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Research
Research Introduction
For my FMP I decided to do Digi Double shots, something which is one of the most difficult things to achieve in VFX. Due to the nature this I needed to do plenty of research into different sectors to achieve a competent appealing FMP. This ranges from software research, to research into how actual industry Digi double shots are created.
Inital Inspiration
For my three shots I decided to look into some shots which had already been done by industry as inspiration. Please find my these below.
I thought that the modern superhero show The Boys would be ideal for my superhero style shot as it shows the main antagonist Homelander doing "superhero jumps" and "superhero landings" throughout the show. Something which I intended to recreate by my own means. Please find the relevant shot above from 1:00 onwards.
For my second shot I decided that I would take inspiration from the movie Joe Meets Black. Although the movie and the effects in it are quite old it captures the idea of the shot I am trying to achieve perfectly, even the comedic aspect of the shot. Please find the relevant shot from 0:05 onwards.
For my third and final shot I decided to take inspiration form one of the final shots from John Wick 3 - Parabellum. This was because I feel the shot itself if near on exactly what I am trying to capture from my own shot, having a realistic feel throughout, even if it feels a bit janky and off weight towards the end. Please find the relevant shot from 1:57 onwards.
Inital Inspiration Rewoked
I ended up changing two of my ideas a bit into development of my FMP. These shots being the falling from building shot, and the hit by car shot. These were changed to a parkour shot and flipping over car shot respectively. This was because they were both too predictable, too dangerous, and in hindsight too logistically unstable to make. Please find my new inspiration below.
This video I took direct inspiration from throughout as it has all of the moves that I thought I would like to include in my shot, from vaulting over and down stairs to big vertical jumps this had all the inspiration I needed to get going with my shot.
This video similar to the above is full of inspiration for my flipping over car shot. However one to me sticks out in particular, that being the shot around 2:34 is nearly exactly what I want. I feel this is perfect inspiration as it has multiple angles of how the man flips over the car making it not only good inspiration but good reference too.
How Industry Does It
Although I already had a decent idea how Digi Double shots were created I thought it would be beneficial to me to look into further how industry does it, as closely as I could to my initial inspiration. Here's what I found.
This video was useful, particularly around 7:35 where it discuses how they used digi doubles to tie between Anthony Starr (Homelander) and his Digi Double counterpart by having him jump up for jumping and down for landing tied in with the Digi Double to create the impressive looking effect. Something which to me is incredibly useful as I can take this into consideration when filming my own plates.
This video is interesting as it shows the shot from John Wick 3 - Parabellum side by side with the behind the scenes shot. From this I learnt that for the final shot they used a blend of the stunt double performance and enhanced it with the Digi Double performance. This is useful as it gives me another way I can utilize my Digi Double animation to enhance my shot.
The only thing I could find on YouTube was this video comparing the final shot with a BTS photo. This unfortunately wasn't very informative in itself however interested me enough to go looking into how they did the shot on google instead.
After looking around for a while on google I found that they actually used a dummy and cut between the shot on Brad Pitt getting hit by the big blue foam car and the dummy being propelled in the air. Then manipulating the result in post as needed. Although interesting I found that this wouldn't be necessarily vital in my work as I would be doing purely Digi Double enhancement for my shots, however it is nonetheless interesting. Please find a link below to the website I found this information on.
https://beforesandafters.com/2019/04/03/remember-that-time-brad-pitt-got-hit-by-a-van-and-a-taxi/
Please find below some additional industry standard practices I researched to inform my Digi Double production below.
All of the above videos are all informative in their own ways enhancing my knowledge of the practice of making Digi Doubles, and my knowledge of the industry as a whole making them all useful resources for my FMP.
Software Research
After gathering research on the process of filming for the Digi Double animation, it was time to learn how to use the software's necessary for me to do this. Luckily for me due to previous industry and academic knowledge I already knew which software's I would be using. Those being Nuke for composition, tracking and grading. And Maya for animation and rendering. As I already had the animation part nailed down I had felt it necessary to start to learn tracking in Nuke.
These three videos in particular were invaluable to me learning how to use Nuke to be able to track real time footage and to be able to export the digital camera of it to Maya to then be animated on top of. To do this properly however I also needed to do research into the camera which I was using, in this instance was my phone. This was so the software knew what the aspect ratio, zoom intensity and other properties of the camera were to ensure the digital camera had the same output as the original.
The specs were easy enough to come by, simply requiring a google search. Please find a link to where I found the specs below.
https://store.google.com/us/product/pixel_7_pro_specs?hl=en-US
Sadly despite these videos I ultimately wasn't able to use Nuke for tracking. Why? Because to export the track to Maya it requires the full paid licence. Meaning I would need to find another way to track my footage.
After consulting one of my tutors on the matter he sent me in the direction of this video, which proved very informative. Not only did it show me how to track in After Effects, but also export it to Maya via a plug in which is provided, thus completely solving the issue. Please find the video below.
I then found once I had completed this video that there was a second part which covered how to do render passes in Arnold, which for me again was invaluable as I wanted to render it professionally. Please find the video below.
The final thing which I needed to research was how to colour match in Nuke. This would be essential in adding that final piece of blend to my shot, ensuring that the base plates and the animated footage look as close to each other as possible. I found this informative video on how to do so below.
Research Sum Up
Overall the research which I have done in preparation for my Digi Double production has been invaluable. I have learnt so much about industry, their practices, how to inform my own work based on that and even added new pieces of industry standard software to my arsenal, making this research not only important to my FMP, but to my career in VFX as a whole.
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