re:think Creates Graphics Package for NFL Draft

Press release from Luxology:

MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA -- Whether it’s in joy or frustration, The NFL Draft makes people want to shout from the rooftops. This year, re:think studios [1]brought their own ideas sky high when they turned promos for ESPN’s 2012 NFL Draft broadcast into rooftop reels for the nation’s top football prospects. And since primetime spots for the nation’s biggest sports channel means game time for graphics; re:think turned to Luxology [2]’s modo 601 [3] and its lightning-fast renderer to make all those bright lights, and brighter talents stand out.

Starting from colorful storyboards created in tandem with The Vault NYC – an advertising agency that also helped with the concept – re:think brought a CGI world full of a run-and-gun passing, swift rushes, neon letters, ESPN analysts, and the NFL Draft logo to life. To provide a dynamic look to the fast-moving sequences, each non-video set piece was rendered with modo, which helped since they were working on a production schedule that needed to be even quicker than the players.

“We needed a software package that would render like the wind,” said Brian Bullock, Founder and Head of CGI at re:think Studios. “modo is definitely the right tool for high-quality, flicker-free animation.”

Having already employed modo’s rendering engine on past projects, re:think Studios knew it could be used to render out multiple EXRs reliably without any fuss or extra coding. This allowed them to focus on the artistic aims of the project, instead of worrying over technical details. And with Alembic-based file transfer tools, re:think artists were able to move back and forth through their favorite 3D software programs with ease.

“Without modo, we’d probably still be rendering frames right now,” added Bullock. “We rely heavily on its photo-realistic engine because we can put our trust in the output. It has delivered excellent results quickly, time after time. And time, in this industry, is money.”