Thursday I posted about the stunning VFX work in Interstellar. Today I came across a behind the scenes video of how they created the robots in the film, TARS and CASE. They play a major role in the film and they were created with a combination of motion graphics and puppeteering.
The basic frames of the robots were created with metal and puppeteered on set using various methods. In some scenes where the robots needed to move quickly through water, they used a modified ATV rig to propel the robot puppet through the water. Then, using CGI, the more detailed aspects of the robots were generated and the rigs used were keyed out of the shots.
This video below shows you exactly how they did it and it's amazing to see how it was actually done. EDIT: The video was removed after I posted this. Here is the mirror link.
So many of us 90s kids know the movie Small Soldiers. Well if you don't I definitely recommend you watch it, its a pretty entertaining movie! After taking this animation class I have really been watching movies in a different way. I now need to watching all the behind the scenes so I can learn how they created what they created. This blog I am going to spend time explaining how they created the Small Soldiers. Just for the people who haven't seen the movie here is a little back ground information. Small Soldiers revolves around two teenagers, who get caught in the middle of a war between two factions of sentient action figures, the Gorgonites and the Commando Elite. (Link to more back story)So obviously the creators of the movie had to figure out how to make these action figures move like action figures but also make them seem more alive. Since CG was still in its expensive infancy, Stan Winston Studios was called upon to create puppet versions of the sentient action figures in the film. Controlled by rods and cables that would later be digitally removed in post production, the characters required carefully choreographed performances from the studio's puppeteers to create lifelike motions. Here is a video that just show you the puppeteers controlling the action figures. It is pretty impressive how life like these characters are created! Check it out!
