Posted on 01/09/2006 3:47:37 PM PST by KevinDavis
Loni Peristere, visual-effects supervisor on the SF movie Serenity, told SCI FI Wire that the movie's computer-generated visual effects mimicked hand-held camera moves and realistic lens effects, which also directly influenced the F/X on SCI FI Channel's original series Battlestar Galactica.
When Galactica creator Ronald D. Moore and visual-effects supervisor Gary Hutzel saw the visual effects that had been pioneered for director Joss Whedon and Serenity's predecessor TV show, Firefly, they came to Peristere. They told him "that's the way it should be photographed, and please bring those rules to Galactica," Peristere said in an interview. "That is the way this should be shot. And now Galactica has taken on its own set of rules. But it started with appreciation for Firefly and appreciation for work Joss had begun." (Serenity is now available on DVD.)
In Serenity, digital animation of the title spaceship taking off in the rain included raindrops on the camera lens. "When you have a massive ship lifting off, it would be hard for the cameraman to keep the lens clean," said Peristere, who worked with Whedon on both the TV show and movie. "We proposed this as a style to Joss, where the animation would have mounted cameras, depth of field, zoom lenses, all in CG, and he's like, 'Well, yeah, my whole movie is a documentary. Find the story in the camera design.' And we went with it."
Peristere's team from his Zoic Studios created Firefly/Serenity's jerky digital style, which differs from the static style of 2001: A Space Odyssey and the more fluid F/X of the Star Wars films. The style adds a sense of realism, as if things were shot by real people and not created in computers. "It seemed sort of silly to not apply the cinematic language to digital photography as well," Peristere said.
As an example, in Serenity's climactic battle scene, visual-effects designers worked as if they had three camera operators following the title ship. "Our job from an animation standpoint was to create an action that moves through the battle, rather than participating in the battle," Peristere said. "Our pilot is chasing Serenity and has to keep Serenity in frame, even though large chunks of debris and fire is coming toward him." The new Serenity DVD includes features on the creation of the movie's visual effects.
I purchased my copy of Serentiy as a Christmas present for me from me... ( I know is selfish), but I thought what the heck..
I'm an Inara man, all the way. She's exactly my type. ;)
I originally liked Andromeda up until about the time he got stuck in the event horizon.
Seriously, in the pilot, they actually put quite a bit of thought into the characters and situations that were going to be totally thrown away in about 20 minutes. That bug-humanoid (it's been quite a while) was a good character, even though you knew (she?) wasn't going to survive. Granted, no one would've wanted that kind of costume week after week after week. Hell, I don't think that that race was ever seen again. Vanished in just about 300 years.
I hear it got really, really bad when Sorbo was put in charge.
TS
Oh, and Rommy was a babe.
They're too busy showing various versions of Stargate day and night.
She's now on Stargate: SG-1.
It did start out good, but it went downhill fast.. I think it did go downhill when Sorbo was put in Charge...
Martin Landau's finest hour...;-)
Well the concept of Earth 2 was neat. I thought it was kinda a pc.. The only scifi shows that I got into was shows that featured space travel...
I liked the mixture of the old west and space..
I guess there is some issue of genre, but Joss is who he is, and he came from where he came from, and in terms of polish, refinement, depth and power, Buffy was better than Firefly.
This may not have remained so had he had time, but he didn't and the evaluation must be done from what was on the screen. Buffy was better.
Richard Benjamin is to acting as Michael Jordan was to AA Baseball.
I noticed, Lol!
Sorbo outta be in charge of the weight room and towels.
lol!!!
FYI, it's in the first 15 minutes of the BG pilot episode. Roslyn is at her doctors office when the camera pans past a window. Like every other outdoor scene in the pre-bombardment planets, the sky is filled with spaceships. If you look closely, for just a moment, you can see a Firefly on final approach for landing.
There was a comment by the animators later that they didn't do this so much as a plug as a timesaver. They created both high detail and low detail models for the scenes (depending on how far they were from the camera). The high res ones that are closer to the camera were very time consuming to make, so the animators reused a number of ships that they'd previously created for other projects. Firefly was one of them.
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