Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1522701
with The Third Floor, so when we got into shooting, it was effective- ly content that the directors had contributed to and were satisfied with as a proxy to the action that they ultimately wanted to see in post. Are you on to your next job at this point? Stephen Rosenbaum: Not yet. There's a few things that are perco- lating out there, but nothing yet. I'm in a few preliminary discussions. Whiskeytree San Rafael, CA's Whiskeytree was brought in to work on 19 shots for Masters of the Air, but that order grew over the series' long schedule, ultimately rising to a total of 283. According to Whiskeytree VFX supervisor Aidan Fraser, the stu- dio's contributions spanned the entire series, and began with basic, out-the-window shots that replaced previs elements shot on an LED volume. "A lot of the scenes we were working on were kind of where they're on the ground," Fraser explains. "Less of the big action scenes, but required creating that photoreal environment. [They were] slow- er-paced scenes, and we're used to working on big action scenes, where shots are less than three seconds long. We're looking at a lot of really long takes. So that was interesting. We really get to stare at the work for a while." He points to a scene where the crew is grounded due to intense fog. The scene was shot with a gray-screen backdrop, and then the Whiskeytree team created the low-visibility environment. One of Whiskeytree's more intricate contributions was a long establishing shot of Nazi-occupied Paris. The visuals are part of a three-minute scene that includes a view from a train and then ex- pands to show period-accurate architecture that's been adorned with German flags. "All of that detail was really fun to kind of research and get into," says Fraser of the city's architecture. Fellow VFX supervisor Brian Meanley agrees. "There was a lot of research that went into it. Aidan had done a lot of good work to up- front, like trying to find the right location to base our shots in. And then from there, we could look at the actual map data to make sure we got historically-accurate buildings, streets, and the trains that were running through the city. We wanted to make sure we started with that data upfront. And then things had to be art directed a bit too, so we had to remain flexible. But because it was such a large, vast shot, a lot of it [had] to be done procedurally. So that's where [lead digital artist] Pierre [Nahoum] came in." The studio's VFX skills landed them another complicated shot—a scene set just aer the Allied forces take the coast of France. "[VFX supervisor Stephen Rosenbaum] liked working with us," re- calls Fraser. "Our work was going over well, and he said, 'How about we give you D-Day?' It became one of the shots that's in the opening sequence—that's quite an undertaking. We're up in the air, from the pilot's perspective, looking down, seeing not only squadrons of B-17s and P-51s, but basically everything that has happened on Omaha Beach aer the battle, and seeing all of the organizing of troops, vehicles, and tents. Just an enormous amount of detail to put into those shots." Whiskeytree used Autodesk Maya as its main asset creation tool.