59 Productions and the Making of "War Horse"

I find it interesting that the use of motion graphics and animation is not solely limited to television and movies. Many staged productions are also using animation to add a new dimension to live theater. One show that uses this technique is the 2011 Tony Award winner for Best New Play, War Horse. I remembered awhile back watching a video on broadway.com that looked into the making of "War Horse" and how the 3D animation is used to subtly enhance the story. The production company behind bringing animation to "War Horse" is 59 Productions, a film and new media production company that excels in film making and integrating moving images into live performance. This company has relations in the UK, Europe and North America. Some of its other projects include commercial productions in the West End, the Royal Opera House and the Metropolitan Opera of New York.

Within this video Mark Grimmer, a video projection designer and director of 59 Productions makes a good point about the use of technology. He said "One of the great things about War Horse in particular, and the way we work in general is, we try to not let the technology take over and just because something is possible isn't necessarily a reason to do it. So using technology without letting it being apparent is something we aim for." I feel like this is a really good outlook because I agree technology should not just be used for technology sake. It must also serve the purpose of enhancing the story the play is trying to tell.

Here is the video about the Making of "War Horse":


At about the 2 minute mark of this video I noticed that Peter Stenhouse, who was the Director of Animation at 59 Productions, is using a After Effects or a program with a very similar interface.