Deadpool Visual Effects

Deadpool is not only a box office success, that was thought to be an extremely risky movie from Fox,  smashing all records and having more domestic gross then other big box office films like Iron Man and Captain America: The Winter Soldier. I was lucky enough to have worked for Lauren Schuler Donner at The Donners' Company this past Fall and go to hear about a lot of the behind the scenes aspects of the film when it came to budget and story development. Lauren had discussed with me about how since the film had a much lower budget than bigger Fox/Marvel films she had produced ,like all the X-Men films, they had to use their resources. Visual Effects was one of those major aspects. In the industry it can be easier to say have a car chase all visually animated than get a stunt team to make it reality. The lead visual effects company that was responsible for Deadpool's effects released a breakdown video, and Lauren was not wrong Deadpool was animated quite a bit, even in places I thought for sure was real. Luckily Deadpool's costume/design can be more easily animated then say Wolverine or Magneto.

Brick Like Me

So on one fateful day last may, two of the worlds greats came together to create one of the most absolutely spectacular half hours of television ever created. These two greats are The Simpsons, and LEGO, and they bestowed upon us the masterpiece that is "Brick Like Me". This is the LEGO episode and the 550th episode of The Simpsons.

The episode is set in the idealistic and basically perfect world that is the LEGO universe. All is well until Homer starts to see visions of his other life back in the Springfield that we all know and love. Throughout the episode more and more of his old life leaks into his new one in the LEGO world, and in the end, he must decide to stay in this new near perfect brick world, or to return to his old 2D classic world.

This episode took two year to get on air, and took over twice as long as a normal episode would to make. I would say that it was definitely well worth the wait! This episode is so beautifully crafted it almost hurts. The LEGO version of Springfield is so bright and brilliant, but still has the hilarious vibe of the Springfield we've know for over 500 episodes. It also added some new comedy to the show when dealing with things that only LEGO people have to deal with; like the water,

and being able to mix the two kinds of animation that LEGO and The Simpsons both are giants in.

From animation, to story, this episode is absolutely brilliant, and I loved watching it on its premiere last summer, as well as over and over again after that. 10/10 would recommend

Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.

I recently noticed on Netflix that the ABC show Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. was available on Instant Watch so I figured I'd give it a go and jumped in. Aside from some funny Joss Whedon dialogue and cool comic book story lines, what really impressed me with this show were the visual effects. Having been a lover of Science Fiction movies and TV shows my whole life, I've gotten used to campy special effects and have learned to ignore how low-budget it looks (here's looking at you every movie SyFy channel has ever produced). In the case of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. the visual aesthetics really do justice to the super-powers and weird alien technologies they are demonstrating. After looking more in depth about the show when I decided to write this blog post about it, I was pleased to learn that the show was nominated for an Oustanding Visual Effects Emmy. Similarly, I was pretty pumped to find a Youtube show that dedicates an episodes focus to different behind the scenes aspects of the show and luckily they rightfully reserved an episode for the Visual Effects department and here that video is.

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Bob's Burgers

This week I chose to look at Bob's Burgers - a comedy on Fox.  The episodes are only 30 minutes, but the creators find ways to pack in comedic situations and hilarious banter from all of the characters.  The animation is more of a cartoonish style, reminding me of early South Park episodes.  I like how drawn the characters appear because it keeps the show light and funny.

I also think that the casting director did a good job getting voice actors for each character.  Two of the female roles (Linda and Tina) are actually voiced by men.  However, the voices match the character so much that viewers can't even tell that the characters are voiced by men.  I think each characters voice plays a key role in the success of an animation, and Bob's Burgers has an all-star cast.

Crazy COSMOS

This month, The National Geographic premiered their new series, COSMOS. This show has become big news that even President Barack Obama got involved. The new show encourages people of all ages to become more involved in exploring new frontiers. The show reached over half a billion homes all over the world the night of the premiere. National Geographic and Fox broadcasting network really made a mark with the new series and set the bar pretty high for all new shows of its kind.

The show itself is pretty remarkable but what is really amazing is the title sequence. Big Block Media Group created the breath taking sequence. Big Block truly captured the show's theme with their amazing graphic animation. Big Block used all the resources they could get their hands on to create this sequence. From the real live action footage to the amazingly created space scenes, this title sequence is one to be noticed. The entire sequence is 90 seconds long, way longer than the usual 30 second openings to most shows. Be sure to take a look at COSMOS' history making title sequence!

Click HERE to see the whole title sequence!

Fringe Title Sequence and Overwhelming Assets

This is the opening titles for "Fringe" on Fox, which I just learned recently was designed by Andrew Kramer of Video Copilot fame. The thing I want to draw your attention to is how much is going on in this sequence, but also its simplicity. The whole thing is incredibly slick, the "moving off into the horizon" transition is very cool, and there are several lens flare effects in there too. There are several easily identifiable assets, like the hand and the frog that are fairly straightforward. But there are a bunch that you have to go frame by frame to figure out. This style of "overwhelming assets" seems pretty common in a lot of TV title sequences, where the designers through up so many images it's impossible to keep up.

Another prominent example of this is the title sequence for "The Big Bang Theory" where the whole intro is literally an overwhelming series of flash images. The thing I think is interesting, and why I personally appreciate the Fringe intro more, is the elegance at which the Fringe intro comes back to a non-scattered state. It has a bunch of flash images, then comes back to the sci fi words, and back again. You never feel completely overwhelmed, whereas in the Big Bang Theory titles the same effect is used to overwhelm intentionally. 

the simpsons

although i tend to post about a current event or something from class, this week I am deciding to write about the Simpsons. I know that the show is created by designers, drawing out each and every frame of an episode; yet this process of digitally animating and creating the on-screen image is a lengthy process, at least according to Wikipedia (ha)!

i think the most interesting part of the now 23-year, 500+ episode series is that the style of animation -- the characters, storyline, sound FX, props, background layouts, timing, etc -- has stayed the same over the years. the characters never seem to age, never grow older, and never leave the original lifestyle -- obviously, if something drastic were to happen to any of the main characters, the whole premise of the show would change.

this video is, supposedly, the first ever episode of the series

now, this link is the most recent episode (from Feb 19). I could not find it out YouTube, therefore it is only a link -- not embedded. as we can see, there is not TOO MUCH that has changed in the series -- besides the voices (very slightly), opening intro (which includes various past episode clips and changes each week) and the HD-ness (from 1989 through 2009, it was 4:3 SD format), nothing has really changed.

lastly, this clip is of the producers and directors and characters speaking about their surprises, reactions, comments, and thoughts on the show -- from the past 23 years and 500 episodes

The Evolution of The Simpsons

It was just released yesterday that negotiations between the voice actors and studio of Fox's longest running, prime-time comedy, The Simpsons, had come to an end after a week of major discrepancies that led the public to believe the hit show was abruptly going to end. The actors were asked to take a 45% pay-cut and in response, claimed they could take a smaller pay-cut if they could have a share of the show's considerable profits. However, a deal was made and everyone's favorite dysfunctional family will be back for not one, but two more seasons.

This news got me thinking, if The Simpsons has been on the air for 23 seasons (and I don't watch the show enough to really take notice), the quality of Matt Groening's original animation must have changed drastically over the years. It wasn't until I looked up The Simpsons 1987 until I realized just how much the show has improved since its creation:



I also found this chart, that not only shows the improvement in the design, but also outlines the character development everyone but Maggie has gone through since the shows beginning.

Finally, I found this video that is seemingly unrelated, however I found it to be pretty interesting, not only because it offers an insight into Homer's life before his family (that we very rarely get a glimpse of on the show) but because I think it would be fun to make in after effects. I couldn't embed it without it telling me I had to download Adobe Flash, so I just put it up as a link.

Fox Sports Graphics

I spend a lot of time on my weekends watching football games, and I began to think about the motion graphics used week in and week out by the major sports networks, in particular, Fox Sports. I discovered that Fox Sports has both a graphics and a design team, and that the graphics team was the one responsible for a majority of the graphics we have become accustomed to on Sundays, such as the basic wipes on the screen, as well as the jumping robot that shows up on the side of the screen quite often.

I was interested to find that the Fox Sports Graphics website actually had a link to the FOX NFL graphics used, and it showed the various wipes and interstitials and other graphics used. The website with all of this information can be found here.

I wasn't able to find substantial information on the Fox Sports Graphics team's software used, but the Fox Sports Design team's webpage states that it employs a number of designers, mostly those who specialize in Flame. Sports in particular have put a strong emphasis in their broadcasts on the use of motion graphics, and it can be seen more and more each year.