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A
GHOSTLY
CHALLENGE
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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."
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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."
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ANIMATION
MAGIC
WITH
SOFTIMAGE
3D
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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.
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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."
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Casper Enters
The Real World
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A small grouping of the
ILM contingent.
From Left: Janet Healey,
Doug Smith, Dennis Muren,
Miguel A. Fuertes,
and Eric Armstrong.
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(C) 1995 Industrial Light & Magic. All rights reserved. |
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INDUSTRIAL
LIGHT
&
MAGIC
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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.
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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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