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framestore cfc harry potter 3

Framestore CFC is already a studio with experience in the saga of the more popular magician boy of all times. In 'Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets', the second film, they give life to the terrible Basilisk, the Pixies and to Fawkes, the phoenix.

In 'Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban', Framestore CFC has given life to one of the most amazing characters of the movie, to Buckbeak, the Hippogriff. A completely digital creature, half horse half eagle, that has given some of the most spectacular shots of all the Harry Potter saga.

We have spoken with David Lomax, CG supervisor for this film at Framestore CFC, on the design and creation process of Buckbeak, the fur and the feathers, the animation of this creature , the composition with real characters,...

 

 


El Portal del 3D y la Animación - In 'Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban' your work has been to give life to Buckbeak, the one that many consider the best digital character of the film, being a half horse and a half eagle. How is created a character like this one? How it was the preproduction?

David Lomax - Our initial starting point is concept artwork and maquettes supplied by the Art Department from Production. This gave us the broad strokes about the overall look for Buckbeak. We collected extensive video footage of horses and eagles performing a complete range of actions. We visited plenty of zoos and animal sanctuaries to get up close to these animals to study and photograph such things as feather layout and packing on an eagle wing. After much micro study of feather anatomy, we then started to develop software for creating phtorealistic feathers. A particular challenge was to make the feathers pack on top of each other such they looked under some compression. This meant devising a system to prevent intersections between feathers that lie on top of each other. This system had deal with the complexity of a moving and deforming animal where this movement could shift the order of packing.

Animation tests were also developed where Buckbeaks personality was created - the way he turns his head, how he unfolds his wings etc. On particular challenge wasa to develop the way Buckbeak walks. Because his front legs are an eagle's and back legs a horse, a style of walking had to developed that combined characteristics of both animals. The challenge was to not make him look like two different creatures just stuck together. There has to be some symbiosis between the halves that retains the essential characteristics of both animal types. What you aim for is meld of the two but with reads as the believable and unique feeling of a hippogriff. A key factor to any creature's believability is how well it lives within the live action. Extensive research was put into developing new lighting models and compositing techniques. The hippogriff had to work in full daylight conditions and directly interacting with Harry Potter. This meant that the lighting on Buckbeak had to be indistinguishable from that on Harry and environment. Proprietary techniques and software were developed specifically for this purpose

3DA - What could you explain to us on the model and its modeling process?

David - Buckbeak started life as a cyberscan of a maquette. This then became a template from which several versions of the hippogriff are created. These versions differ by resolution - low res for animation all the way to high res for final render. We model using Catmull-Clark Subdivision surfaces.

 

 

  


3DA - Were created different models for different types of shots?

David - No. One model was used for all shots. This was a goal from the outset - to produce one fully functioning setup that would cover any shot type.

3DA - Part of the greatness of the Hippogriff is related to its appearance, half of the body covered of fur and other half of feathers. Can you explain to us, with more or less detail, how was created that fur and the feathers of the Hippogriff?

David - The fur and feathers were all realised using proprietary software specificaly developed for this project.

Each feather is fully modeled as a collection of barbs and filaments since we knew that we would have extreme closeups. This micro modelling produces very realistic lighting effects that truly replicate the nature of the real thing. The feathers have to blend seemlessly into the fur in topology and look. Having an integrated fur and feather system enabled us to perform a seamless join.

At render time the feathers and fur are converted into RenderMan RiCurve primitives.

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