CASPER BAR

"Great animators can do wonderful things with great software."

Casper
ILM's goal in creating Casper and
his ghostly cohorts was to design
characters that totally engrossed
the audience to the point where
they never stopped to think:
"How did they do that?"
(C) 1995 U.C.S. & Amblin, Casper Harvey Comics, Photos courtesy of Industrial Light & Magic.


News A GHOSTLY CHALLENGE
How do you make people believe in ghosts?
You create the impression that they are unbelievably real. That's exactly what Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) has accomplished in the making of Casper. Their visual effects wizards have, yet again, created incredible feature film animation. Animation director Eric Armstrong says, "We chose Softimage 3D to animate and articulate the ghosts, camera and environment for Casper because it was the best software for this challenge."

The Productivity Factor
With a phenomenal 400 shots of visual effects to create-more than any other feature film in history-productivity was a critical factor. "With Softimage, we knew the software was flexible and powerful enough for the animators to accomplish the type and quality of animation that has earned ILM its reputation as the world's foremost visual effects facility. Casper is a testament to the quality and flexibility of Softimage 3D."

loupe ANIMATION MAGIC WITH
SOFTIMAGE 3D
A Matter Of Movement
Armstrong continues, "To animate the ghost, we imported the models into Softimage, chained them, then articulated them through inverse kinematics and hierarchical rotation." ILM chose this method of animation because it gave them the flexibility to combine a variety of Softimage tools in unique and innovative ways. The result was a set of animated characters that "read" as 3D with the free floating, fluid motion the audience expected of ghosts. Ironically, ILM initially tested the motion capture tools in Softimage 3D, but the result looked too human. Armstrong knew that they wanted a more cartoon-like look with a greater range of fluid motion for Casper and his uncles.

A Learning Experience
Another challenge was training almost 30 traditional animators that ILM recently hired to work on Casper. This is another one of the reasons Armstrong chose Softimage animation software. "Every piece of software has its strong point. Softimage's is its animation, flexibility, and intuitive interface", adds Armstrong, "Great animators can do wonderful things with great software. Softimage 3D made the learning process a lot quicker and easier for the newly hired animators. It was so amazing to watch them experiment as the team came up to speed with Softimage."

Fatso
1
Casper Enters
The Real World

A small grouping of the
ILM contingent.
From Left: Janet Healey,
Doug Smith, Dennis Muren,
Miguel A. Fuertes,
and Eric Armstrong.
Casper
(C) 1995 Industrial Light & Magic. All rights reserved.
INDUSTRIAL LIGHT & MAGIC
Founded by George Lucas in 1975, ILM has set the standard for visual effects, creating world class visual effects for Star Wars trilogy, the Indiana Jones series, Jurassic Park, The Mask, and Forrest Gump. Based in San Rafael, California, the award-winning team's latest endeavor is Casper, featuring animated 3D characters using the latest in Softimage technology.


Casper 123
The ability to freely combine
a variety of animation tools allowed
ILM animators to create unheard
of fluidity and motion for quarrelsome
uncles: Fatso, Stretch, and Stinkie.



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