Rising Sun Picture’s comprehensive look at their ML REVIZE set of tools was a big highlight of the week, which also included many other in-depth VFX sessions.
SIGGRAPH Asia Sydney 2023 has just wrapped up, and befores & afters was there for the week sitting in on sessions, chatting to VFX supervisors (and enjoying a conference in our home town!).
One thing about the conference in general was the mood–it’s been a very, very tough year for artists in VFX, animation and games–but there was also a buzz about recovery of the industry and the wave of new tech, especially in terms of machine learning.
Here’s a bunch of selected highlights. I thought I would keep it to five of my top sessions.
1. RSP delves into REVIZE
Rising Sun Pictures has in the past few years dived heavily into ML tools that aid in their VFX workflows, especially in the areas of face replacements, de-ageing and head and body augmentation. They call their suite of tools ‘REVIZE’, and, in particular, REVIZE Face and REVIZE Body have now been utilized in over 20 projects at the studio.
Much of the work remains super-secret, either because it is upcoming or because it lies within the realm of actor and face replacement and augmentation (which has traditionally been an area not always able to be fully discussed in VFX). Some shots from Thor: Love & Thunder and Shang-Chi were shown, which RSP has been able to talk about in terms of the stunt facial replacement and baby work previously.
But the overall tech Rising Sun showcased–via a special Foundry session presented by Robert Beveridge (Machine Learning 2D Supervisor – RSP), Tom Rowntree (Machine Learning Developer – RSP), and Bree Whitford-Smith (Business Development Manager – RSP)–was fascinating.
The studio used in-house employee imagery to break down their process, including how the machine learning workflows made their way into and through to Nuke for compositing. I personally think this was the major highlight at SIGGRAPH Asia Sydney, since it represented an area that many VFX artists and studios have been looking at, but with real-world use cases (as in, actual shot production). Really looking forward to seeing what RSP delivers with the REVIZE tools.
2. Wētā FX went deep on many projects
This is a bit of a catch-all highlight, since Wētā FX had a number of presenters delivering the details on their big recent projects. Joe Letteri spoke on The Way of Water, which completely captivated the big room, while Robin Hollander revealed a ton of behind the scenes info on Cocaine Bear.
I especially enjoyed sequence VFX supervisor Sabine Laimer’s rundown of The Marvels, which included many of the studio’s ‘practical’ explorations for key shots, such as where they tested lasers shooting into whisky tumblers, and even hand sanitizer on a TV screen. There was something really tangible and authentic about that, alongside seeing Wētā FX’s impressive digital effects work.
3. Oppenheimer and DNEG in detail
During the week, I moderated a session about the visual effects of Oppenheimer, in DNEG’s dedicated room. This was with DNEG Sydney Creative Director and Oppenheimer production visual effects supervisor Andrew Jackson, and DNEG visual effects supervisor Giacomo Mineo.
What was great about this session was the extra detail provided by the supervisors on the creation of the SFX and VFX of Oppenheimer, and even some commentary about the ‘overall’ discussion of visual effects right now, which has been controversial. It also provided an opportunity for attendees to learn more about the creative process, and opportunities at DNEG Sydney.
4. Paul Debevec blows the audience away with a history of his research
Paul Debevec is now the Chief Research Officer, Eyeline Studios, and before that he worked at Netflix, Google and of course was a long-time academic. His contributions to image-based lighting, digital humans and virtual production are legendary, and have indeed aided many visual effects productions for decades.
Watching his featured session at SIGGRAPH Asia was like looking back through a history of recent computer graphics itself, and I was particularly struck by the new high-definition remastering of The Campanile Movie, the short Debevec directed in 1997 that showcased to so many people the power of photogrammetry. Look out at befores & afters for an upcoming in-depth interview with Debevec on his career.
5. Where art and tech meet, with Rob Bredow
In this featured session entitled ‘The Intersection of Art and Technology: Creative Design at Industrial Light & Magic’, Rob Bredow, SVP and Chief Creative Officer of ILM, spoke about key creative opportunities for artists. This, of course, related mostly to his time at studios like Imageworks and ILM, with lots of fun examples from Solo, for which Bredow was VFX supervisor.
This was a highly inspiring talk, especially for VFX and animation artists in the room. One element of the talk was about ‘bringing people along with the theme’, and I thought this was a very practical real-world factor in keeping artists motivated for what can be long, arduous stretches on big tentpole projects. I was lucky enough to interview Bredow at SIGGRAPH Asia, so look out also for that chat at befores & afters.
Next year’s SIGGRAPH Asia is heading to Tokyo, and b&a will be there, we hope you might be, too.
