AWN.com | Media Kit | Contact Us | Register | Log in | Forgot Membername/Password?
AWN » Blogs

From Where The Color Spaces Meet

Douglas Larmour's blog, From Where The Color Spaces Meet, gives insight into the day-to-day challenges that compositors face, as well as the thoughts that crop up in his head while working at the sharp end of the VFX pipeline in one of the best VFX houses in the World.

Douglas Larmour has been working in the Visual Effects industry as a digital compositor on films including Lara Croft:Tomb Raider (2001), Troy (2004), Sunshine (2007) and Kingdom of Heaven (2005). For the last 5 years he has taken on a more senior role as supervising lead on shows including Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 (2010) and The Chronicles of Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010).

He has also been a Visual Effects Supervisor on a number of British films (Stage Beauty (2004)/ Suzie Gold (2004)/ The Other Man (2008)) and was recently nominated for an Emmy for his work on the TV series Rome, Series 2 (2007). In addition to his work for MPC, Doug also worked for a year with Weta Digital on the Oscar winning King Kong (2005).

Should VFX Oscar Reward Groundbreaking, Innovative or Just Clever?

By Doug Larmour | Wednesday, March 2, 2011 at 10:28 am | Blog: From Where The Color Spaces Meet
Posted In | Site Categories: 3D, Awards, CG, Films, Visual Effects

Well, my name is Doug Larmour and I'm the head of Compositing here at MPC London and I’ve been tasked with giving you an insight into the day to day challenges that we face, as well as the thoughts that crop up in our heads while working at the sharp end of the VFX pipeline in one of the best VFX houses in the World. If that tickles your fancy then read on...

Well I suppose right now, because its awards season, I would say the thing that most people are talking about is: why Inception won the Oscar for best visual effects this year?  So why did it win? First of all let me say well done to DNEG for all their splendid work. The environment and destruction work that they did especially in the limbo sequence was lovely to behold.

However, what struck me was that, for the first time in a while, it seemed that the judges at BAFTA and in the Academy gave this award more for how well the physical special effects were done and then seamlessly woven into the visual effects rather than just the visual effects themselves. I can't really see anything overwhelmingly different or wildly new within the film's VFX.