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ENVIRONMENTS 18 ■ CGW M a r ch / A p r i l 2 014 from previs and integrated the shot – of an actor on a buck in Bulgaria – into the final shot in the CG environment. It was a monumental effort on Scanline's part." For his part, Hollander worked with the director on detailed previs for the land-based shots and was on set in Bulgaria for the shoot. "Everything was on greenscreen except for one day when we shot outside," Hollander says. He worked primarily with The Third Floor and Halon on the previs, which continued even after filming began. "When the actors are on a stage where everything is green for 360 degrees, they can lose the sense of where things are and what the action is," Hollander says. "So we kept adding more and more detail to the previs. For some scenes, we had CG characters [representing actors] with facial reactions turn their heads in the way we thought they would turn. Some en- vironments were completely detailed. But in others, we were more abstract." The production crew was in Bulgaria for six months. And during eight weeks of production, previsualization continued. "We'd do Cinesync with the previs studios, go through the scenes, and review them on set with the director," Hollander says. On set, the actors could see the previs on monitors, and markers on the greenscreen represented elements in the en- vironment that would appear in the final shot. "Patrick Tatopou- los designed the environments. But the actual sets were on small greenscreen stages in Bulgaria, so we would need huge [digital] set extensions. I was gritting my teeth knowing how rough it would be later. The big sets were fine, but the small sets were cramped and not big enough to be lit properly. We had green spill everywhere." When production ended, Hollander moved on to a previous commitment, A Winter's Tale, while Zack Snyder joined the 300 production, bringing along John "DJ" DesJardin, who had just finished Man of Steel, to supervise the visual effects effort in postproduction. Geysers of Blood "It's a whole CG movie," DesJardin says. "Same as the first. Although a lot of it is painterly, everything is pretty much mod- eled to a high level of detail. We tried to make it more real than you'd think, so Zack [Snyder] could dial it down or up the con- trast or push the color in DI. It has the same tone as the first movie. The main thing we did differently is that all our blood is 3D CG so we could control it. We still have geysers of blood, but they are on the ocean. We could do big washes and really be ridiculous about it." Three studios tackled most of the visual effects shots, with Scanline sailing through all the sea battles and with Cinesite and The Moving Picture Company (MPC) attacking the land- based sequences. "I came in at a good time," DesJardin says. "I think the hard part was in Bulgaria. The decisions I was part of happened after the fact to enhance the story. Scanline was so far down the line already that the only input I had was to suggest a few more shots to set up the geography. Brian [Hirota] and Scanline had already developed the look. The water doesn't look unreal. If you don't have a natural relationship between the vessels and the scale of the water, you wouldn't like the movie very much. We did put a huge standing wave in the first battle. But in terms of the fine elements, the foam, ripples, and swells, it's pretty naturalistic." Enhancing the story for land-based shots involved adding el- ements to the sets and set designs. "MPC started with a tent palace for shots when Xerxes conquers Athens," DesJardin says. "By the time we got done, Xerxes was in the middle of death and destruction. We had bodies tacked to columns." Charley Henley supervised the work at MPC, which also in- cluded the burning of Athens on the Acropolis, the post battle ■ SCANLINE ARTISTS CREATED the water in most sequences for 300. MPC artists added over-the-top effects to land-based environments. VIDEOS: Go to "Extras" in the March/April 2014 issue box .com .com