Computer Graphics World

April 2009 28 n n n n Gaming•Multimedia have the budget to do so. (Confidentiality agreements prohibit Hall from revealing the sum.) Visually speaking, there's a cer- tain level of realism in "Chadam," a look that is in step with the story: Chadam, whose strong imagination can physically alter his environment, lives in a hyper-styl- ized, metropolitan island city of Vulture. All the imagery is being captured in high definition at 1920x1080. Hall reasons that the Web series should be an improvement over traditional television content done in CG because there will be more content gen- erated with HDFilms' game-development process than a "traditional" production at the same budget. Hall offers this analogy to support his point: "If I only give you $10 for gas, you will go much farther in a Prius than a Fer- rari. So, when you are trying to get the most distance with limited money, you would use a Prius because it processes fuel differently," he explains. "If you had as much gas as you need no matter what, or if you need to go fast, well then, you would use the Ferrari." Even so, Hall acknowledges that in terms of his analogy, a Prius is not supposed to replace a Ferrari. "We are living with a con- trolled budget and building a machine that can get the most distance while still looking great. We are not trying to negate the need for [traditional 3D software] or traditional 3D productions." Some Bumps Like with any project, the "Chadam" crew has encountered its share of bumps along the road. One of the major limita- tions was not due to a lack of realism, contends Hall. Rather, it was the num- ber of sets and the total number of ani- mations being made. "With any 3D animated project, artists essentially have an infinite amount of res- olution in terms of how detailed their ani- mations, textures, and models are going to be," explains Hall. "Part of the genius of what we're trying to do is control the overarching budget. e trick is figuring out what you can accomplish with a fixed budget, and how compelling you can make that content. It's hard because it is a subjective scale. For every piece, whether it's the special effects, the models, or the level of detail in the animation, they can go on forever." As of press time, Hall and his team were still tweaking and learning as they fine- tuned their creation and the new pipeline. WBTVG has given the project plenty of time to gestate in the hope of getting it right the first time. An Unreal Editor Selection of UE3 was an economical move from the beginning. One of the reasons Hall chose to buy the UE3 license was because Epic Games releases its complete UE3 tool set to gamers through PC titles like Gears of War and Unreal Tournament 3. So, in effect, he got the kit for free. Hall then partnered with a graduate from e Art Institute who had a UE3 background to lead this project and assemble a team, thus further controlling costs. "You have this tool set and all these people who know how to use it," says Hall. "Unreal has become pervasive. It turns out you only need a few experts in terms of payroll, and they can guide others who are newer to this, and you can create some- thing like 'Chadam.' " Epic Games designed UE3 this way, and the key tool that has opened the door once segregated to programmers is indeed Mati- nee, which HDFilms is using extensively for keyframing and camera work. In addition, this software within UE3 gives artists con- trol over lights and particles. In addition, it offers the ability to edit between shots. "Anyone who has worked on any type of software in Hollywood, whether it is Adobe After Effects or Premiere, Apple Final Cut Pro, or Avid Media Composer, can easily jump in and see how Matinee works," says Greg Mitchell, digital cinematographer at Epic Games. "Hollywood is used to work- ing in a system whereby scenes are ren- dered out shot by shot. In one particular film scene, there can be 20 shots numbered individually. UE3 has the director track in it, which allows you to plot out the entire scene in the engine and then actually cut your cameras from shot to shot. You can have an entire scene in one file and then maintain it in the one UE3 scene, instead of having to break it up into small scenes." Although obviously biased, it is Mitch- ell's opinion that the traditional Hol- lywood method of progressing from a moving storyboard or animatic phase to a final master offers a road map with little flexibility. With Matinee, creators can look at things with extra camera shots and then lock down what they want, as opposed to Artists are using primarily 3ds Max to model and animate the characters, and Max and ZBrush are the tools of choice for the backgrounds.

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