The film, made as part of the company’s ‘Project Arena’ deep dive into ICVFX (in-camera VFX), highlights the state of visual effects and filmmaking – from the artist’s point of view; new innovative virtual production tools integrate virtual shoots into overall production pipeline, enabling direct use of film production assets without any preprocessing.
Leading global visualization technology company Chaos has released a short film, Ray Tracing FTW, which highlights the state of VFX and filmmaking – from the artist’s point of view. The comedic short is the first major test for Project Arena, the culmination of the Chaos Innovation Lab team’s dive into potential applications of real-time path-tracing technology for in-camera visual effects (ICVFX) on virtual production stages.
Project Arena seamlessly integrates virtual shoots into the overall production pipeline, enabling direct use of film production assets without any preprocessing. The application is meant to eliminate the need for scene stripping, asset conversion, or baking, to maximize efficiency while reducing production costs, and ultimately making virtual production more accessible.
Ray Tracing FTW, inspired by classics like Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid and Once Upon a Time in the West, is an Easter egg-laden commentary about what holds productions back from telling great stories. While a "fix-it-in-post" mentality can certainly cause problems, the short argues that a return to golden-age filmmaking is only lacking real-time tools that truly let people operate in the moment.
“Technology is too often a distraction on set,” said Christopher Nichols, director of special projects at the Chaos Innovation Lab and VFX supervisor/producer of Ray Tracing FTW. “It crashes, doesn’t respond fast enough, or requires too many specialists to make it work right. We’ve been developing Project Arena to change all that, so everyone from the artist to the DP can stop thinking about the technology, and just get back to the natural rhythms of filmmaking.”
The upcoming virtual production toolset promises a faster and simpler alternative to game engines. With Project Arena, artists can move V-Ray assets and select animations to LED walls in around 10 minutes, accessing real-time ray tracing with known pipelines. The production-ready tools let artists use the same assets throughout the process (from pre to post), with no do-overs or drops in quality, mitigating the need for virtual art departments.
Chaos shared that Project Arena’s role on Ray Tracing FTW worked as intended, bringing over two trillion polygons to the screen for three days straight, without any of the crashes that often come with using game engines in virtual production. The consistent, always-on system let the team pull off 30 set-up shots during a standard 10-hour shoot day without thinking about tech.
Feeding the screen was a massive V-Ray environment of an Old West town, designed by Erick Schiele and built by The Scope with the help of KitBash3D and TurboSquid assets. The production used this environment on everything from all-CG establishing shots and tunnel sequences to the background for a physical train car set, which was able to portray nuanced details by using full ray tracing.
Having detailed CG models blend seamlessly with physical sets allowed director of Photography Richard Crudo (Justified, American Pie) to get almost every shot in-camera, barring a Bottleship VFX-driven train crash or two. In addition, when needs suddenly came up, such as “finding a 3D hacienda for the final shot,” the crew was able to buy one online and get it on-screen in under 15 minutes.
"I was shooting predominantly in an LED volume and I was continually blown away by how genuine the results looked — even to the naked eye,” . It was so clear how much quicker and more efficient Project Arena made the compositing process, which enabled a much more aggressive sense of creativity in the photography," said Crudo. "By carefully managing the color and density values of the volume with the live foreground action, I was able to bake-in the exact look I wanted. And since there was no guesswork to burden the special effects supervisor, the DI process was equally invigorating. I'm certain my colleagues will embrace this tech as soon as it becomes available."
Although Ray Tracing FTW was a test project, its production approach was the same as that used on any other major project, Nichols explained, “Everyone understood the assignment,” which was to craft a love letter to one of Old Hollywood’s most popular genres, using modern tools and opinions.
To achieve an old western look, the team used an ARRI Alexa 35, loaded with Panavision PVintage lenses, which replicate the original Ultra Speed lenses used throughout the 70s. For color, the team relied on Mark Griffith of FotoKem, the post house which also graded V-Ray I.R.L., the Heat-inspired short that first got Nichols and crew thinking about industry-focused films.
The production tapped Nick Cave and INXS super-producer, Nick Launay for sound and music and to make the theme song evoke the spaghetti westerns of old. Alex Smith and Margarita Mix managed the overall score and sound design, respectively.
"In the 60s, the studios were in trouble.,” said Ray Tracing FTW director and writer Daniel Thron. “Audiences were tired of the same old stuff. But then you get this wave of young filmmakers coming in with smaller cameras that allow for naturalistic photography and acting, and that revolutionized Hollywood. We have the opportunity to bring that same sentiment to the next revolution in filmmaking."
Watch Ray Tracing FTW, the first major test for Chaos’ Project Arena:
Source: Chaos
Debbie Diamond Sarto is news editor at Animation World Network.
