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Softimage Helps Bring Fantastic Four to Life

Softimage Co. announced that leading visual effects studios Giant Killer Robots (GKR) and Stan Winston Digital used SOFTIMAGE|XSI software to create several key visual effects and environments for Foxs FANTASTIC FOUR.

As the primary vfx vendor on the project, San Francisco-based GKR was responsible for more than 200 shots in the film. GKR used SOFTIMAGE|XSI to create several of the extensive, immersive environments in the movie, including a photorealistic New York City. For a key action sequence set in the virtual New York, the team used the XSI customizable rendering system to create more than 400 passes with detailed, tailored shader effects. This allowed them to manipulate the lighting and effects, which saved valuable render time while scenes were in the approval process. The XSI Animation Mixer also helped to simplify the high-level animation of both digital cars and people in various scenes throughout the film.

Los Angeles-based Stan Winston Digital completed 92 shots, including many of the scenes where character Sue Storm becomes the Invisible Woman. During the early design process, the art team at Stan Winston used the XSI Realtime Shader technology to develop realistic on-set previs, which allowed vfx artists to share ideas and designs immediately with the production team. The technology helped to create an interactive, dynamic and collaborative environment to plan the effects shots. The Syflex cloth simulation system, which comes as part of XSI Advanced, provided the key to realistic clothing animation. In addition, the Animation Mixer and the high-level XSI animation tools allowed the team to efficiently process and optimize vast amounts of motion capture data for Invisible Woman.

We were responsible for the majority of the CG shots with the Invisible Woman, including the force fields she creates and the objects she makes disappear, and we needed a specific effect for the characters visible invisibility. The intuitive tools in XSI made it easy to quickly test out many variations to find the look that embodied the fluidity of the characters style, movement and props, said Andre Bustanoby, visual effects supervisor at Stan Winston Digital. When working on a film like Fantastic Four that has many elaborate vfx shots, we need to be able to balance the creative and the technical aspects, and using XSI makes that possible.

Added Gareth Morgan, senior product manager for Softimage, FANTASTIC FOUR continues in the tradition of effects-driven summer blockbusters that our customers excel at. From the early days of the company, Softimage has always been a key part of feature film vfx pipelines, for both digital character animation and overall visual effects

SOFTIMAGE|XSI (www.softimage.com) is a complete 3D modeling and animation solution for the film, broadcast, post-production and interactive entertainment industries.

Avid Technology (www.avid.com), headquartered in Tewksbury, Massachusetts, is a world leader in digital nonlinear media creation, management, and distribution solutions, enabling film, video, audio, animation, games and broadcast professionals to work more efficiently, productively and creatively.

Bill Desowitz's picture

Bill Desowitz, former editor of VFXWorld, is currently the Crafts Editor of IndieWire.