The team at Axis was clear that they wanted each Spartan Ops episode to be as engaging as the best feature film or television drama. To achieve this Axis built a layout and editorial team that shot and edited episodes in a way more akin to live action than typical CGI. After the motion capture was complete, Axis would create a performance edit from the reference cameras at the shoot. The layout team then shot the CG cameras providing coverage for all scenes, allowing editorial to have as much flexibility in shot selection as possible.

Director Aitken immersed himself in the Halo canon, taking in everything that could provide insight into previous story elements, given that Axis would be creating never-before-seen moments in the Halo universe.

During the project, a range of production challenges were met, including Axis’ animation department having to work with motion capture across a range of character scales from 5.5ft to 14ft. However, the most demanding task was to create convincing facial animation. In order to maintain every nuance of the actors’ performances when applied to the CG characters, Axis in-house rigging and animation team developed a special facial motion capture solution in conjunction with Giant studios and Cubic Motion, a world leader in solving this difficult problem. The result is some of the most realistic and expressive CGI facial animation to date.

Axis also had to deal with the daunting level of environmental detail that is evident in the Halo world. The studio’s shading team developed a series of procedural approaches in Side FX Houdini, which enabled them make the world feel alive and “lived in.” Additionally, the lighting team was tasked with creating lighting set ups that matched the look of Halo 4 but also developed a tone and approach that gave a signature look to the Spartan Ops episodes. The lighting had to be quick to iterate across multiple shots and artists, whilst maintaining the highest quality being demanded by Aitken and the team at 343 Industries.

As with any cinematic project, sound is an integral part of creating a believable world. Axis turned to Savalas, a previous partner for Dead Island, for all of Spartan Ops’ sound design as well as the final mix.

Spartan Ops was on a scale unseen on any prior project for Axis. The 10 episodes will contain 45 minutes of content, more than 30 characters, 23 sets and 1,200-plus shots.

Source: Axis