Table of contents for 2016:08 - Animago in Digital Production

The DP team went the whole nine yards in 2016 to make the animago’s 20th anniversary as special as possible. Indeed, these roundnumber birthdays don’t come around that often, so we wanted to revel in the celebrations as much as possible. Not only did we corral the most festive and colourful party gear, we also went the extra mile in our selection of nominees, conference speakers and exhibitors. We even moved the animago from Babelsberg near Berlin to downtown Munich, where we now call the Gasteig Centre our new home. As you can tell by the sheer volume of the animago Special Issue you’re holding in your hands right now, all these big changes – our move to Munich, our 20th anniversary, our new prize categories and much more –…

Seit über 25 Jahren werden mit Fusion visuelle Eekte für Tausende von Kinohits, Fernsehsendungen und Werbefilme erstellt. Fusion bietet eine benutzerfreundliche und leistungsstarke Node-basierte Bedienoberfläche, einen riesigen Werkzeugkasten, einen echten 3D-Arbeitsraum sowie eine beschleunigte Grafikprozessorleistung – und das alles in einer einzigen Anwendung. Jetzt, wo auch Linux unterstützt wird, ist Fusion 8.2 leichter denn je in Ihre vorhandene VFX-Pipeline integrierbar! Hollywoods geheime Waffe Mit Fusion wurden bahnbrechende visuelle Eekte und Bewegtgrafiken für Hollywood-Filme wie „Der Marsianer - Rettet Mark Wattney“, „Thor“, „Die Tribute von Panem – The Hunger Games“ sowie für TV-Hits wie „Orphan Black“, „Breaking Bad“, „Grimm“ und „Kampfstern Galactica“ kreiert. Sie waren schon einmal im Kino oder haben ferngesehen? Dann haben Sie auch Fusion im Einsatz erlebt! Schnelleres Arbeiten mit Nodes Fusion verwendet Nodes, um Eekte und Filter…

Loom This story about a successful catch – or an unfortunate “getting caught”, depending on your perspective – won an animago trophy in 2O1O in the category “Jury’s Prize”. That year, it was also nominated in the category “Best Technical Realisation”. And to this day, our voting audience continues to be impressed by this full-CG visualization of a spider and its prey close-up, as evidenced by the large number of people who voted for it. The 3D animation studio Polynoid was founded by graduates of the Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg; „Loom“ was their diploma movie. Today, the team works for renowned international clients, including Greenpeace and Nike, with further creative minds at the production company Woodblock. The Present Moving stories with an important message are timeless. This fact is borne out by…

Dämmrich’s Pinterest account is packed with images of foggy petrol stations and works by photographer Todd Hido. He had been planning to convert his personal pipeline from VRay to Octane for a while anyway; so, seeing as one of the big themes in the Octane 3.0 Roadmap is Fog, Dämmrich thought it was a good opportunity to explore a “car park in the mist” motif. After choosing the theme, he started working on the project at the end of 2015 in a winter break from his freelance work; it took him four months to finish. The loneliest whale Dämmrich derived the title “52Hz” from a whale that sings at the very unusual frequency of 52 hertz. Seeing as other whales do not communicate at this frequency, this 52Hz whale has…

The entire animago team felt very strongly about introducing a special new category to acknowledge motion design projects. In fact, these projects distinguish themselves from other works of art by means of their special look and entirely different form of storytelling. The concept of “motion design” or “motion graphics” is indeed difficult to define in a clear manner; in general, the terms are used to refer to moving graphic elements, usually adapted to a sound or voiceover. They also describe abstract forms that use animation to create an imaginative and visually demanding work of art. The type of people working in this design “genre” comprises perhaps the broadest group of artists active in the creative sector today, especially because this type of work is required for everything from titles and…

A group of frogs are having a blast in a gorgeous house with a backyard pool. There are promising tête-àtêtes (it’s up to your own fantasy to decide whether they move to the next stage), great jumps up to the big windows and a nighttime garden party with an accompanying light show. Life as a frog on this grand estate is fantastic when the owner isn’t home. And the visuals of the house would suggest the owner hasn’t been back for a while now. Every single image in “Garden Party” – as regards the environments, animation, shading, lighting and texturing – is infused with love. The film’s slower pacing also helps give it a special mood and slapstick atmosphere. Inspiration & project duration “Garden Party” was inspired by a previous…

The analogy is pretty accurate, actually, seeing as Stefan Larsson is a self-taught Swedish artist who learned how to do motion tracking by making animated clips of robots and organisms. Larsson is the man behind the label Aujik and he also happens to have lived in Japan for the last 7 years, which explains his choice of Tokyo and Osaka as the inspiration for “Spatial Bodies”. In fact, the post-war Japanese architectural movement known as Metabolism provided the ideal template upon which to transmit Larsson’s notion of breathing life into matter; in this case, he brings architecture to life in a kind of Shinto-animistic way and combines it with a touch of artificial intelligence. Above Osaka The real-life images for the 360-degree panorama-scan taken 100 metres above Osaka were supplied…

Over the years, the secret to the animago’s success has emerged in its unique mix, which includes the awarding of those hotly contested trophies alongside a conference programme and tradeshow where leading companies showcase their latest products and developments, including Assimilate, Autodesk, Avid, Chaos Group, Dell & Intel, Esri, Fayteq, Grass Valley, Maxon, NEC Display Solutions, PNY Technologies, RD|Innovations, Rodenburg Verlag, Wacom and XMS Expert Media Solutions & Tools. The animago Trade Floor was also open to all visitors and played host to some of the best known international post-production studios, all the while encouraging animation fans to get into direct contact with Arri Media, DigiTale Studios, Mackevision Medien Design, Scanline VFX, Trixter and Rise | Visual Effects Studios. Wacom once again played a special role in generating an exciting…

The animago AWARD officially reached adulthood in 2O14, and this year we want to wish it all the best on its 2Oth birthday! As it sets out on its third decade, we would also like to take a moment to look back at the animago’s modest beginnings and reflect on how it’s grown into what it is today: an international focal point for the global VFX and animation industry. The animago AWARD was born in 1996 into humble circumstances. The idea for the competition came about during a meeting attended by Heiko and Gabriele Knappe – the couple who would go on to found Digital Production magazine – and representatives of the companies Kinetix, Intergraph and SGI. They had gathered together to brainstorm about how best to jump-start the burgeoning…

As expected, no effort was spared to put together a crème-de-la-crème jury for the 2Oth anniversary of the animago AWARD. After they were chosen – but before they gathered to make their final decisions – we grilled each member of the jury on what inspires them in their everyday lives and what exactly artists can do to win them over. This year, for the very first time, the jury came together in Munich, the home town of Digital Production. As expected, the fact that Munich has delicious food and great beer – plus a well-functioning airport – our jury members were definitely chill about the move from Berlin. And, of course, our heart-felt thanks go to NEC Display Solutions Europe for their wonderful hospitality. Günter Hagedorn animago AWARD The only…

The ad was shot in the bleak yet beautiful landscape of Iceland. In order to do justice to the stunning location, the student team chose the Icelandic beer Einstök as their advertising product. Indeed, this dark beer seemed to provide the perfect metaphor via which to depict the secrets of the ocean whitecaps on the cold and wild Icelandic coast. In the roughly one-minute spot, the hero confronts the black monster – the beer – and prevails effortlessly. Icy film shoot It took the 9-person team one week to shoot the ad in Iceland. The journey there was almost a spur-of-the-moment venture, which meant that the students had no time for location scouting; instead, they simply set out with their equipment. As luck would have it, they found the perfect…

The most important message in “Alike” is that it’s not easy raising children. The short film was designed to explore and shed light on this state of affairs without providing any concrete answers. When it came to choosing a title for the personal project, the two directors sought to find a single word that would capture the relationship between father and son: “Alike” hit the nail on the head. The film emerged from a need to explain what it’s like when a child turns his father’s life on its head from one day to the next. 5 years of work During the first two years of production, a team of ten people worked on creating “Alike”. During the final three years, a steady flow of new artists supported the project…

If you’re like the editors of DP and can’t speak Hebrew, here’s an excerpt from the song “Ma’agalim” in English: “Nights turn into days, days turn into years – and among them I was going faster in circles. It’s not me who’s moving forward; it’s time that’s moving further away”. In order to visualise the song’s quintessential meaning in their animated video, Lotan und Shtibelman developed the idea of a wooden marionette stuck on a roller in an antique vending machine; the figurine goes around and around as the world passes her by in an endless loop. The whole collaboration started when Lotan and Shtibelman contacted Jane Bordeaux to suggest they design a video for the band; up to that point, there hadn’t been any kind of briefing, nor did…

The biggest challenge facing Rise FX on this project was the sheer variety of tasks; the Lagos sequence called for the creation of assorted digidoubles, FX simulations, body extensions, CG weapons, set extensions and much more. The extremely high number of CG characters, effects and environments meant that the team was faced with a new level of complexity; in fact, so much happens with the effects in each frame that it’s hard to even comprehend it all at first glance. Seeing as Rise FX had already worked on other Marvel productions – in particular on the “Captain America” films – it was clear from the beginning that the German studio would be on board again for the effects on “Civil War”. For such a big project, the Lidar services offered…

In addition to the always fantastic Bavarian beer and those delicious pretzels, it was indeed the easily accessible and centrally located Gasteig near the Isar Gate in downtown Munich that won some major brownie points among animago visitors. The conference presentations were held in English, of course, just to make sure everyone understood each other during the special 20th anniversary celebrations. There was an also simultaneous translation for the animago awards show; not from standard German into the unique Bavarian dialect, but rather from German into English. In fact, contrary to popular belief, it’s quite easy to communicate in the beautiful city of Munich – even with the natives of the “Free State of Bavaria”. Global programme This year, our invited speakers from Europe and abroad – including that soonto-be…

Hungary “Hey Deer!” by Örs Bárczy 3ds Max, Maya, After Effects, Arnold The Netherlands “Project IM” from the Saxion University of Applied Sciences 3ds Max, Maya, Houdini, V-Ray, Mental Ray, Real Flow New Zealand “La Fontana” from the Media Design School Maya, After Effects, Mari, NukeX, V-Ray France “Catch it” from the Esma School ZBrush, Maya, Premiere Brazil “Pick up and Read” by Sávio Lima Blender, Gimp China “China Fortune Future City” by Image Unit Shanghai Corp. Ltd. 3ds Max, V-Ray, After Effects, Nuke Japan “Sushi Police” by Sedic International Inc. Painter, Renderman, Media Composer Norway “Flyndre” by Ole Christoffer Haga Maya, Mental Ray, After Effects Sweden “Discovery Channel – Sharkweek 2O16” by Important Looking Pirates Maya, Nuke South Africa “Unsung Hero” by Character Matters Animation ZBrush, Lightwave, Maya, Fusion…

Richter is currently completing a Bachelor of Arts in the field of “Digital Film Production” at the SAE Institute in Munich. The so-called “SAE Diploma” gives Bachelor-level students a strong practical orientation and provides them with wide-ranging knowledge of the scientific and economic aspects crucial to the success of media productions. In the broad range of film productions Richter has completed at the institute so far, he has undertaken a wide spectrum of tasks, including production planning, cinematography, colour grading, compositing and much more. Of course, the larger the production, the more difficult these tasks become. However, for Richter, the clear favourite is editing; this is where he truly feels at home, and it also forms the starting point for his journeys into other areas of film production. Practical projects…

If one looks at the structure of the media industry in Germany’s four biggest cities in the north, east, west and south, one might get the impression that each region has intentionally “placed a bet” on one particular media field. For example, Cologne is much more active in the field of TV than other cities, plus it’s home to the RTL Media Group and Brainpool, the production company founded by former TV host Stefan Raab. For its part, Stargate Studios, which was also founded in Cologne, makes it possible to produce international TV series and films in a cost efficient and time-saving manner with its virtual back-lot process: this technology allows directors to shoot in a large-scale daylight studio no matter what the weather is outside and without having to…

And even today, five years later, the cinematic continues to have the same effect on people; which means that it comes as no surprise that our online audience voted it their favourite contribution to the animago AWARD in its 20-year history. Game Series The trailer celebrated its premiere in June 2011 at the Electronic Entertainment Expo, or E3 for short, one of the most popular and important tradeshows for computer games. The game itself was released that November for PC, Playstation 3 and Xbox 360. Before creating the trailer for “Revelations”, which formed part of Ubisoft’s famous “Assassin’s Creed” game series, the Hungarian team at Digic Pictures had already proved its mettle by making the cinematics for “Assassin’s Creed II” and “Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood”. “Assassin’s Creed: Revelations” was the fourth…

The everyday work done at 3dar in Buenos Aires consists of advertising jobs for leading brands such as Sony, Dell and many others. Even more than that, however, the team enjoys doing experimental private projects, gathering experience on VR projects and developing a Virtual Reality Soccer. VR is the new hip trend on everybody’s lips. This year, “Pokémon Go” brought some major hype to augmented reality (AR) on smartphones, only to fizzle off just as fast as it came. Many VR-tech games and experiments are now underway in the digital industry, and many of them show considerable potential; and yet, at the moment, nobody really knows what to do with it. In the dystopian future world of “Uncanny Valley”, however, VR has already made its way directly into the heart…

One hint in advance: it has to do with a hormone called oxytocin. Unlike dopamine – or “the happiness hormone” as it is often referred to – oxytocin is known as the “birth hormone” and serves a purpose that goes beyond causing contractions in the delivery room. In “A Guide to Happy”, Panoply uses entertaining 3D animation to explain how to increase the oxytocin levels in your body. In their own interest The Panoply team belongs to a generation known for thinking “there’s always room for more”! In other words, they’re constantly looking for new ways to improve their own lives. Doing sports, eating well and getting enough sleep are an excellent basis for a good life, but the team wanted to take an even closer look at the feelings…

Unit Image is for France what Platige Image is for Poland and Digic Pictures for Hungary: they are luminaries in the field of game cinematics. The last time the team from France won an animago AWARD was in 2013 for their trailer for “The Crew”. In 2016, they once again took home a trophy for a project commissioned by Ubisoft. The “For Honor” trailer impressed the animago jury first and foremost by means of its almost photorealistic, epic-scale environment destructions. More staff Unit Image had to use a larger team than usual for these large-scale destructions. For the sake of comparison, the trailer for “The Crew” was made by 25 artists in four months, while “For Honor” involved a total of 65 artists in all production phases from the script…

And yet, Özbek and Philipp have taken the image far beyond a runof-the-mill architectural visualization; in fact, this still tells an entire story as if it was a snapshot from a film. Countless minute details, such as the ringshaped glass marks on the living-room table in the foreground, draw the viewer deeper into the image’s riveting composition. By creating a tension between the concrete reality revealed by the sharp desert sun and the vague puzzle-like nature of the story, the artists captivate viewers while simultaneously leaving them entirely alone to wonder: Has the family been here before? Why did they leave the house? In effect, the subject itself is already a contradiction, that is, the neverending, modern Californian belief in progress depicted as a melancholic, surreal ghost scene. Studio Nookta…

Canadians do a lot of things differently than their neigbours to the south: for example, they have a great social system, reasonable gun laws and some pretty sweet state funding for media content development, especially for visual effects and 3D animation. It’s no surprise, then, that the animago conference programme is once again spotlighting the land of moose and maple trees and why we joined with the Canadian Embassy in Germany to invite speakers from two leading Canadian studios, Mr. X and Digital Domain. Take me to Valhalla Mr. X is a Toronto-based VFX studio specialising in creating visual effects for feature films such as “Crimson Peak” and “Ben Hur” and TV series such as “Penny Dreadful”, “The Strain” and the Canadian-Irish production “Vikings”. In fact, the team has delivered…

Each year, many international projects from all over the world participate at the animago AWARD. Here are some examples: Turkey „Kara Street“ by Cihan Özkan 3ds Max, V-Ray Vietnam „House Side Stream“ by Nguyen Thanh Vich 3ds Max, V-Ray Egypt “Gettin Too Old For This” by Antone Magdy Girgis ZBrush, Maya, V-Ray Egypt “Rocket and Groot” by Antone Magdy Girgis 3ds Max, ZBrush Mexico „Christmas Heart“ by Daniel Garza Blender Italy „Classroom“ by Roberto Senato Modo, Photoshop Ukraine „Business Monkey“ by Yuriy Dulich ZBrush, Maya Ireland „Lonely Boat“ by Tomasz Ciesielski Blender, Gimp Great Britain “Meditation” by Grégoire A. Meyer Poser Hungary „Jurassic Ledge“ by István Vastag 3ds Max, ZBrush, V-Ray Russia „Diana“ by Ilya Polyakov 3ds Max, Z-Brush, V-Ray…