AVATAR - Final Notes 12.3 - Visual Hollywood

This allowed Cameron to shoot the action from any angle or approach, giving himunprecedented spontaneity, flexibility and options on the virtual production stage. “Forexample, Jim could tell us to create a five-to-one scale in vertical,” says WETA’sStephen Rosenbaum. “And when he moves the camera, instead of moving it three feet,it’s a 15-foot crane move, in real time. In effect, Jim could turn the camera crew into ateam of 10-foot-tall Na’vi.”“Long after the actors had gone home, I would still be in the Volume with thevirtual camera, shooting coverage on the scene,” says Cameron. “Just by playing backthe take, I can get the scene from different angles. We can re-light it. We can do all sortsof things.”“It’s filmmaking on a different level – like comparing grade school to a doctoralprogram at M.I.T.,” says Laz Alonso.Another groundbreaking tool in Cameron’s “toolbox” was the Simul-Cam, whichintegrated, in real time, CG characters and environments into the film’s live action Fusioncamera eyepiece. The technology essentially treats a photographic camera like the virtualcamera, taking the virtual production toolset and superimposing it on the physicalproduction. “The ability to shoot on a live action set and see in your camera eyepiece CGcharacters and environments that are not there, allowed Jim to shoot that scene with thesame sensibility he would a live action scene,” explains Landau.CREATING PANDORASince all the action of AVATAR takes place on Pandora, whether within thehuman base at Hell’s Gate or out in the wilds of the rainforest, every single thing thatwent before the cameras or was rendered in CG had to be designed from scratch. Inparallel with the technology development, the design process took two years beforeshooting began. The filmmakers enlisted a team of world-class artists to design everycharacter, creature, plant, costume, weapon, vehicle, and environment in AVATAR.They created not one culture, but two: the highly technological human colony with all itsvehicles and weapons, and the Na’vi society.As he did with the characters, Cameron created Pandora to be recognizablewithout losing its exotic, never-before-experienced qualities. It is a world that merges the17