As Prometheus lands in cinemas, Laura Westbrook speaks to Weta's Visual Effects Supervisor Martin Hill.
More than 33 years after Alien redefined science-fiction from kooky green men to terrifying aliens bursting from chest cavities, Ridley Scott has returned to his creation with the highly anticipated prequel Prometheus.
It's the iconic director's first trip out of orbit since 1982's Blade Runner, but with credits like Gladiator and Kingdom of Heaven to his name, he hasn't been far from the spotlight.
The film is set towards the end of this century, with archaeologists Elizabeth Shaw and Charlie Holloway discovering a series of cave paintings that provide a map to the stars.
They convince corporate giant Peter Weyland to fund an expedition to follow the map and discover the origins of life on Earth.
Wellington's Weta Digital added to its already ground breaking portfolio of work by contributing more than 200 visual effects shots to the film, including the stunning opening sequence and all but one of the alien creatures.
Visual effects supervisor Martin Hill, a dyed-in-the-wool fan of the franchise, jumped at the chance to get involved.
"Ridley Scott was very open to suggestions. Although he has very strong idea of what he wants, there's a lot of extra details, like how does this creature move, what are the small design extras that you want to put in such as how does this engineer character disintegrate. He was open to us giving design input into those things."
Like many of the year's blockbusters, Prometheus was filmed in 3D, a technology Hill himself is a little divided on.
"3D is another tool to tell a story. It really suits some films, I think it was used very well in Prometheus and helped to give it a very epic scale and the same with Avatar.
"I think for some films it's put in as 'it's new and fresh and exciting and it might draw people to cinemas' and I think that sort of use will die out and it'll be used in the same way artistically as people might use black and white for a film or a silent film.
"I hope the more films that use it well like Hugo and Avatar and Prometheus the more it will encourage filmmakers to really think about why they're using it and how they can use it to better enhance the film rather than be able to put it on the poster to draw people in."
Prometheus may be Hill's first foray as visual effects supervisor on a big budget blockbuster, but the rising visual effects star has a wealth of experience.
He originally moved out to New Zealand from the UK to work on King Kong, and subsequently lent his talents to The Adventures of Tintin and Avatar as a shading supervisor.
"The main challenge was that almost every shot that we did in the film was completely different. On a film like King Kong, you've got many shots of one character and once you've got the character working you'll be able to put him into many shots and the more you do the easier they get.
"With Prometheus every sequence is completely different to the others and even within the sequences a lot of the shots have organic growth or escalation of effects so each shot is a continuation of the one before and the effect gets even more intense."
Just how the visual complexity of this film will play with audiences remains to be seen, with the doors opening today in New Zealand. However, the stunning imagery and breathtaking visual effects guarantee that this will be cinema on an epic scale.
- © Fairfax NZ News
No comments:
Post a Comment
Share Your Imagination with Us