Thursday, January 31, 2019
Movie Production Designers, VFX Teams Work Together for Cohesive Look
Variety: Many of today’s movies are shaped as much by visual effects as by physical design. It’s a development that has driven some production designers to stay involved in a production well beyond the shooting stage — even without pay — so that they can provide input on the effects that form a film’s final look.
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Many high budget movies nowadays have partially (or, in some cases, entirely) replaced traditional scenery, costumes, and effects with digital visual effects. My friends at home have actually asked me on several occasions how I feel about the digitization of the film medium as a technical director who will depend on the construction of physical sets for his livelihood. However, unless film and TV manages to go 100% digital, sets will still need some physical aspect for visual effects to interact with. As such, I am not particularly worries. Additionally, I think the article raises an interesting point about how the rise of digital post-processing has lead to some movies having a different look than what the production designer envisioned. This can lead to difficult or awkward situations. As the author writes, "A production designer’s job officially wraps with principal photography, but artistic passion compels some to check in periodically during post-production." Sometimes, they are "surprised by final cuts of films that don’t have the look they originally conceived." To me, the artistic integrity of the film is far more important than my ability to build it. As such, the real question to be asked is at what point and to what degree can a film digress from its original vision?
The design aspect of film has been a world unfamiliar to me because the roles differ so much from theatre. Recently, however, I have been involved with a wonderful group of students who have written and created films. I assisted with the management portion, but the experience was mostly to introduce me to film and what it entails. Directors in film and theatre also differ, especially with the collaboration aspect. Directors ultimately make the final call in a film, whereas in theatre I have noticed more conversation and compromise over issues or disputed aspects of a production. In design specifically, collaboration is just as essential in film as stage. The costume designers must discuss color palettes with the scenic designers and it must correlate well with lighting. Communication remains essential in creating a cohesive work. The same principles provide the foundation for both forms of art, but the process most definitely differs.
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