19 Dec 2012

Week 47 – Christmas
by | posted in: Animation | 1

What a year!

We had a certain idea of what was waiting for us with this project, but never did we anticipate it would be so hard. Or so rewarding!

Obviously, we would have prefered if our main computer didn’t die on us without warning. We also would have liked to be able to stay on schedule and actually be doing our last shots before leaving for the holidays. But things didn’t go exactly as planned. This project is just gigantic. It might very well be the most important thing we ever did.

But don’t worry, moral is at its best, and the project is now going at full speed. Now that every pre-prod element is completed, I’m finally able to help Carl with the animation. That means we now spend 100% of our time getting out shots while Thom is doing the lighting and compositing. During the last months, we fixed almost every single texture or render problem, found a visual style we like, and refined the animation style.

We don’t know exactly how long it will take before we can finish this film, but one thing is certain, we’ll do everything it takes to make it the best possible. And believe us, it’s gonna be worth it!

Since it is our last update before the holidays, we wanted to celebrate properly. It’s been a while since we showed you any new animation shots, so we thought it’d be the perfect moment to show you my first sequence, along with the very first shot featuring the little girl!

Happy holidays from the entire Le Gouffre team! Thank you infinitely for your support, and come back in 2013 for the latest developments on the film.

5 Dec 2012

Week 45 – New look
by | posted in: Compositing | 2

Hello everyone!

Now that we can finally render the set (the textures and import script being done), Thomas is reworking our old shots. Although they weren’t that bad, they didn’t feel like it’s evening, as required by the story. Also, the storm effect wasn’t feeling menacing enough to our taste.

So here’s the first shot we showed you a while back with the new look. After that, you can see comparison shots between the old and the new look. Comments are welcomed!

SHOT 019_010 – Old version:

SHOT 019_010 – New version:

SHOT 019_030 – Old version:

SHOT 019_030 – New version:

For those who are wondering what’s going on with our screwed-up computer, well it will take a little longer that expected since the new piece we need is backorder. So we’re a little slower at rendering stuff there days but that should be fixed eventually.

Thanks for coming and see you soon!