Made in Hollywood

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In the preparation and shooting process, only two special effects teams, Industrial Light and Magic and Weta Studios, were serving the crew, but in post-production, in order to catch up with the summer file in 2006, Duke must ensure complex and cumbersome special effects production It can be completed on time, and more special effects studios have been hired to join in.

Among them is the same famous visual effects studio in Hollywood. Although the scale and reputation of this studio are far less than that of Industrial Light and Magic, it also has its own advantages.

However, the production of special effects is still dominated by Industrial Light and Magic and Weta Studios, and new entrants like VFX Studios are more to repair some minor details.

Just like the earliest editing that does not follow a fixed logic model, Duke has never been a rigid person in post-production. The editing is hosted by Mike Dawson, who has always adhered to his style. In terms of important special effects production, Duke is Encourage special effects artists to create characters and images with pioneering thinking, not just follow his requirements mechanically.

This incident was quickly taken up by Marvel Pictures and Warner Bros. as a publicity point in the early stage of the film.

The responsible Phil Sanders of Industrial Light & Magic in the "Iron*∑, Man" crew specifically accepted an interview with Yahoo Entertainment.

"We were all taken aback by Duke's request, and even a little bit scared of the unexpected scenes we were encouraged to create."

He said in the interview, “But Duke is a great director. He knows how to inspire the creative enthusiasm of the whole crew. This is a very interesting display. Because although we don’t directly participate in the early stage, we are very early Being invited by Duke to contribute our ideas. This is great. But this is just one of these things... We used to want to get creative opportunities, but in this movie, we were surprised that we suddenly got this many!"

At the same time as post-production, the publicity of "Iron Man" is gradually exerting force.

Of course, these are temporarily in charge of special personnel, Duke's most important work. It’s better to complete the post-production on time with quality and quantity, because after consulting his opinion, Warner Bros. has selected the current period for "Iron Man", just like last year's "Batman: Hour of War", this Marvel series The first major film of the film will be officially released in North America beginning in the summer of 2006.

Perhaps last year’s "Kings of Heaven" and "Heroes of Air", which directly competed with "Batman: Hour of War", lost so badly. In the end, even the cost could not be recovered. Many publishing companies did not say anything, but privately stayed away. This schedule. On the first weekend of May when "Iron Man" was released, there were no competitors of the same magnitude at all. Only in the weekend two weeks later would there be Duke of Paramount Pictures’ "Charlotte's Web" Impressive films are released.

Warner Bros. is solely responsible for the publicity affairs. Duke’s Tina Fei participates in the coordination. He doesn't have to worry too much. How to complete the special effects of the film is what he cares most about.

After all. Special effects are one of the biggest selling points of the film.

In most movies, the special effects shooting of the board always assists small visual effects input. Then the editor will edit them together, and the sequence frames will be sent to the special effects team along with relevant instructions to let them know how to get into work.

Subsequent meetings with directors usually focus on individual shooting topics, such as a character moving too fast, or where to move this thing.

Although Duke is not a perfectionist like James Cameron, he will not be easily satisfied. Whenever the special effects department has the latest completed picture delivered to him, he always said to Phil Sanders, "You know, these are far from what we want, these are just preliminary qualifications. Remember, you guys are the top special effects experts in Hollywood."

For those lenses to be used or special effects pictures put together, Duke must make a choice to make them better serve the entire movie.

Therefore, once he enters the work state and finds that some of the pictures produced do not meet the requirements of the film, he will definitely not be angry like James Cameron, but try to relax and consider other suitable ones. Type selection to replace them, rethink and throw it to the special effects team.

Encouraging innovation can also bring problems. For example, those who are engaged in cg creation are often people with wild thinking, and sometimes their imagination will inevitably be excessive.

In early February, the special effects team was rejected by Duke one after another for quite a few production results.

For a long time, the team's post-production privately believed that this was a misuse of digital special effects.

Digital special effects have become a standard throughout the entire Hollywood production pipeline. It is not only used to solve problems and add some highlights, but also can be used to create complete scenes and work processes related to the entire movie and product.

However, few directors can recognize the talents of these providers, and few recognize its contribution to the success of a movie. The special effects team was rejected by super directors like Duke one after another. Know what to do.

Communication is the best way to resolve differences. Duke took the initiative to find Phil Sanders in charge of special effects.

Originally, Phil Sanders thought that Duke would make some severe criticisms even if he was not angry, but Duke did not do so. He knew very well that he should not use some restraints to tie these imaginative wings.

Many people, when it comes to cg special effects, they always think that it is a symbol of low-level, naive and boring movies, and is synonymous with assembly line mode, but they have ever thought that cg is the same as the real-life shooting and other literary techniques they advocate , Is also the brainchild of a group of people full of imagination. The special effects artists paid much more imagination and brain cells when making cg images than those who advocated the so-called "dogma95" rule.

Therefore, Duke is still based on encouragement.

In a brief meeting called by Phil Sanders and special effects artists, Duke released a short cg scene that was basically useless and said to these people, "Let’s not rush to deny anything, let’s take two steps back. Look at the entire sequence of images. It’s in the film. How do you make it serve the story? This lens may no longer work, and we may no longer need this lens.”

He looked at the special effects artists and said, "But no one can deny how imaginative and full of creative enthusiasm this is. For me, this is very worthy of promotion in the "Iron Man" project."

Everyone needs recognition and encouragement. In the crew, the recognition of directors and producers like Duke undoubtedly inspired more creative enthusiasm for these special effects artists.

"Iron Man" is a well-arranged and orderly project. There are many interesting things worth doing. Although Duke is not the kind of director who loves robots, machinery and technology, he has enough reasons to like it. This exciting movie has always maintained a strong interest throughout the production process.

He graduated from the California Academy of Arts, strictly speaking, he is an academic director. It seems that Duke, who has experienced enough literary films in the academy, should prefer literary films rather than commercial films, but in this world, who People or God have set rules, so academic directors must be directors of literary and artistic direction?

Some people like commercial films and some like art films. Everyone has the freedom to choose. But Duke always believes that movies are made for people to watch, and that movies that can be widely supported are the ones he wants to make.

Besides, a director who pays for a film can really gain power in this Hollywood ecosystem?

From the beginning to the present, Duke has never been a pure director.

The simplest question, Stanley Kubrick and Steven Spielberg, look at the whole world. Among a wide audience, who is more famous and who has a higher status in Hollywood?

The director of Literary and Art has the survival rule of Literary and Art, but that is not suitable for Duke. If he chose the director of Literary and Art at the beginning, can he have the status of today?

Even an idiot knows that this is absolutely impossible in Hollywood.

After all, Hollywood is a circle that relies on commercial performance.

Although Duke encourages special effects artists to use their imagination to actively create, the premise of the team's creation and play is to stay within the permitted role range-a heroic character, wearing a very suitable humanoid armor, and flying.

For example, although the flight scene of Iron Man was filmed by Robert Downey Jr. using motion capture, Industrial Light and Magic still needs to add flight effects. The flight scene is one of the highlights of the film.

The reaction force of the battle armor and the style of the jet sparks are very important. Industrial Light and Magic produced many versions of effects for Duke's reference. After several rounds of revisions, he finalized the best version.

There are also Iron Man weapons, especially those delicate small weapons. The time is too long, and Duke can’t remember these details. The design of these small equipment made him rack his brains, and Marvel’s support played an important role at this time. , Kevin Fitch brought Duke an Iron Man Bible-a complete set of weapons and props used by "Iron Man" for more than 40 years.

For nearly half a century, many outstanding cartoonists have designed many eye-opening magical weapons, which have given Duke and weapon special effects artist Adi Grano enough inspiration.

Therefore, movies have never been the product of individual heroism, but the crystallization of the close cooperation of an entire team.

The whole post-production special effects is very cumbersome. Even the special effects suit produced by Robert Downey Jr. through motion capture must be modified several times with cg. (To be continued...)