After our initial meeting with Evolution Studios, we developed a variety of set action sequences which we knew would portray the purpose and feel of the game, such as vehicles scraping across cliff sides and various near death experiences, to produce approximately 20 different shot options, including a climatic ending. We then went through these with Evolution Studios piecing them together to form the basis of the concept movies’ shot list.
With the narrative of the movie established we then moved on to block out our 3D animatic and plan the visual approach we would be taking. During this process we encouraged our artists to push their skills to the limit allowing them to experiment with the scenes and explore cinematic treatments and visual effects.
The vehicle assets provided needed to be worked up from untextured in-game models to HD movie resolution by increasing the detail in appropriate places before texturing and rigging. Our custom in-house vehicle rigs allowed the animation team to manipulate the complex suspension with ease. A driver skeleton system was also integrated into the rig, so that when the vehicles banked, dipped and turned, the characters inside them would react realistically.
Using the finished animatic as an outline, we plotted a route through the landscape that would supply us with the right environment for each set sequence - we let the action dictate the environment and not the other way round. Different pieces of reference photography were assigned to each part of the environment to ensure each section had its own distinct look, while portraying a sense of progression through the ever-changing wilderness.
With the vehicle animation complete, we worked on the scene interaction and incorporated the tyre rutting, spray and mud. The interactive rutting was one of the most challenging parts of the project as all the vehicles needed to interact with the mud on the road and also leave deep tyre tracks in the surface. We explored different systems to achieve this, the solution we went for used extremely high resolution displacement maps. Although this meant working with some large animated textures, it did provide greater control over the effect and sped up render times considerably.
Our chosen renderer for this project was Vray, which combined with our Post Production team’s deft skill, was able to provide the bleached out midday feel we were looking for. So much CG relies on attractive sunsets or moody shadows to sell the look but we wanted a raw and aggressive look to this movie.
