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VFX•CG Films ■ ■ ■ ■ envelope, to break out of the real world in a way, and go into fantasy." In this sequence, the "wires" became the light Adds McGrath, "We wanted to push the sources. "When we saw the color script, we real- ized it would be graphic, colorful, and abstract," Ramasubramanian says. "And, that the unim- portant things would fall into black. Usually, you're afraid to let things go to black, and not very often do you see the light sources, only the impact of the lights. Th is was very non-tradi- tional." Th e bright lights against the black back- ground had an unexpected benefi t beyond the dramatic impact. Usually, images lose contrast in stereo 3D, but not these images. All the circus apparatus, from the ramps to the rings, to the keyboard the King of Versailles plays, is a light source. "Kendal [Cronkhite, production designer] kept saying she wanted things to look like a glow stick or a lightbox," Peterson says. "A lightbox is not just a surface that illuminates. Something beneath the surface diff uses light in an interesting way; it's intense in the middle. We wanted to get that look on geometry." When the King of Versailles plays the key- board, the animated keys light up, and that light shines on the characters. "Th at starts in eff ects," Peterson says. "A glow stick looks in- tense in its core, and it's always intense, no mat- ter what angle. Th ere's a volumetric substance inside, and it was important to simulate that, so we put light sources in the middle of the keys, rather than on them." Th e same was true for the tightropes and other geometry. Th e crew even illuminated confetti created with traditional particle eff ects by adding glints. "Th e eff ects in this fi lm are never con- ventional," Peterson says. "Th ey're zany and wacky. It was very interesting work. And, super-satisfying in the end." ■ Barbara Robertson is an award-winning writer and a contributing editor for Computer Graphics World. She can be reached at BarbaraRR@comcast.net. Blue Sky Studios, the acorn-obsessed creature moves heaven and earth, literally, as his latest quest for the elusive nut tears the Pangaea world apart into the seven continents. As a re- sult, unlikely "beasties" Manny the mammoth (Ray Romano), Diego the saber-toothed tiger (Denis Leary), and Sid the sloth (John Leguizamo) become separated from the rest of the herd and are cast adrift on an ice raft in the open water. And so their adventure begins. Th e gang gets captured by a band of prehistoric pirates. Th ey escape on an ice raft, destroy- ing the pirates' ship-shaped iceberg in the process. Th ey fi nd refuge on an island. So do the pirates, who begin building another ship. Th is time the gang steals away on the pirate ship. Th e pirates construct a new shark-propelled boat and give chase. Meanwhile, back on land, the continental breakup wreaks havoc for the herd. Th ey move to a land bridge and become trapped, until Manny arrives just in time to save them. Returning is Manny's wife, Ellie, and their daughter, Peaches, who is no longer a baby but a teen. She has a crush on BMOC (big mammoth on campus) Ethan. But over- protective Manny has rules; Peaches rebels. Th en the really big rift occurs (thanks to Scrat), separating Manny from his family. Taking "center ice" alongside the franchise's main characters in Continental Drift are some newcomers, including: the female saber-tooth Shira, a pirate (that is correct) who eventually steals Diego's heart; Sid's long-lost clan members, including his crotchety Granny, who be- comes a surprise castaway; the fearsome orangutan pirate Captain Gutt; the jiggly 4,000-pound Well, Scrat, the prehistoric squirrel-rat, did it again. In Ice Age: Continental Drift, the fourth animated feature from Twentieth Century Fox/ Blue Sky creates new water tech and more for the latest prehistoric adventure, Ice Age: Continental Drift By Karen Moltenbrey Granny was a diffi cult character to be around, as Diego discovers. Granny's design, with her loose, fl abby skin and fur shawl, was also diffi cult for the crew at Blue Sky, albeit in a different way. elephant seal (and fi rst mate) Flynn; and others. Th ree in particular—Granny (with her fl abby neck and fur shawl), Gutt (with his long beard), and Flynn (with his jiggly body)—were espe- cially challenging for the creative crew, requiring new technology and workfl ows. Despite the diffi culties that all the furred (and feathered) creatures presented, the biggest hurdle came from Mother Nature herself in the form of a vast, sometimes turbulent ocean, Images ©2012 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp. Courtesy Blue Sky. June/July 2012 61