We initially received storyboards from White Noise Productions which featured a toy glamour doll character and a male plastic toy figure. Although they were specific about what the characters needed to do, they both required some development work.
Our creative team did some research into the current market to avoid any licence infringements and ensure the characters were unique. The concept art and mood boards for four characters were produced and two were selected and approved by the client. Our attention then turned to designing suitable cars for each of the characters to drive.
While this was happening the live film shoot was taking place at Carcraft (Leeds). Our VFX Supervisor attended this shoot to obtain important information which we would later use in re-creating the lighting, reflections etc. this included HDRI (High Dynamic Range Image) photography, scene measurements etc. The HDRI was shot using a Digital SLR camera and a reflective sphere. We were under tight time constraints while on set as there were only 3 days available to do all the filming and we had to capture all the data we needed within this time as well.
Once the live footage was delivered to us, in full HD, we worked on tracking it to provide a steady and stable platform for the animators to animate into. This was one of the most challenging aspect of the project which we overcame by using specialist 3D tracking software, although for some elements were tracked manually.
3D block animatics were produced using the live footage to mark out where the CG characters would be inserted. Once approved by the client our team of character animators then set to work bringing life to the characters, which were passed to our finishers who worked on lighting the scene. This is where the captured HDRI imagery was used to great effect. The outputted rendered elements where then composited into the live footage using After Effects.
After Effects was also used to rotoscope all the shots where the CG imagery would pass behind the action plate. Some of the additional elements, such as reflections and shadows, were created in post to help ground the CG in the environment.
