I’d give a spoiler warning, but you totally already know what happens in the movie.
Jon Favreau’s The Lion King is out this weekend, and there’s already a couple of places you can watch and read about how the all-CG and virtual production was brought to life.
Start with this American Cinematographer article, by Michael Goldman. It goes in-depth with DOP Caleb Deschanel, ASC and visual effects supervisor Robert Legato, ASC, plus other members of the crew to discuss how VR, the Unity game engine and work by Magnopus and MPC enabled a like-live-action approach to building the film. Great behind the scenes images here.
Goldman is also the author of the upcoming making-of book about the film, which you can get at Amazon.
Another place to learn about the film in more general terms is via this ABC News Nightline report, which includes a little footage from the virtual production shoot.
Heading to SIGGRAPH? There’s a couple of panels and talks planned on The Lion King, too:
Disney Presents: The Making of The Lion King
DMP Without DMP, Full-CG Environments for “The Lion King”
NVIDIA Presents: The Future of Filmmaking with Rob Legato and Ben Grossmann
And of course, keep an eye out at beforesandafters.com where I’ll be posting coverage of The Lion King soon.
