Watch Video from The Vancouver Sun:
Zoic Studios Ride VFX Boom

By Vincent Laforte:

Every one in awhile, life throws you a bone.  In this case, Director Loni Peristere of Zoic Studios asked me to shoot 3 commercials with him over a little more than a week in Vancouver.  The bone? (Besides the work!) One of those 3 – was to be shot at 600 fps – at night – with snow and with motion control!  We all knew that this one had the potential to be very special. And I think Loni and the team nailed this one! Here it is:

Famous Footwear – “Neighborhood” Spot from Vincent Laforet on Vimeo.

This was a dream job for me – for several reasons.   For one – it was a beautiful story with a simple but strong emotional thread that we can all relate to easily.  Second, Loni wanted to make this thing sing visually – and he made sure that I had the resources at hand to pull this shoot off.

First we needed 225,000 Watts of light – a MASSIVE amount – to get enough light to shoot at 600 frames per second – with the Phantom Gold HD camera.  I brought one of my favorite people up with me to Canada – Gaffer Mark Lindsay who wielded the light with ease.   Basically we had enough light to cook an egg in under 10 seconds – and a turkey in under an hour.  BUT – believe it or not – all of this light got us a whopping aperture of f 2.0 on the Cooke S4/i primes… So Yeah… think about that for a second: 225,000 Watts of light and you get f 2.0…!!!  Even with a 360º shutter (359º to be exact) – at 600 fps SO LITTLE LIGHT is actually making it to the sensor.

This was a huge technical challenge – and one that several people told us: “could not be done” on as large a stage/setting as we were hopping to do – with diffused lights.   Lighting it with enough light is easy – but lighting it well is not with a good quality and shape of light isn’t.

Below is a great video that shows you the behind the scenes shoot – all of the people, the gear, the lights. A HUGE thanks goes out to Chris Dowsett for shooting this footage – and for putting this edit together for everyone to see!

BEHIND THE SCENES: Famous Footwear “Neighborhood” from Vincent Laforet on Vimeo.

You’ll see we used the Go Pro HD camera (see bottom of that page) and mounted it on the motion control rig to get you a first person perspective – or a first camera perspective if you will.

One other hero on the shoot – was my 1st AC – or focus puller.  Cam Hayduk – with more than 26 years of experience under his belt as a 1st AC, had the impossible challenge of keeping focus with up to a 100mm (see the tight headshot of our actress with hair flowing) WHILE moving on a dolly, as she too was running towards camera.   Did I mention this was done at f 2.0> At one point we had less than an inch of depth of field.  And don’t forget – that a split second of being out of focus at 600 fps- or “buzzing” – last an even greater eternity when played back at 24 fps. (One quarter second shot at 600fps will last 6.25 SECONDS when played back at 24fps…. that’s a long time for everyone to see you were soft on set… no pressure at all there!) And not to belabor the point: but the dolly was being pulled/pushed by skilled human beings – not a robot.   Ergo a variance in speed in both the dolly, and the actress was expected – not to mention a ramp up an down.  Each burst lasted 7 seconds max with the RAM aboard the camera at 2048X1080… Cam was the MVP of this shoot in my book.

The last technical challenge?  When shooting at f 2.0 – how could we get multiple planes of focus at once?  It was impossible. We discussed tilt-shift lenses – but those would have looked quite odd with snow. Adding twice the amount of light (cost prohibitive!) would have gotten us all of f 2.8.

Therefore we shot many of the sequences with a motion control rig. Basically a computerized dolly/jib system – that can repeat each move EXACTLY time and time again. You’ll notice one shot where the actor puts his foot down from the cab – and the actress is running towards him. Getting them both in focus at 600 fps wide open would have been impossible. Here is the magic of Motion Control + a great post house to splice them together seamlessly.

Overall – all 3 shoots were a blast. But this one is special for me. Not only did it turn out beautifully – but we had an absolute blast on set – as you can witness by all of the smiles in the behind the scenes video. (And we were shooting NIGHTS!!! After 3 shoot days during daylight hours.)

Thanks to the entire crew, cast, production, art deparment, PAs and to the incredible people who did the post at Zoic – and to Loni – it was an unforgettable two winter nights in Vancouver – in August! and if you haven’t seen enough, here’s one more: a time lapse Chris shot of everything being set up:

“Neighborhood” Time Lapse from Vincent Laforet on Vimeo.

————————————————————–

I will be doing a more in depth interview with Vincent in the coming weeks to talk more about his life as a DP and award winning photographer so stay tuned! In the meantime, check out his blog! Vincent Laforet blog

Also I am about to head to set for a big commercial spot that we are working on. Can’t say much, but I can say it’s up the street and is bound to be a lot of fun on set.

Finally the biggest news of the day is TOMORROW November 18th at 4:00pm Zoic Studios is having it’s first LIVE BROADCAST. Yours truly will be interviewing VFX Supervisor Andrew Orloff on Ustream about the latest and greatest in Visual Effects for such shows as V, Human Target, and CSI. So join me as I take you Inside Zoic Studios:
Inside Zoic Studios

As I mentioned in a previous post, Zoic Vancouver is a very important part of Zoic Studios.  I felt fortunate to meet everyone and get a tour of the offices this past August.   Patrick Mooney, Production Supervisor and VFX Producer of Zoic Vacouver gave me a run down of all of the exciting things coming up for the Canadian arm of the studio and the offices certainly have been full of activity.  I wanted to share the news as there is some pretty big stuff in the works, but don’t take my word for it. Here is what Patrick has to say:

“The big news here in the Zoic Vancouver office is our imminent move to a more spacious and more creative space in a heritage building called ‘The Landing.’  The move is taking place at the end of November and into the beginning of December.  The Gastown location will have about 20% more space, and the area has some amazing restaurants, bars and nearby shopping.   It is also adjacent to the main downtown transportation hub so it makes coming and going incredibly easy and efficient.

In terms of projects, we have been working on the feature Red Riding Hood, which is a really cool retelling of the childhood fairy tale.   It’s quite dark and scary.  The creature work is being done by R&H while we focus on environments and backgrounds.   We have been doing a great deal of matte painting work and set extensions on the project.  It’s a fairly stylized world, and the director is Catherine Hardwicke who directed Twilight.  Gary Oldman plays his usual villain-type role.  Kristen (Branan) is producing in Los Angeles, and we’ve got a great team here in BC lead by Ralph Maiers as VFX Supervisor, Chris Roff producing, Colin Liggett as Comp Supervisor and Kevin Struckman as CG Supervisor.

We’re also just starting up on the feature Premium Rush, directed by David Koepp and starring Joseph Grdon Levitt.   We are working with Mark Stetson, Raoul (Bolognini) and Rocco (Passionino) in Los Angeles.  Ralph Maiers will again supervise in BC, with Brett Dowler producing.

On the episodic front, V is of course in heavy production up here, which is scheduled to return to air in the US on January 4th on ABC. We’re also contributing Nuke work for Falling Skies.  So far we’re comping shots with alien targeting beams, death beams, flares, explosions, debris and blood hits.   Los Angeles is providing the CG.

Overall, we’re staffed more heavily than at any prior period.  We’re packing into spaces we didn’t know we had!  Not only is it incredibly busy here, but we’ve also just upgraded practically our entire hardware infrastructure with new workstations and a new storage cluster, in addition to beefing up our render farm.  So, in a nutshell, we’re crazy, but very good.”

I for one am incredibly excited to see the new space once it is complete.   Plus I am excited to check out all the projects on Zoic’s slate up in Vancouver especially Red Riding Hood. I’m a big fan of Hardwick and the film could be another hit for Amanda Seyfried (Dear John, Mama Mia).  Stay tuned for more upcoming insight into Zoic Vancouver in future posts.

Last year Zoic Studios teamed up with Tarsem on the “Level Up or Die” spot for Mountain Dew and Ekker was the VFX Supervisor/ Creative Director on that spot as well.  Ekker and Tarsem had a good connection from the previous work they had done together.

“They were shooting when they called us and asked if we could help.  We didn’t have a supervisor on set, but I talked to the team to let them know what they would need to make their shots work. However, they were already well informed as Tarsem has extensive experience in visual effects.  He knows his stuff and he has always been really good about supporting visual effects in his work. Most of the work we did was replication of animals: chickens, deer, rabbits, baby ducks.  What they didn’t have was a butterfly.  They wanted us to animate a butterfly for the end of the spot.  They also wanted the eyes of three actors to reflect light when they turned around towards the camera in one shot, almost like an animal at night.”

Ekker actually took a tip from the film Blade Runner for the light reflection shot.  “We were referencing Blade Runner.  When Ridley Scott directed the film, he had a light source right next to the lens and bounced light out of the actor’s eyes. It was very subtle yet effective.  The visual effect takes place in the scene where there is a machine that can find out if you are a Replicant or not by examining your eye and how it responds to questions.  I was very familiar with that because I not only studied the film, but also worked on the movie so I knew exactly how it was done.  So we replicated that in how we set up the composite.  I had our compositor take the entire scene and reduce it in size to a postage stamp and blur it.  We used that image in the pupil of the actor’s eye.  We could move the image around and set in the place we needed it inside the eye.  That worked out really well because each eye is different and it’s very organic looking because we are using an organic source for the image.  We worked with the Head of Art at the Fallon Agency, Christy Peacock who worked with us creatively on the spot.”

With regards to the butterfly, Ekker had a butterfly image in mind that the agency ended up responding to, “I selected a photograph and proposed it as a texture map and the agency loved it.  We used that as a guide and set it up for animation.  We had Chris Barsamian who is a very talented animator at Zoic Studios do the animation for us and he did some great work.  We did about eighty different versions of animation and found the right animated piece that was the right compromise of naturalistic animation and expressive animation. The final step in the shot was to put a little powder on the window from the butterfly’s wings when it hits the glass.  To accomplish the look, I went into a dark storeroom and there was a monitor in there that I tipped up.  I took some chalk and shaved it with a knife, took a Kleenex from my pocket and made a V shape out of the chalk shavings onto the monitor.  I took a series of still photographs, making several different patterns out of the chalk.  I lit them with my LED flashlight and all of the photographs were taken with a long exposure.  In about twenty minutes I handed the elements over to Chris and they worked really well in the spot.”

The spot is highly stylized and was shot on the ARRI Flex Alexa digital camera.  “It has a very broad range of exposure latitude so it has a huge dynamic range; it has a 16 stop dynamic range and it looks like film.  It’s very low noise and has great detail of highlights, really nice shadow details and great color continuity through the tones.  It was really impressive and the first time I had worked with the camera as it is brand new.”

The spot for the Cosmopolitan is pretty hot and I for one am excited to check out the real deal when the hotel opens on December 15, 2010.  Check out the spot  below.

Loni along with VFX Producer Ian Unterreiner, Terence Reilly, VP of Marketing for Famous Footwear, Andy Anema, Art Director for Campbell Mithun and Nancy Liss, Account Management Supervisor for Campbell Mithun went on quite an adventure. They all hiked up one of Vancouver’s most renowned and challenging trails, The Grouse Grind. Located about thirty minutes outside of the city, the trail climbs 2800 feet of elevation in about 1.8 miles and is open from June through October depending on weather conditions. The trail opened in 1983 and is composed almost entirely of stairs cut from the rock and soil of the mountainside. Sections of the trail that are quite steep are lined with rope and hikers will often use the rope to haul themselves up the difficult portion of the trail. On average it takes most people about an hour to complete the hike. Once completed, hikers are given a stunning view of the city and surrounding areas. There is a restaurant and refreshment options as well as a Gondola that will take hikers back to the bottom of the mountain. It is advised that those who dare to hike the trail be in decent physical shape and bring plenty of water and snacks. Apparently, the first fifteen minutes are the most challenging and if you can get past the first quarter mile you will be able to complete the hike.

However, don’t take my word for it. Check out this video below where Loni gives you a firsthand look at his experience hiking Grouse Grind.

As I got older my taste in pop music grew.  I would listen to my parent’s Tina Turner, Michael Jackson, Captain and Tennile and ABBA records.  In fact, I remember one day listening to “Dancing Queen” pretty much non stop for almost an hour until my dad came downstairs and moved the needle on the record player to a different track.  As a teenager I would listen to Pearl Jam and Nirvana with my friends, but before bed I would put on my walkman and listen to Boyz II Men and Hootie and the Blowfish.  The first CD I ever bought was Dave Matthews Band, Under the Table and Dreaming and the song “Satellite” still reminds me of a crush I had on one of my close guy friends my junior year.  As a camp counselor, the summer before my senior year in high school, I heard Tori Amos and Sarah McLachlan for the first time and it would forever change me as I began to listen to other female singer songwriters like Liz Phair, Poe, and Mazzy Star.

College was a turning point when I stepped into the college radio station.  I snatched a show from 5am-8am in the mornings and it was then that my taste in music really expanded.  I got into Depeche Mode, Joy Division, The Ramones, but also Billie Holiday, Dizzie Gilepsie and then Phillip Glass.  However, in my car driving to campus, I would blast The Gin Blossoms, “Hey Jealousy.”  My senior year of college my pop sensibility was on overload when I discovered Brit Pop in my travels to England. Oasis, Blur, Supergrass and Elastica were all on my stereo, but I also had a soft spot for boy band Boyzone, a pop singer known as Billie and I secretly longed to replace Ginger in The Spice Girls.

Today, though I prefer the indie sounds of Fleet Foxes or Avnet Brothers, I will always and forever be a pop princess at heart. So if you see me in my car, singing my heart out to Rhianna, you’ll know why.

My top of the pops albums:

1)    Tina Turner: Private Dancer- Turner’s break out solo album without Ike. She released this album when she was 45 and now 71 Turner is still one of the best live performers you will ever see.

2)    Michael Jackson: Thriller- This album went 29 times Platinum in the US alone for a reason.  You can’t get more pop than the King of Pop’s second solo album.

3)    ABBA: Gold (the best of the best of ABBA) I am not usually a fan of best of albums, but to really get the best of ABBA you have to go for GOLD. From Fernando to Dancing Queen, Take A Chance On Me and Money Money Money this album has it all.

4)    NOW That’s What I Call Music 39: UK edition- With Robbie Williams, Spice Girls, All Saints and Run DMC all on the same album you can’t go wrong. This is pop guilty pleasure at its finest.

5)    Dave Matthews: Under the Table and Dreaming- The first isn’t always the best, but for DMB it is.  I still can sing all of the words to Ants Marching and I will always remember how it felt to buy a CD and not a record or cassette.

6)    Sarah McLachlan: Fumbling Towards Ecstasy- At sixteen this album spoke to everything I was going through and now more than fifteen years later, I can still relate to McLachlan’s lyrics.

7)    Blondie: Best of Blondie- Deborah Harry was the first rapper I ever heard and to she may just be better than some of the rappers out there today.

8)    Pink: Funhouse- There aren’t a lot of artists today that would get me to run out and physically buy a CD.  Pink did.  Her live performances are gutsy just like her music.  Her lyrics are honest, and heart breaking one minute and fun and sarcastic the next. Plus she has a killer voice.  She makes me wish I was a rock star.

9)    The Beatles: Let It Be- In my opinion the pinnacle of pop bands. They were the boy band that truly started it all and they became so much more than four young lads from Liverpool.  I wish I could have seen them perform together, but I did get to see Paul two years at Coachella and it was literally the best live performance I have ever seen in my life.

Not only would I have four days to explore this beautiful city, but it was a chance for me to connect to another part of the company, and a whole new set of people that I had only emailed or spoken to by phone.  As I soon found out, The Zoic Vancouver office is filled with talented and down to earth staff members.  It was a unique opportunity for me to look at some of the projects the staff were working on as well as simply get to know some of the people.  I thought that the I Design Your Eyes community should get the opportunity to know some of the staff as well so I documented it in this video, which incorporates the office, interviews with some of the staff as well as will give you, the I Design Your Eyes Readers, a glimpse into the fabulous city of Vancouver.

For me, on a personal level, it was an eye- opening trip on several levels.  First, there is a very rich artistic community that I was not aware of.  Up the street from my hotel a group of young airbrush artists were commissioned to paint a wall with figures from British Columbia’s past and present.  None of the artists wanted to be filmed, but I was able to hang back and watch them create something really incredible.

On my second night in Vancouver I had an opportunity to go on a cocktail tour, Vancouver Food Tour, around the Gastown district with food and beverage expert Melody Fury and veteran barman/ cocktail expert Jay Jones, who was a partner in the restaurant Pourhouse.

Besides the fabulous sampling of food and beverages, I also got a brief history lesson in the up and coming area of Gastown.

Part of Fury and Jones’ mission with the tour is to educate both the locals and tourists about the homeless population that still resides in the area.  As we walk the streets, Fury talks about how it is important that everyone reside together and that she doesn’t want people to be afraid, but instead to acknowledge that a problem does exist and that the community needs to take part in embracing this instead of being fearful and shying away from it.  The other lesson I got that night is that there is an incredible local music scene in Vancouver.  With the opening of Calabash Bistro just a month ago, local bands play in the bar’s stage area downstairs.  I am a huge music fan, so it was a really special treat to get to listen in on the local music scene.  It was a fun and informative night.

The following day, Friday, I met the Zoic Vancouver staff.  Everyone greeted me with a smile. They were curious why I had come all the way to Vancouver and so I told them it was to get to know them and to interview them on camera.  A few of the staff were a bit camera shy.  However, I was able to coax most of them into sharing their thoughts about the places I should explore while in Vancouver, which I was excited to do on Saturday afternoon.

That night around 5pm, I drove one hour outside of Vancouver to Fort Langley, a quaint town with a lot of local artisans, http://www.fortlangley.com/ to take a behind the scenes look of a commercial shoot that was directed by Loni Peristere.

For me, being on set was a highlight, not simply because I got my fill of craft service.

I also had the opportunity to get to know the crew who were both amiable and hard working.  Plus a lot of the people in the neighborhood came out to watch the shoot.  They were all so excited to have a camera crew virtually in their backyards and of course, I got out my trusty Flip Cam to document their reactions.  Some even brought their dogs.

The shoot ended at 5am, and I got into my trusty Nissan Vestra rental car and drove the hour back into the city to crash until 9am when I returned said vehicle and did some more exploring of Vancouver on foot.  Per the recommendation of the Zoic Vancouver staff, I rented a bicycle and rode around the Seawall and parts of Stanley Park.

It was a beautiful ride until around 3pm when my legs seemed to turn to Jell-O and exhaustion set in.  I returned the bike, walked back to the hotel and passed out in my comfy Hampton Inn bed to not awaken until 4am when I had to pack and catch my flight back to Los Angeles.

All in all it was an amazing experience to get to explore the people and places of Vancouver.   I am incredibly grateful I was sent to check out what the city has to offer and get to know the Zoic Vancouver staff.  So I Design Your Eyes Community, without further ado here is my video of the experience.

I Design Your Eyes Community what do you think?  Anyone familiar with the Vancouver area and if so anywhere or anything I missed on my journey?