ANIMATION & GRAPHICS TECHNOLOGY NEWS

Baking VFX

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 10:30

French-based 3D computer graphics company The Bakery has confirmed that visual effects powerhouse Tippett Studio has chosen Bakery Relight software for its visual effects (VFX) group production pipeline.

Since its debut at NAB 2011 in Las Vegas in April, Relight has swiftly garnered strong praise and support from industry insiders worldwide.

Tippett’s Digital Effects Supervisor, Scott Singer explains: “Our entire VFX pipeline is based on The Bakery's advanced VFX specific tool set. We’ve now completed several of our latest film projects using this technology, including Immortals and The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn, Part 1 , which released last November, as well as our current projects, Ted, Mirror, Mirror, and The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn, Part 2, which are scheduled for release in 2012.

“We couldn't have completed the work we did on one of our top-secret projects without it, especially considering the small size of the crew in the VFX department, the very short period of time we had to complete it, and the large amount of complexity involved. The VFX animation on the project - 25 shots of rigid bodies with four VFX animators – was completed in six weeks. We are able to quickly build shot independent, data-driven automated processes and efficient interactive processes.”

He describes The Bakery team as ‘amazing’ in helping the Tippett crew to solve its pipeline architecture problems. “We primarily use their advanced VFX-specific database functionality to describe assets, asset management, VFX processes, process control and farm submission. This means we can work far more efficiently with data driven, reproducible results managing hugely complex processes and data. It has become the backbone of our effects pipeline and has replaced most of the traditional Tippett pipeline for the FX Group.

“We can now describe any pipeline processes as a series of interchangeable and re-useable modular building blocks - like pipeline Legos in a way. Thanks to The Bakery, we can now create four times as many wolves, in four times as many shots with two thirds of the crew size and in less time, or describe the complex steps necessary to deliver raw blood data to lighting, as we did in Immortals.

“Furthermore we’re working with The Bakery on an ongoing basis now to build on the asset system to encapsulate more complex, compound asset management for future projects,” says Singer.

Bakery co-founder and CEO, Erwan Maigret adds: “We’re extremely proud to be able to collaborate at this level with a partner such as Tippett Studio. They bring an extraordinary level of knowledge and expertise to the table. This partnership is a great validation of both our technology and the work of our team.”

« go back