{"id":5100,"date":"2015-03-10T18:54:58","date_gmt":"2015-03-10T18:54:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.icgmagazine.com\/web\/?p=5100"},"modified":"2021-06-01T16:51:43","modified_gmt":"2021-06-01T23:51:43","slug":"how-to-train-your-dragon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.icgmagazine.com\/web\/how-to-train-your-dragon\/","title":{"rendered":"How To Train Your Dragon"},"content":{"rendered":"

HBO\u2019s Game of Thrones<\/em> demands (and delivers) VFX spectacle beyond other small-screen fare<\/p>\n

A Song of Ice and Fire<\/em> is the title of novelist George R. R. Martin\u2019s series of runaway successes in fantasy fiction, one that for many seems destined to eclipse Tolkien\u2019s and other past masters\u2019 works of that genre. From the seminal book A Game of Thrones <\/em>onward, Martin\u2019s universe has proved immensely popular, and even though HBO\u2019s series began airing in 2011, development began more than four years earlier, under the stewardship of David Benioff and D.B. Weiss.<\/p>\n

The series balances strong production values<\/strong> with a combination of eye-opening and invisible VFX, but all elements are carefully subordinated to the epic storyline. For director Michael Slovis, ASC, who helmed the first two episodes of the new season, the production \u2013 based in Northern Ireland \u2013 differed markedly from a domestic TV shoot.<\/p>\n

\"Michael<\/a>
Michael Slovis, ASC<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cDuring my episode prep, producer Chris Newman and I drove an hour out of town,\u201d Slovis recalls. \u201cThen we transferred to a four-by-four to go fifteen minutes up the side of a mountain. This whole while, I\u2019m saying, \u2018We can\u2019t afford to get a crew up here,\u2019 knowing you\u2019d never pick a location like this in the States. But I\u2019m told, \u2018Of course we can,\u2019 and Chris just keeps smiling. I wonder how much of my prep is being eaten up by this madness, but then we got to the top \u2013 and there\u2019s this incredible vista, and it is immediately clear that this is worth all that time and effort.\u201d<\/p>\n

When Slovis learned he had six weeks of prep for his two episodes, his first thought concerned what he would do with \u201call those weeks,\u201d but he soon discovered otherwise. \u201cI worked seven days a week getting ready and could still have used another week,\u201d he laughs. \u201cSome of that was due to this being my first show, so I had to learn the culture of this production and how it works, but you are just so involved with all departments due to the lead time to come up with what will be needed in advance of the day. You can\u2019t just run to Macy\u2019s to get a new costume.\u201d<\/p>\n

During his work as cinematographer (most notably on the Emmy-winning Breaking Bad<\/em>) and as director, Slovis has always preferred shot lists to storyboards. \u201cBoards don\u2019t always translate to the real world in terms of framing,\u201d he maintains. \u201cBut this series relies heavily on storyboards and photoboards.\u201d The latter arise out of location trips during prep, when the director photographs stand-ins in a variety of potential shooting environments. \u201cThis step is essential in letting us determine if the locale can be dressed out \u2013 which is the preferred option \u2013 or if we\u2019ll have to cover aspects of the frame with VFX.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"GOT2\"<\/a><\/p>\n

With six episodes under his belt, cinematographer Robert McLachlan, ASC, CSC<\/strong>, reports that GOT\u2019<\/em>s major VFX sequences are addressed early in each season\u2019s prep.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe climactic stuff for the last two episodes of Season Five, which we shot during October, was the subject of meetings in L.A. with director David Nutter back in April,\u201d McLachlan recalls. \u201cBoarding and extensive previsualization began, including techvis, so that each department would have no surprises down the line, and planning for VFX design could begin.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lead visual effects supervisor Joe Bauer and lead visual effects producer Steve Kullback are heavily involved up front. \u201cWe start by putting our heads together with the others to make guesses about who will be doing what based on the script,\u201d explains Bauer. \u201cFrom there it\u2019s a matter of figuring out hand-offs between departments. There\u2019s a film language with live action from which you don\u2019t want to depart when entering the realm of VFX, so it is rare that we do a full CG shot; realism benefits when at least some elements from all departments are included. Even on our standalones, we\u2019ll rely on reference from set and from stunt performers to keep working from some real-world aspect.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"GOT6\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Another real-world concern is dealing with the physical realities of locations and their impact on production. \u201cWhen doing previs for our dragons and giants,\u201d says Bauer, \u201cwe put the digital camera on the digital crane or dolly so that our virtual world matches the conditions Production faces with their equipment. By staying in the world of real photography, we can generate info and give that tech back to production so they know how much track will be needed and just how far the crane is going to have to extend, which makes the shooting much more efficient.\u201d<\/p>\n

McLachlan stresses the \u201cdirector as filmmaker\u201d angle as key to making the show work. \u201cA lot of DGA members shoot everything from every angle, which most producers like, since they can do whatever they want in post,\u201d the cinematographer observes. \u201cBut that kind of piecemeal shooting isn\u2019t cinematic. Here, you have to be more selective up front, and so the show employs directors who have a vision going in.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"GOT3\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Game of Thrones<\/em> has shot on ALEXA from the beginning, <\/strong>and has been captured via Codex starting in Season Two. Only plate shoots and shots requiring exceptional amounts of post work are acquired in RAW, though one unit now carries a 4:3 camera to facilitate the effects effort. McLachlan credits both Newman and executive producer Bernadette Caulfield with coordinating the huge logistical monster that is production.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re juggling ten episodes that shoot with two units,\u201d he marvels. \u201cAs a result, I may shoot three or four days with one unit, then do a day of prelighting and rehearsal while working with a different crew. You hopscotch around, sometimes squeezing in a day or two in Croatia before flying back to Belfast.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since episodes often rely on oft-used sets and locales, continuity of look is a factor. \u201cWhen DPs start on a new season, they get an iPad with what is called a flipbook<\/em>,\u201d McLachlan reports. \u201cIt includes frame grabs from the most successful examples of how each set has been photographed, with chapters showing how various DPs handled locations each season, and how it all looked after final color timing \u2013 there\u2019s some variance, since there\u2019s more than one cook in the kitchen.\u201d<\/p>\n

With eight episodes to her credit, cinematographer Anette Haellmigk reigns as the queen of Thrones<\/em> shooters, earning one Emmy and two ASC nominations in the process. Haellmigk often finds it necessary to eliminate light from above or the side of frame while on location.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m always using eight-by-eights or twelve-by-twelves on closer shots,\u201d she reveals, \u201cand when we shoot Harrenhal [Castle] in Northern Ireland, I\u2019ll use flyswatters. With really sunny conditions, I may use a 40-by-40 overhead to control the light intensity. Production says, \u2018Shoot in all weather,\u2019 so matching is an issue. I recall one scene in a quarry over several days requiring dark overcast weather. Since we were shooting in November, the sun came into the set for a few hours; we had to block it. We built a huge wall of negative fill with 20-by-40s suspended horizontally from three or four Condors.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"GOT4\"<\/a><\/p>\n

McLachlan has faced similar conditions. \u201cI had a 20-by-20 solid on a Manitou that let me get some modeling on faces,\u201d he reports. \u201cThat only took five minutes, but it turned out we needed to be doing thirty setups per day. Five times thirty cuts a big hunk out of your shooting day, so I just had to stick that away in the corner and do without.\u201d On one grueling stretch this season, McLachlan had four ALEXAs turning almost continuously in order to record 127 setups in 9.5 hours. \u201cOur playbook was the size of a small phonebook,\u201d he chuckles, \u201cbut it let us know all we needed to do and at what time of day it needed to be shot.\u201d<\/p>\n

Earlier in her career, Haellmigk worked on Paul Verhoeven\u2019s VFX blockbusters Total Recall<\/em> and Starship Troopers<\/em>. She finds that the evolution in digital effects has streamlined some of what was once tedious and time-consuming.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe often need only small screens for composite work, and sometimes can do without them altogether,\u201d the German-born Haellmigk offers. \u201cWe had a very big fight scene in season four with several \u2018wights\u2019 \u2013 our reanimated skeletons \u2013 and putting green screens up behind the performers for every shot would have been very impractical.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo we ended up only using it for one shot, and VFX was able to make the rest of the sequence work just by employing the empty passes shot after the talent, along with their terrain measurements and markers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Scanline VFX was tasked with realizing the battle of the wights, translating the action of the stunt personnel, who wore prosthetics over green costumes that facilitated extraction.<\/p>\n

Haellmigk characterizes Season Five as being \u201cmore of everything\u201d \u2013 more VFX, more dragons, and even more challenging. \u201cIn the past, I just had some minor dragon scenes when they get locked up,\u201d she recalls, \u201cwhich involved shooting a green screen dummy head so the actress could appear to put restraints on.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

With the dragons getting larger and more active, it can only mean fire-breathing attacks are on the way.<\/strong> And, Bauer says, there always issues with CG fire. \u201cIf you can\u2019t spend time to refine it to work with a specific environment, it will look wrong,\u201d he insists. \u201cThis happens even on high-ticket features.<\/p>\n

\u201cSince fire is an object that throws shadows, with an appearance that is affected by the sun and other strong sources, we always try to photograph real fire on location,\u201d Bauer continues. \u201cIf you just rely on generic fire elements shot against black, that can work for a cave shot but will fail when comped into a daylight plate.\u201d<\/p>\n

During Season Four, the physical effects crew piped the grounds being strafed with flames, with the idea that only the fire coming from the dragon\u2019s mouth would have to be comped. Unfortunately, strong winds flattened the practical fire, requiring post enhancement that Bauer acknowledges as a less-than-ideal solution. To accommodate the expanded dragon workload, Rhythm & Hues joined this season\u2019s VFX roster, augmenting Pixomondo\u2019s work on the flying lizards.<\/p>\n

\"GOT9\"<\/a><\/p>\n

A major sequence in Season Four \u2013 realized by MPC \u2013 involved giants alongside human-sized wildlings and woolly mammoths, all approaching a great ice wall.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn previs done at The Third Floor, we made a point of keeping the camera at human eye height,\u201d says Bauer, \u201cto get across the true size and menace of the giants. We cast much larger performers, too, because when a normal-sized person acts big, you can tell he is exaggerating his movements. Big people have that gait naturally, so all you have to do is slow the film down to get them the rest of the way to standing a convincing 12 feet tall.\u201d\u00a0 Camera moves were scaled appropriately to allow proper integration of the other characters, and shots featuring attackers climbing the wall re-employed a foam wall section built for Season Three, augmented by a CGI set extension.<\/p>\n

An L-shaped 30-foot-high by 400-foot-long green screen was deployed for the Northern Ireland location work in the giant sequence. \u201cWe put red flashing lights on top,\u201d Bauer adds, \u201cboth for tracking and so low-flying planes wouldn\u2019t hit it.\u201d The series experienced a mishap during shooting in Spain, when a huge screen was ripped apart by winds. \u201cThis year production committed to inflatable green screens for our last stretch of work,\u201d notes Bauer. \u201cNormally we finish by mid-November, but we were going well into December this time, when the worst weather the British Isles can throw at you arrives.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo avoid a possible repeat of Spain, they ordered them, and the inflatable greens were rock-solid, even in the heaviest winds,\u201d he continues. \u201cThat\u2019s a great innovation. So many things continue to improve. We can deal with filtration in front of the lens now, since the cameras are so good our key edges don\u2019t get screwed up. And between the Arri equipment for metadata capture and all data wrangling and HDRI passes, we\u2019re never short of information for the vendors.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"GOT7\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Earlier this year a preview of Season Five was screened in IMAX theaters<\/strong>, along with the two-part conclusion to Season Four. While Bauer admits to some trepidation (\u201cI signed off on shots viewed on a 60-inch monitor, not a 60-foot screen!\u201d), McLachlan has cause for more optimism. \u201cAt IBC [the International Broadcasting Convention held each September in Amsterdam], Arri up-rezzed some of my footage to 4K and projected it on a 65-foot screen,\u201d he notes. \u201cWhile prepared for the worst, I wound up being blown away by how well the material held up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ensuring her material looks its best is why Haellmigk makes a point of trying to get as close to a final look as possible on the day, which facilitates the DI. \u201cInitially, post had requested I shoot one stop overexposed, especially on exteriors,\u201d she recalls. \u201cThere was some dialog about that \u2026 until the finals colorist explained that more time would have to be spent on an exploration in the DI if the image wasn\u2019t nailed up front. So my approach \u2013 baking-in lighting, contrast and color temperature, which I change in the camera \u2013 gives the colorist a clear idea of intent. Also, I\u2019ve always been available to do the final grading, so I\u2019ve been lucky in that regard.\u201d<\/p>\n

Perhaps Michael Slovis has the track on why this series succeeds consistently in ducking the curse of many a genre entry, when the VFX tail wags the dog. \u201cVFX meetings never get off track, because these guys aren\u2019t pitching, \u2018I\u2019ve got a kick-ass effect to throw in,\u2019\u201d Slovis observes. \u201cFor Joe and Steve, it is about delivering the story beats; their huge team always keeps that front and center. The quality of the work goes far beyond what I even hope for, but it\u2019s a never-ending dance between production and effects to deliver a thousand shots in nine months, and it\u2019s not a task I\u2019d advise mere mortals to tackle.\u201d<\/p>\n

by Kevin H. Martin \/ photos courtesy of HBO
\n<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

HBO\u2019s Game of Thrones demands (and delivers) VFX spectacle beyond other small-screen fare A Song of Ice and Fire is the title of novelist George R. R. Martin\u2019s series of runaway successes in fantasy fiction, one that for many seems destined to eclipse Tolkien\u2019s and other past masters\u2019 works of that genre. From the seminal book A Game of Thrones onward, Martin\u2019s universe has proved immensely popular, and even though HBO\u2019s series began airing in 2011, development began more than […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5101,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[29,363,364,365,37,38,61],"class_list":["post-5100","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features","tag-cinematography","tag-game-of-thrones","tag-got","tag-hbo","tag-icg-magazine","tag-international-cinematographers-guild","tag-vfx"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nHow To Train Your Dragon - ICG Magazine<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.icgmagazine.com\/web\/how-to-train-your-dragon\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How To Train Your Dragon - ICG Magazine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"HBO\u2019s Game of Thrones demands (and delivers) VFX spectacle beyond other small-screen fare A Song of Ice and Fire is the title of novelist George R. R. Martin\u2019s series of runaway successes in fantasy fiction, one that for many seems destined to eclipse Tolkien\u2019s and other past masters\u2019 works of that genre. 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