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September/October 2022

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www.postmagazine.com 2 POST SEPT/OCT 2022 EDITOR'S NOTE mazon's new series The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power is recognized as the most expensive show ever made. It cost $250 million to acquire the broadcast rights, and more than $450 million to produce the first season, with a second season already in the works. That said, the show's VFX supervisor Jason Smith never felt that the production had an unlimited budget when it came to building the various kingdoms inspired by the writings of JRR Tolkien. "We looked at the work. We knew it had to be a high caliber," Smith explains. "We knew the facilities that we wanted to work with. We estimated what the work would take. We put a number down and a number of shots that we expected to do at each vendor. It wasn't a dream number. It wasn't any kind of padded number. It was literally, 'Here are the dollars that we need to put this story on screen in the way it deserves.'" Our cover features the Queen Regent Míriel (Cynthia Addai-Robinson), who rules the island kingdom of Númenor on behalf of her ailing father, the King. Míriel is pressured to fund a journey to Middle-earth, where darkness is growing, and while she is initially hesitant, her own premonitions have alerted her to pending doom for Númenor if action is not taken. On page 11, I speak with key members of the show's production and post teams, including Smith, who is a VFX supervisor with ILM, as well as producer Ron Ames and colorist Skip Kimball. The show employed an AWS cloud workflow, allowing collaborators to easily share assets across the globe. Kimball was at home in Idaho for much of the post timeline, while Ames and the production team were in New Zealand. Blackmagic Design collaborated with the production to develop realtime remote color grading tools for DaVinci Resolve software, which have since been rolled into Version 18 for all users to take advantage of. Check out this month's feature to gain insight from Ames, Smith and Kimball on how this massive project — the equivalent of four two-hour movies — came together. Also in this issue, I had a chance to speak with Ben Jones, VFX supervisor at MPC, which created all of the CG characters and environments featured in Disney+'s new streaming feature, Pinocchio. Tom Hanks is one of the feature's few live-action characters, portraying skilled craftsman Geppetto, who carves the puppet and ultimately brings him to life after wishing upon a star. Starting on page 14, Jones explains how the characters were created, using physical props for reference, and what scene demanded the most attention. My Policeman, from director Michael Grandage, seamlessly takes the viewer between the 1950s and 1990s, where the subjects of a love triangle are forced to confront the past. The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival and now streams on Prime Video. Post contributor Iain Blair speaks with the director (page 16), who discusses the adaptation of Bethan Roberts' award-winning novel, how it was shot and his collaboration with Oscar- winning editor Chris Dickens. Other highlights in this issue include Kendra Ruczak's report on the "Bad Travelling" episode of Netflix's Love, Death + Robots (page 26), which was directed by David Fincher. The episode marks the filmmaker's computer-animation debut, and Blur Studio was instru- mental in helping him realize his vision. And on page 18, Post speaks with the editorial team that helped create Peacock's new romantic drama, Vampire Academy. The show was shot in Spain, and the editors all worked remotely using high-performance virtual workstations configured by Remote Picture Labs. There's much more to check out, so enjoy the issue and be sure to visit postmagazine.com for additional post-related content. BY MARC LOFTUS EDITOR-IN-CHIEF MLOFTUS@ POSTMAGAZINE.COM A WORLD BUILDING SEE US ON EDITORIAL MARC LOFTUS Editor-In-Chief Post Publishing, LLC 516.376.1087 mloftus@postmagazine.com KENDRA RUCZAK Managing Editor Post Publishing, LLC/CGW kruczak@cgw.com CONTRIBUTORS IAIN BLAIR Film & TV DESIGN MICHELLE VILLAS Senior Art Director michelle@moontidemedia.com ADVERTISING MARI KOHN Director of Sales Print, Digital and Awards 818.291.1153 cell 818.472.1491 mkohn@postmagazine.com LISA NEELY Publisher's Assistant Sales Manager 818.660.5828 lneely@copcomm.com JUNIOR LOPEZ Customer Service, Circulation 818.291.1117 jlopez@copcomm.com TOMMY RITTWAGE Digital Marketing Social Media 818.291.1166 tommy@copcomm.com REPRINTS 781.255.0625 • 818.291.1153 WILLIAM R. RITTWAGE President/CEO Post Magazine is published by Post, LLC, a COP communications company. 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