Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/47583
V F X [ ] '05 and subsequent years to work on [the episodic series] Star Wars:The Clone Wars are now in senior roles on our animated feature, which started production late last year. Others are working on games and some have decided to stay on Clone Wars, which has become a destination in itself." The staff now numbers 500, and they hail from all over the world."We have more than 30 nationalities represented," Slevin says.They have not only worked on numerous Clone Wars episodes but also hundreds of shots for Transformers: Dark of the Moon, the two Iron Man movies and 25 percent of Rango. "Singapore is our first stop for production work" unless the bandwidth and skill sets required are not available, he reports. "But there's a dwindling list of what Singapore can't do." Lucasfilm also maintains "strong partnerships" with vendors in Taiwan, Japan and Shanghai, he adds. Geographic and time-zone issues have been hard to surmount, and the biggest ongoing challenge has been on the communications front. "People are largely accustomed to speaking to each other face to face in this industry," says Slevin."When you don't know someone face to face, it's hard to build that trust.We've made big efforts to bridge that." Advantages outweigh drawbacks, however."We've hugely increased our capacity with a sort of follow-the- sun workflow," he notes."Singapore has also offered an opportunity for experimentation and innovation:We call it our Petri dish.We're married to certain work- flows and processes in California, but starting from scratch you can try different things. It gives us a chance to unlearn some habits that have become ingrained. It's really healthy to see that you don't have to do that." With Lucasfilm Animation Singapore "bursting at the seams," the company has broken ground for a new glass-sheathed building nicknamed The Sandcrawler by George Lucas. It's scheduled to open in 2013. "The global production marketplace is where we live now," he notes."Either you embrace it and figure out how to make the most of it or you spin in a constant cycle of 'why can't it be like it was before?' and that's a waste of time — that era is not coming back.The bene- fits [of the global marketplace] are huge.You get access to a human cloud if you're willing to take the jump." MPC Headquartered in London, MPC (The Moving Pic- ture Company) has a considerable global presence with offices in Vancouver, Los Angeles, New York and Bangalore, India. MPC launched in Vancouver just over three years ago when the company (www.moving-pic- ture.com) was awarded shots for Watchmen.At about the same time MPC started building a team in Banga- lore to carry out roto, paint and matchmove tasks. Both facilities focus primarily on feature VFX, while satellites in LA and NYC handle mainly commercial work. "Economics was certainly a major consideration for the formation of Bangalore and Vancouver, how- ever, facilities cannot function on economics alone, and the available talent in both locations made setting up facilities a viable option," says Christian Roberton, MPC's managing director of film."Vancouver's time zone is also an advantage when working with Califor- 42 Post • September 2011 O N T H E M O V E nia-based filmmakers." Roberton says that "from the beginning it was im- portant for us to build self-contained facilities capable of producing VFX at any level. In Vancouver we have been able to achieve this relatively easily as we were able to send experienced artists from our London fa- cility to share their knowledge [and] workflow with the artists there.We were also able to recruit new artists from North America to join MPC Vancouver's expanding team." The plan for Bangalore is similar but on a longer timetable."Our goal is to produce full VFX shots at our Bangalore facility," says Roberton. "Although Bangalore has a wealth of extremely talented artists, there's a lack of experience gained from working on productions. This is something that we are bringing to the team in India, and we are progressing towards this successfully." It's key for MPC to ensure that "our artists and clients always receive the same experience regardless of the location of the facility," he stresses. "Consis- tency in VFX is something that we put great impor- tance on.We have structured our facilities in a way to ensure there are no A or B teams.We share our artists, technologies and learned experiences [among] all of the shows we work on." Although MPC's facilities may be thousands of miles apart,"there's a definite mindset that we can treat [any] facility [as if it were] in the building next door," he says. "We try to ensure that we are constantly sharing and communicating and fully integrated.There are some areas, though, that do make sense to retain in one place without duplication. Our great software team has been established in London for many years, and al- though we do have some software team members in Vancouver, our primary team is based in London and the majority of our software is developed and main- tained from [there]. Apart from that, we aim to cover each location with the full range of capabilities." MPC's pipeline team adapted workflow to deal with the company's new global structure."I think [we were] one of the first, certainly in the UK, to build the global pipeline model, therefore we are ahead of most people on this," Roberton says."The full set of software tools we use are available in all locations.We do have our central database and asset management database served from London, so we're constantly syncing back to the UK.This means that we are very much reliant on a sophisticated networking solution. As our parent company is Technicolor we were able to make use of the network they had created for their worldwide post business." MPC is currently tackling the issue of scheduling and production management."There isn't an available solution to enable us to schedule work across multi- ple facilities around the world," Rober ton explains. "We have now developed our own scheduling tools that enable us to look at MPC as one facility and the production team to track their shows across all facili- ties through a global schedule. It did take some time for us to build the tools, but there was no option but to write something of our own." He notes that "setting up a facility and ensuring consistency doesn't come for free: It takes time and dedication.You have to work really hard to make sure www.postmagazine.com that things come off well. No one is willing to risk the quality of a project [by] not being able to guarantee delivering VFX of the highest quality." MPC Vancouver has delivered shots for Sucker Punch, Fast Five and Source Code and is currently working on Sherlock Holmes:A Game of Shadows, Life of Pi, Journey 2:The Mysterious Island and Jack the Giant Killer. MPC Bangalore worked alongside London and Vancouver on X-Men: First Class and Fast Five, and is busy with Sherlock Holmes:A Game of Shadows and John Carter of Mars. Among the advantages of MPC's global reach is the ability to draw on the various financial advantages of working in many different locations and bringing them together in one package."We are able to pass the savings we make on to our clients and hopefully bring in more work," Roberton says. The company's multiple facilities also offer a change of scene for artists with a wanderlust."Now we can offer them an alternative [to working in London] while remaining within the MPC family," he notes. Roberton emphasizes that "the VFX business is all about moving forward,whether that's with new tech- nologies, pushing the creative bar on each project or making sure that you can adapt to the budget. If you be- lieve working in VFX is a privilege rather than a given, [you have] the mindset that you've got to be open to the next challenge. I think MPC Film has done it's expanding for now, but we know for sure it's a constant evolution and we are ready for the next step." [ COVER STORY for the show? ] FINE:"We do most of our color matching on set at the DIT station.We'll often use silhouettes on one cam- era while the other camera is shooting at a 90-degree angle with cross-light.USA,our network, likes splashes of saturated color and blue skies,but we'll temper that with the softening effects of reflections and foreground blur- ring.We do almost no lighting on exteriors, and favor mixed, natural lighting at most locations." POST: Can you talk about shooting in New York City? FINE: "Even as a NYC-based DP and director, I've never tired of using the city as a location. Everything from deciding where to walk away for food or coffee to riding bikes to work at dawn to navigating the aleatory aspects of shooting in the vivid street environ- ment still remains a true joy after 25 years in the city. "On White Collar, we use the city as our principal set for the show.We'll typically cut out all the street level signage and commercial clutter and feature the great design and architecture that exists right above the first floor. Our signature master framing is an asymmetrical low-angle shot with high headroom with the characters relatively small.We balance graphic compositions with cluttered,moving long lens shots. You'll not mistake our show as taking place anywhere but NYC, and I've been eager to pay homage to the great artists who've worked here, by referencing their work:Woody Allen, Paul Strand, Helen Levitt,William Klein, etc.We love showing how architecture speaks to character and we feature locations from beaux-arts to cutting-edge contemporary." cont. from 27 cont. from 14