Category: Visual Effects

The Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has voted the Gordon E. Sawyer Award to David A. Grafton, a pioneering designer of lenses for optical effects printers, which at the time of their development were adopted by nearly every visual effects facility in the movie industry.

The award, an Oscar statuette, will be presented to Grafton at the Scientific and Technical Awards Dinner on Feb. 9 at The Beverly Wilshire.

Vicon provided state-of-the-art motion-capture systems and support to Sony Pictures Imageworks on the performance-capture hybrid BEOWULF from Paramount Pictures.

The film is the most ambitious project to date employing Vicon motion capture systems, and achieved many "firsts," including shooting with 200+ MX 40 cameras, and capturing the movement of more than 20 performers simultaneously.

The Pixel Farm Ltd. has released PFTrack 4.1 Personal Learning Edition (PLE). The free learning edition of The Pixel Farm's industry-leading tracking and matchmoving application allows students, digital artists and facilities to evaluate, learn and master PFTrack 4.1 without the need for a permanent or temporary software license. The complete toolset of PFTrack 4.1, including geometry tracking, image-based modeling, z-depth extraction and multiple-motion solves, is included in PFTrack 4.1 PLE.

With last week's highly anticipated 25th anniversary release of BLADE RUNNER: THE FINAL CUT from Warner Home Video on DVD, Blu-ray and HD DVD, it's a very opportune time to publish some of director Ridley Scott's comments at a press roundtable, which VFXWORLD participated in.

Prior to embarking on the FINAL CUT, Scott decided to screen a print for the first time in about 12 years to make notes. However, he was so surprised and elated at how well the film holds up, that he wound up not taking any notes.

Paul O'Shea has departed The Moving Picture Co. to become Asylum's newest vfx supervisor.

After having met Asylum Co-Founder/Creative Director Nathan McGuinness, O'Shea was persuaded to join the team. "Nathan's vision for the future of Asylum, the quality of visual effects, and the opportunity to work with the amazing talent here was a deciding factor for me. This, coupled with the chance to bring my daughter up by the beach, convinced me to swap Soho for Santa Monica," said O'Shea.

The Visual Effects Society (VES) will launch a new white paper program beginning in 2008 to better service and educate the entertainment industry on the practice and business of VFX. The first paper, titled "The State of VFX," is due out in March and will cover the industry transition to a digital-dominated production paradigm and how it is being driven by rapid changes in technology. Other issues addressed are economic and creative and how they all affect each other.

Peter Plantec, our resident expert on Virtual Humans, tackles the cognitive dissonance that's at the heart of the Uncanny Valley problem, which is very topical right now with the release of BEOWULF. VFX vet Tim McGovern tells us all about his VES India Tour, which should pave the way for greater future endeavors. And Tara DiLullo Bennett finds out about the latest Weta Digital endeavors for THE WATER HORSE, opening Christmas Day from Fox. Speaking of which, due to the holidays, the VFXNewswire will be going out on Thursdays for the next two weeks.