Chabrier was indefatigable — he spent a year designing the shamanistic sequences.

Chabrier did long research on the Internet to find textures that could form the basis for future 3D images. What he came up with were fractal artworks, mathematical forms, macrophotography, electron microscope imagery and quantum physics concepts. Ultimately, each image of the trance sequences consisted of dozens upon dozens of superimposed textures. All were submitted to various effects such as blur or vibration in order to be stylized. “We didn’t want the sequences to feel like a ride, or like a comic strip!” explains Chabrier.

Casting the Right CG Artists
Completed at the end of 2002, principal photography was followed by a full year of postproduction work at Mac Guff. Heading a team of about 30, digital effects supervisor Bruno Chauffard oversaw the effort of generating hours of 3D animation — each image consisting of multiple animated layers — and the creation of some 250 “invisible” effects shots for the non-shamanistic sequences. Those included cable and rig removals, painting out footsteps in the desert, adding light effects and enhancing explosions.

Dieu (God) is seen in his CG breakdown form (above) and as a final image.

CG animation and 2D effects were assigned to individual artists according to their sensibility. “We had long conversations with each one of them about shamanism and mysticism, trying to communicate what we’d experienced”, recalls Chabrier. “Some of them got it right away and developed great concepts. Others rejected the whole thing and gave up after a while, saying: ‘I just don’t get it’. At Mac Guff, we often have artists single-handedly creating a shot from beginning to end, controlling every aspect of it. This was not possible on Blueberry though, as the amount of 2D and 3D work that was required for any single image obliged us to set up a production pipeline.”

The sheer amount and complexity of the CG models required the development of a procedural modeling tool nicknamed X-Frog. It allowed the artists to create the basic structure manually while the repetitive aspects of the model were generated procedurally. Simpler models were created with Symbor, Mac Guff’s in-house modeling and animation software.

Complex structures were animated procedurally while simpler objects, such as the creatures, were handled manually. Particle systems were also used for a large number of elements. In several disturbing shots, snakes and other creatures take on the shape of the moving face of the main characters. For those, Mac Guff resorted to a different technique. “We shot each actor on our stage with three synchronized cameras, one in front of him, one on each side at an angle. This tri-cam technique allowed us to capture facial movements in three dimensions and to apply that information to the CG animation. Whatever objects were forming the shape of the face would then follow the movements of the actor. It would be a 100% CG face, but the actor’s performance would still be there.” Rendering was done by proprietary software, nicknamed MGLR, using either radiosity or ray tracing.