Making "Engine City" With BUF in Paris
Mark Denyer-Simmons: There was actually going to be more of that. Unfortunately, we ran out of time to fully develop that avenue.
Jason Scott: Working with NASCAR, we have to be a little bit careful about not showing the cars crash. Getting that shot in we had to make a point of showing the car reforming, leaving no doubt in the viewers mind that the driver and car made it.
MDS: It’s a fine line because also there’s a lot of fire and smoke in there, which is a kind of touchy point, as well. We were fortunate that we could get away with all that.
Can you talk about the original concept, and how it evolved?
JS: Originally we had it in our minds to create a practical city made of engine parts, skewing more towards the bizarre, ala the Brothers Quay and “Street of Crocodiles.” So we started our thought process and research from that point. Reality hit us in the face, and we soon realized budget and time weren’t on our side. NASCAR is such a huge and respected property we knew if we were going to go a bit more surreal with the pitch that we had to respect the sport while showing a reverence to its fans. A city made of engine parts, in our opinion, gave us the best of both worlds – a complex environment that forced the viewer to wonder while keeping the integrity of the sport in tact. Knowing that going full CG was the answer, we really wanted to exploit BUF and their creativity. It worked out. It took it from a grungy place to a much more glossy and fantastic environment.
How developed are the visuals at the pitch stage? Is it just images that you’ve worked out, or do you have pre-vis images from BUF?
JS: Mark and I both saw it in our head, and we didn’t want to reference too much, so we just made a hero frame in Photoshop of things we wanted incorporated into the city. Ultimately, we pitched the idea off of one frame.
MDS: Our boss gravitated to all that amazing, intricate detail in the background. That was a real key point – in the background there would be thousands of little bolts, bits of metal, and mechanisms. That was going to be the creative key, and that’s what we sold him on. It was an amazingly intricate world.
JS: Then we took it to BUF and they hired a storyboard artist to do some sketches for us so that we’d know we were all on the same page. The detail was really the selling point on everything. We wanted to avoid it looking like a game, where the scenics are nice-looking but they’re just these crude objects. We needed to go beyond that.
How early in the process was it clear what a challenge this was going to be just in terms of the pipeline at BUF?
JS: From day one. We told them that it was all going to be about the environment, which entailed a ton of work to approve on a daily basis.
MDS: They gave us deadlines from the storyboards all the way through to the final coloring and finishing, so it was imperative we were really organized and to the point.
JS: Any perceived challenges that may have come about with working with artists in Paris was well worth it.
MDS: It’s an eight-hour difference, so when we came in in the morning, they were finishing their day’s work. It was key that we had notes as soon and as clear as possible, so starting the next day they’d know exactly where we were coming from. There are some phraseology differences – for instance, if we say “gloss,” it means “shiny.” Right? But over there, it means “matte.” We were saying, “Why isn’t it shiny? Where’s the gloss”? And it would come back with a matte finish. It was an interesting challenge, getting over the language barrier. And in Paris, the VFX supervisor didn’t speak English, so everything would be translated through their producer.
So it was a less efficient process than you had hoped.
JS: No matter who you work with as an outside company you always hit a comfort zone where everyone and everything is right on target, only to feel miles away a week later. We have worked with BUF before, so even on days where we felt like we went off path, our confidence in them never waned. They are as good as it gets in my opinion, so we always had that to fall back on.
MDS: There were going to be some extra dynamics that we didn’t get to. To get the grunge factor, there was going to be oil over some of those parts.
JS: We like the chrome. We just thought there were some areas where we could have had oil spilling out, to give this nice contrast behind this shiny chrome. We anticipated putting the flames in there, which accomplished part of our goal – the flames take it away from being this Wizard of Oz environment into something a little bit more ferocious.
MDS: We were kind of lucky, as well, that BUF has done similar visual effects, such as smoke and lightning bolts, in previous films. We were worried about those things looking nasty, and we were surprised to see that they were almost perfect from the first pass.
How far along were you still dumping ideas to stay on target?
MDS: Even with a couple of days to go, we were sending shots back. We had to be a bit selective, but we kept pushing them all the way to the very end.
JS: And we’re needy here. We wanted everything. We didn’t forfeit anything until late.
Anything in the finished version that was especially challenging, or exceeded your expectations?
JS: The oil hitting the piston – we didn’t see any realized version of that until there were maybe four days left. I don’t know if it exceeded expectations, but it came out amazing. The most challenging thing about what we do is not going too haywire with an idea. In theory it’s great and you can always look at a finished spot and think of what you could have done, but in this case we were able to take it to a place without compromising the product. Thats what makes this spot a success.
Credits
Fox Sports Creative Directors: Mark Denyer-Simmons/Jason Scott
Fox Sports Art Directors: Mark Denyer-Simmons/Jason Scott
Fox Sports EVP Marketing: Eric Markgraf
Fox Sports SVP/Creative Director: Robert Gottlieb
Fox Sports Executive Producer: Bill Battin
Editor: Kirk Smith
Sound Design: Mic Brooling
Mac artist: Tommy Wooh
VFX/ 3-D: BUF
BUF VFX Supervisor: Olivier Dumont/Julien Bollbach
BUF Flame color and compositing: Thibault Debaveye
BUF Producers: Audrey-Anna Bazard/Vanessa Fourgeaud
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