Digital Effects and Animation Panel from SXSW

Some belated notes from Sunday's SXSW panel on 'Animation and Digital Effects on a Budget'...

We talked a lot about the importance of pre-visualization (what used to be called simply 'storyboarding.') The panelists agreed that pre-viz, in whatever high-tech or low-tech form, is probably more important for independent filmmakers working on a tight budget than it is for the studio-backed big guys.

Alex Lindsay recommended Google SketchUp. Stu Maschwitz said he'd pre-vizzed national ad (for Toshiba's HD DVD gear, alas) using video from his Panasonic DMC LX2 digital camera; the camera costs less than $300. Others said that even pencil sketches of stick figures can work well, edited together in FinalCut or not. Stu said he'd also recommended that a friend use a PlayStation 2 game called 'Driver 2' to pre-viz a car chase he wanted to shoot. Stu said there's lots of potential in using videogames (and videogame controllers) to pre-viz quickly.

I asked about some recent work that might be encouraging to people working on tight budgets. Among the stuff mentioned was Don Hertzfeld's animation, the Galacticast podcast, 'Persepolis,' and 'Hoodwinked.'

Geoff Marslett showed some early footage from his new feature project, 'Mars,' which he's making for under $200K. It involves some pretty stylish rotoscoping. Mark Forker showed some work done by his new Philadelphia visual effects studio Dive, for an indie director.

And Stu offered a break-down of how he made a quick-and-dirty, but very impressive, ad for a Southwest Airlines "Wanna Get Away?" Internet contest (he didn't win, but should have). It's here.

Cinital's new take on green screen tech

In Sunday's Boston Globe, I wrote about a small company called Cinital that's trying to bring down the price of high-quality, real-time green screen compositing. What's novel about their approach is that the camera can move anywhere it wants -- or change focus -- and the background responds appropriately.

From the story:

Ordinarily, it's hard to tell what live actors will look like once these digital backgrounds are laid in; that work, called "compositing," is usually done afterward by visual effects specialists. But the concept behind Mack's company is to mix the actors and the backgrounds in real time, so the director can see what the final shot will look like by glancing at a high-definition monitor - and reduce or eliminate the costs of all that laborious, after-the-fact compositing.

Mack's Cinital system could be used on as many as 20 TV productions and a handful of feature films this year, says Sam Nicholson, chief executive of Stargate Digital, a South Pasadena, Calif., visual-effects firm that bought the first system. One of the first projects to which Cinital contributed is NBC's new made-for-TV movie "Knight Rider," which airs next month.

"This year is going to be a watershed year for us and this technology," says Nicholson, whose company has contributed visual effects to movies like "Charlie's Angels 2" and TV shows like "Heroes."

So far, the prototype system has been used for pre-viz on the forthcoming "Knight Rider" TV movie and an episode of "Saving Grace."

I also shot some video of the system, and Cinital founder Eliot Mack.

The DGA's Digital Day: Leave no trace...

I'm sure the DGA's Digital Day is great if you're a Director's Guild of America member: panels on 3-D, visual effects, videogames, editing, and pre-visualization.

But if you're not a member, you're not gonna find out much about what transpired there... there's hardly any coverage of the event each year. (My pitiful blog entry about the 2005 event is the third result on Google when you look for "DGA Digital Day.")

This year, you get a photo montage of the participants, with captions, from the DGA Monthly magazine. (Last year, there was a slightly more thorough treatment in the mag.)

I met Michael Apted, president of the Director's Guild, at the Consumer Electronics Show this January. Really nice fellow.

So Michael, why not help out the young filmmakers who are future members of the DGA, and put some video/audio/blog posts on the DGA site about what happens at this great event?