the prize in 2003 for "Monster." Michelle Williams, Critics' Choice winner for Best Supporting Actress in 2005's "Brokeback Mountain" will also compete for Best Actress for "My Week With Marilyn." Shailene Woodley earned nods in both the Best Supporting Actress and Best Young Actor/Actress categories, among the seven nominations for "The Descendants." Saoirse Ronan was also nominated for Best Young Actor/Actress for her role in "Hanna," having previously won the category in 2009 for "The Lovely Bones."

The Critics' Choice Movie Awards are bestowed annually by the BFCA to honor the finest in cinematic achievement. The BFCA is the largest film critics organization in the United States and Canada, representing more than 250 television, radio and online critics. BFCA members are the primary source of information for today's film going public. Eligible films were released in 2011. The accounting firm of CMM, LLP tallied the written ballots.

Hollywood Reporter | December 2011

'Hugo' Named Best Film of the Year by the National Board of Review

12:15 PM PST 12/1/2011 by Gregg Kilday

The National Board of Review has named Martin Scorsese's Hugo as the best film of the year. The group, comprised of scholars, filmmakers and students, also gave Scorsese its best director prize for its 3D homage to the early days of film, produced by GK Films and released by Paramount.

“Hugo is such a personal film by Martin Scorsese,” said Annie Schulhof, NBR president. “It is a tribute to the early years of cinema that uses today's cutting edge technology to bring the audience into a completely unique and magical world. It is visually stunning and emotionally engaging.”

Animation World Network | November 2011:

A VFX & 3-D Convergence for Hugo

Rob Legato and Ben Grossmann divulge the secrets behind Martin Scorsese's first foray into 3-D.

By Bill Besowitz | Monday, November 28, 2011 at 5:19 pm

Hugo is a natural for 3-D; in fact, it's one of the few films that cry out for 3-D, with its storybook spatial opportunities: the magnificent Paris train station of 1931 and the myriad of clocks within it, and the recreation of Georges Méliès wondrous glass studio and magical silent films.

Once Martin Scorsese decided to embrace 3-D, there was no turning back. It had to be done right. The idea was to be on the set with the characters. You're with Hugo in the train station; up in the clocks; in the toy store; or with Méliès in the glass studio. It's about the thrill of discovery.

This not only meant shooting in 3-D (with the Alexa and the Fusion 3D stereo rig from Cameron|Pace), but also having the ability to view it live in 3-D to make the proper creative choices and adjustments to the convergence. In fact, if Scorsese couldn't view it in 3-D, then he had no use for it. The flat version was even an afterthought, so take note: Hugo must be seen in 3-D to be fully appreciated.

Indeed, this is 3-D that went beyond the limits of the stereo rig to make the camera separation conform to the human eye. That's why it contains so much more depth than any other 3-D movie you've seen. It's certainly made true believers of Scorsese, who recently said that it's a natural part of the viewing experience, and production VFX supervisor/2nd unit director Rob Legato, who says it's changed the grammar of film.

But more than that, Hugo has changed the way VFX and 3-D work together because, even though the movie was shot in 3-D, it required CG enhancement (more than 800 shots with unique VFX needs) and sweetening to achieve its impact, which is significant. Truth be told, there never was a locked edit until the final day of delivery. They were accepting new VFX shots 48 hours before the deadline to film out the film.

Take the opening fly-through the Paris train station, which looks like a single shot. It's the most complicated sequence and took more than a year to achieve, thanks to the combined efforts of the crew and Pixomondo, which worked on the VFX in nine of its facilities worldwide.

"It took Pixomondo 1,000 computers to process all the material for a giant wide shot of the train station that goes into a tight close-up of Hugo watching through a clock," explains Legato. "It took more than a year to complete. They worked in Stuttgart, Frankfurt, Berlin, London, Toronto, Los Angeles, Burbank, Beijing, and Shanghai. It was the first shot I designed for the movie because we had to figure out the live-action concourse part and what vehicle could get up to speed fast enough to make the whole shot play in a comfortable time.

"I prevised the opening which was created with a virtual camera of sorts. It's a scaled down version of the Avatarsetup using encoded mini crane, and fluid head instead of motion capture, but the concept is the same, as is the software [Motion Builder]. The full size virtual camera was an encoded Louma crane on the live set and real time composite of the CG background and people.

"Where the live action ends and the CG starts is very seamless. The only thing built was the main concourse, a smaller under hang and the front door. It was all greenscreen with CG extension throughout, live action in the middle with CG extension and CG at the end."

According to Ben Grossmann, Pixomondo's VFX supervisor, "They flew so close to the people that they shot them on treadmills or standing on platforms with multiple cameras and then rotomated them to match their performances. These were fully moving 3D people. For distance, we built a team of Massive agents that were all photographed from the actual extras that were used and dressed on set.

Legato suggests so many shots are more dynamic in 3-D, even a little camera move over Hugo's head. Sitting on the ledge of the clock face, using a little crane shot, which he did as 2nd unit, adjusts the depth to bring you there with him.

Meanwhile, the flying drawings that become animated flip pages and the intense close-ups of the station inspector (Sacha Baron Cohen) and Méliès (Ben Kingsley) during his gala speech are extraordinarily immersive.

"You now use space to alter their performance," Legato adds. "In the case of Sasha Baron Cohen, when he bends down and gets in Hugo's face, he gets in our face because he's in our lap. It tells you a different story and places you more in Hugo's position. He's literally invading your space, which is threatening and frightening. Then when we see Georges [who's also up against our face], we read how he feels. It takes us back to the poetry of silence in a way."

Digital Media World | February 2010:

VFX Previsualization for 2012

By Adriene Hurst | February 2010 Issue

The realism of the destruction of the world in ‘2012′ may largely be due to the detailed previsualization Pixomondo completed for director Roland Emmerich and the visual effects team, headed by Volker Engel and Marc Weigert.

Pixomondo′s work on the film started with the previsualization of the destruction of St Peters Square. The first passes of their previs of the scene were shown to VFX Supervisors and co-producers, Volker and Marc. After their initial comments had been addressed, the passes were shown to Roland.

“Our first priority in the previsualization was to lock down the staging of the storytelling elements, the timing, the framing, and anything relevant for the edit of the sequence,” said Rainer Gombos, VFX Supervisor at Pixomondo. “It was our goal to deliver working sequences to the filmmakers rather than individual shots.

“The St Peters Square sequence had been storyboarded for us, and most of the more extensive sequences that we later worked on either had storyboards prepared or were already partially pre-visualised by other vendors. We were asked to address outstanding comments on these and to enhance the animation and look of the shots. But on some sequences we were free to suggest completely new shots.”

When Rainer and his team started working on the approximately 200 shots of the third act, the sequence was not fully storyboarded yet and they had to rely on the script as a starting point. Roland was already shooting in Vancouver at the time. “I flew to Vancouver for a few meetings and we worked out the remaining shots. He is artistic and was able to sketch out many of the remaining shots for us. Nevertheless, we also hired a storyboard artist to support our pre-visualization team in LA.”

Pixomondo′s scope of work grew and developed a great deal as the project got underway. Originally, they worked on two previsualization sequences. “Then for one of the sequences, we were asked to produce finished VFX shots. We delivered around 100 final composites of full CG environments, with the Antonov cargo plane crash landing in the Himalayas and the full CG shots of helicopters transporting animals,” said Rainer.

Three VFX-heavy sequences were added to the original work assignment for pre-visualisation as well - the Los Angeles limousine sequence, the Los Angeles plane sequence, the destruction of the Washington Monument and most of the third act, including all the ark boarding scenes and the scenes with the arks in the tidal wave up to when the ark is passing Mount Everest.

For their shot production, they were working with a beta version of thinking particles. “For our CG FX department in Berlin, it was an enormously helpful tool when working on the complex CG destruction simulation. One of the most challenging shots was when the Antonov transport plane tips over at the edge of a glacier cliff. The camera is held close on the plane and the cliff, and the shot is 100% CG,” Rainer explained.

“The technical challenge was the multi-level breaking of large ice chunks into smaller and smaller pieces. All this integrated with fluid systems for smoke and icy water spray, as well as an avalanche of ice with larger chunks sliding down and disintegrating in a flood of small pieces. But the shot production did not produce major surprises, as the pre-visualisation was solid. There are always changes in post production but they weren′t excessive in this case.”

Pixomondo′s regular previsualization pipeline is based on 3D Studio Max as their set-up and lighting tool, and V-Ray is used as their standard renderer. “On ‘2012′, the transition of focus from pre-visualization to post-visualization, to layout animation and then to final shot production was fluid, as we could stay with Max and V-Ray. After Effects was used for pre-visualization compositing, but for final shot production our compositing department used Nuke.

“Several Pixomondo Studios contributed to the work on ‘2012′. In our LA studio, around 40 artists worked on pre-visualization, animation, lighting and compositing. Artists working in our studio in Stuttgart contributed the Antonov textures. A team in our Frankfurt Office worked on the animals. And our CG FX team in the Berlin office, together with their compositing department, worked on the most challenging simulation shots,” Rainer said.

From May through October 2008, around 80 artists were involved overall in the production of the approximately 700 pre-visualization and 100 VFX shots. Rainer′s team included lead animator Paul Dennis Taylor, visual effects lead Mohsen Mousavi, visual effects producer Steve Kullback and visual effects executive producer Thilo Kuther. They were working on previsualization for five months, and their final shot production assignment lasted another six months.

VFX previsualization is, in fact, one of Pixomondo's specialties, and they have established an effective approach to such projects. “In general, we want to deliver to the client advanced camera moves and animation. The sets might be scarcely decorated at times but the camera moves and the edit need to be working,” said Rainer. “The difference on ‘2012′ was that we went further in visualising CG FX elements - destruction, fire, smoke - and also delivered first lighting and matte painting passes. Many assets, models and simulations had to be produced.

“To pre-visualise the destruction of LA by the massive earthquake, we created an ‘earthquake engine′ that would slice and deform the surface depending on the amount of destruction the director asked for. We also created sets of pre-simulated house destructions that could be placed and timed according to the needs of a particular shot.” All these tools had to allow for fast iterations so they could try out and suggest alternative camera angles within the tight previsualization schedule.

They aimed to design each shot to allow the viewer to understand it, and used whatever technique seemed the most appropriate. For example, if a car is sliding through a snow cloud at night, the headlights in the snow become an important storytelling element. Rainer said, “Every shot has a purpose and it needs to be clear, even in the pre-visualization, what the shot is about. One of the goals of the pre-visualization is to eliminate costly shots that are not needed to tell the story.”

To a large degree, Pixomondo′s previsualization designs were successfully translated into layouts and used in the finished film. The sequences of the limousine driving through Los Angeles, the one with the plane taking off, then dodging collapsing skyscrapers and their completed CG sequence showing the Antonov cargo plane attempting to crash land in the Himalayas, did not change significantly in final shot production. Rainer believes that the reason many shots followed the previsualization so closely was that the director and the editorial department worked extensively with the team during their design.

“Fortunately, Roland Emmerich understands previsualization,” explained Rainer, “and in most cases if he liked the previsualization shot, he would also approve a similar looking final composite.” There was, of course, one factor that Pixomondo couldn′t predict and control so well. “We also created many pre-visualization shots that featured actor stand-ins. In the previs, everyone accepted that they would stiffly slide over the floor. On the set, unfortunately, they would behave more like human beings and be terribly unpredictable, and therefore change the timing and framing of a shot. Often, the whole edit had to be changed.”

Overall, however, the previsualization allowed VFX production to be more predictable and there were many requests from the director or the editorial in the post-production to “make it look more like the previsualization”.

Animation World Network:

Structured Destruction The Previs for 2012

By Matt Kapko | Monday, December 14, 2009 at 8:43 am | AWN News

Posted In | News Categories: Business, CG, Films, Visual Effects | Geographic Region: All | Site Categories: Business, CG, Films, Visual Effects

Press Release from Pixomondo

The detail of the massive global destruction in 2012 is a reflection of the intense previs work done by Pixomondo for director Roland Emmerich and producers/visual effects supervisors Volker Engel and Marc Weigert.

The previs was not only a road map for the technology of the production and post production process in the execution of the huge number of visual effects shots, the previs was equally important as a storytelling tool for the film′s creators. While the previs served and assisted the filmmakers with the lighting, camera, post pipeline and other technical issues, it gave Roland Emmerich the opportunity to create, revise and layout a detailed blueprint for the images he and his team wanted to see on screen.

2012 previs was almost a seamless process of visualizing the story and the roadmap of how to execute this process.

From May through October 2008, Pixomondo visual effects supervisor Rainer Gombos worked closely with Roland, Volker and Marc producing the previs shots. Rainer′s team included lead animator Paul Dennis Taylor, visual effects lead Mohsen Mousavi, visual effects producer Steve Kullback, and visual effects executive producer Thilo Kuther. Work was spread between the Los Angeles, Frankfurt, Stuttgart and Berlin facilities of Pixomondo which has offices around the globe.

“In a sense, the sun never sets on Pixomondo”, states Thilo Kuther. “We are by design operating 24/7 around the world. In today′s complex global filmmaking community there is really no other way to work to satisfy the needs of our clients.”

Pixomondo had to provide previs that satisfied Sony′s desire to keep it simple while providing as many possible options to enhance the process for the filmmakers. Almost everything had particles for water, ice, fire and snow, motion capture, modeling or other tools to help define the shots. As the previs developed and matured in its capabilities so did the confidence with it. In some cases Pixomondo was creating shots when storyboards did not exist.

The communication and trust between Roland, Volker, Marc and Pixomondo permitted them to develop a pipeline of previs that often reflected final shots almost 1 to 1. This is a huge benefit for an effects driven film like 2012 with over 1300 shots.

Pixomondo′s previs focused on the big action sequences which required the most complex work. The ability to design and resolve these shots in detail in advance was a huge advantage to both the creativity and cost of producing global destruction on such a massive scale. Pixomondo also contributed over 100 finished shots for the airplane and cars sequence.

“It was some of the most organized and creative destruction ever on film. It was great fun”, said visual effects supervisor Rainer Gombos.

http://www.awn.com/news/business/structured-destruction-previs-2012

Animation World Network:

Ninja Assassin: There Will Be Blood

By Bill Desowitz | Monday, November 30, 2009 at 3:45 pm

Posted In | Site Categories: Films, Visual Effects

The Wachowskis are back doing what they do best with director James McTeigue (V for Vendetta). And Ninja Assassin is an anime-inspired martial arts film with plenty of CG: blood, weapons, dismemberment, embers and matte paintings. Nearly 800 vfx shots were done by Pixomondo, Trixter, Ghost FX, Rise FX, Evil Eye, Hirota Paint, Roto Factory and Prologue. In addition, in-house artist Ryan Urban provided postvis design, working initially in After Effects and later switching to Shake for many of the final composites, removals and fixes.

"It was a fun romp and obviously the complete opposite of Speed Racer," suggests Dan Glass, overall visual effects supervisor. "And obviously a lot of the same set up as V for Vendetta. The brothers were behind it but much more intentionally left it to James. Second time around, it's an easier job.

"The one thing for me was that it came so much on the tail of Speed Racer: they literally started shooting three or four weeks after we delivered. So, for the first time in my life, I just couldn't do it, so I brought in Chas Jarrett [Sherlock Holmes], who'd helped us on Speed Racer, and he supervised the shoot for me. I was there for breakdowns initially and kept in touch during the course of it and joined it in post."

As with Speed Racer, the production took advantage of Germany's Federal Film Fund. According to Variety, Ninja Assassin received 5.8 million Euros ($9 million). But in this case, more than three-quarters of the vfx took place in Germany. As a result, Chris Townsend (Journey to the Center of the Earth) was hired onsite during post.

"The majority of the vfx work was split between four different companies in Europe: Trixter in Munich, Pixomondo in Stuttgart, Ghost in Copenhagen and Rise FX in Berlin," Townsend relates. "As a vfx supervisor, I worked directly with them, to ease the flow of information between James and Dan and the artists and supervisors 5,000 miles away. For most of the artists, Ninja was the first time they had worked on a major Hollywood studio picture. With that, comes a steep learning curve about what the needs of the clients are, how high the quality has to be and how many iterations are deemed necessary to satisfy the director's vision. The nuances of client presentation techniques and when it's OK to charge for a requested change, were as important as checking black levels, matching grain and finessing matte edges.

"Daily, for about seven months, I found myself on a plane, train, taxi or driving myself between these four cities, often feeling like I was in a movie myself. With teething problems of small companies trying to grow, comes both frustration but also huge excitement, as artists realized that what they were doing was an important part of a much bigger picture. And, after about 800 shots, it's amazing how many in your face vfx shots there are, but equally incredible to see how many go unnoticed, the seamless invisible shots, which contribute greatly in making Ninja Assassin as visually slick as it is."

Blood simulation work was initially led by Pixomondo (done with RealFlow), and then also created at Trixter and Ghost FX using references from anime. The Pixomondo work was so good, in fact, that the simulations were used to generate libraries as the shot count grew higher.

"There's a lot of inspiration we took from anime and, particularly, Ninja Scroll, which we sent out as a reference to all of the vendors," Glass continues. "And it's got these super stylized battles in the forest, which is one of James' favorites. The clothes get torn to shreds and the blood travels in sheets that are very graphic and we designed it to have that feel but incorporating a physicality that you could almost believe except for the amount."

With about 7 liters of flying CG blood per ninja, Pixomondo definitely had its hands full.

"Our work started with a huge matte painting for the preparation of the shooting in Berlin," recalls Bjørn Mayer, vfx supervisor at Pixomondo. "The 125k translite matte painting was wrapped around the set for the rooftop sequence after Raizo's first kill. The cityscape painting was printed 90m x 10m and lit from behind to serve as the environment for the rooftop fighting sequence.

"Together with Chas Jarrett, I was set-supervising 1st unit for the whole shooting starting in June 2008 for seven weeks. Early after principal photography, we received first plates to start with R&D on the blood squirts. Pixomondo worked overall on 185 shots that included a lot of blood and flying limbs but also all set extensions and matte paintings as well as the animation of Raizo's favorite chain weapon for some sequences.

"Our most complex shots were the head slicing sequence in the tattoo parlor in the beginning of the movie and the slow death of Raizo's nemesis. Although a lot of blood reference and blood elements were shot in front of greenscreen, we used none of them in our shots due to interaction with blood and other elements like jaws, heads, necks, hands, arms and much more. I think we were most successful with our blood simulations at the point when Dan asked us to reduce realism again because the MPAA would rate the movie NC-17, which was not intended by the studio.

"James had very special expectations for blood flying in the air, which were sometimes hard to meet because we had to bend a few laws of physics to match the shapes he had in mind. With the very dedicated work of our fx team, we were able to get all the arcs, discs and spirals of blood out of every limb or head flying in any direction as desired."

Bill Desowitz is senior editor of AWN & VFXWorld.

http://www.awn.com/articles/article/ninja-assassin-there-will-be-blood/page/2%2C1