A round-up of the upcoming VFX and animation sessions featuring major films, shows and tech at SIGGRAPH this year.
SIGGRAPH 2022 in Vancouver, which is happening early August in-person and online, features a raft of presentations about visual effects and animation in recent films and streaming shows. They are mostly taking place as part of the Talks and Production Sessions tracks (two tracks I always follow at SIGGRAPH). Here’s my run-down of all the big sessions that I’m looking to attend at the conference.
Note, too, that a number of talks and production sessions will be online, available to watch with a virtual ticket. It’s also worth mentioning that many visual effects projects are featured in the SIGGRAPH Electronic Theater, again available to see virtually. I’ve embedded the ET trailer, below.
Production sessions–the big VFX presentations
Some of the biggest films from the past two years will be featured during the in-person Production Sessions presentations. DNEG will be there discussing Dune, WetaFX is talking The Batman, while Imageworks jumps into The Sea Beast. Meanwhile, Walt Disney Animation Studios will break down its ‘We Don’t Talk About Bruno’ sequence from Encanto, and a large panel from Pixar dissects the making of Turning Red.
Online, Digital Domain is tackling Spider-Man: No Way Home, Framestore is discussing Moon Knight and WetaFX is presenting on Peacemaker. Pixar will be jumping into Lightyear, and there’s also an interesting looking online presentation on neural rendering for The Champion by Mike Seymour, Hao Li, Zimo li and Matt Graham.
Talks–bite-sized in-depth VFX and animation info
I often say that the Talks part of SIGGRAPH is the conference’s secret weapon. That’s because there are regularly little nuggets of info presented in the Talks that you don’t really hear about anywhere else. Here are some highlights:
Animation: WDAS is back with more Encanto for talks on a new tessellation algorithm for production rendering of fractured subdivision surfaces, cloth sims, USD and more. Pixar will look at hair in Turning Red, and a number of aspects of Lightyear. DreamWorks Animation has a whole bunch of The Bad Guys and Boss Baby talks, including about the stylized nature of the Bad Guys work. Animal Logic probes its work on Super-Pets and DNEG Animation explores procedural workflows in Ron’s Gone Wrong.
VFX: WetaFX discusses large scale water in Eternals and reveals its face-swapping work in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. ILM breaks down its ABBA: Voyage concert experience with synthetic band members and the cursed conquistador in Jungle Cruise. Digital Domain explains the video-driven animation transfer aspects of its facial capture pipeline. Finally, Goodbye Kansas Studios will showcase digital human production at the studio.
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Feature image credit: Spider-Man: No Where To Swing Ⓒ MARVEL 2021 COPYRIGHT CTMG ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
