Luma Pictures Provides The Next Step In VFX Evolution For "X-Men: First Class"

VFX Visionaries Design Darwin, Havok and Banshee Characters

June 7th, 2011 — VENICE, CA, - Visual effects juggernaut, Luma Pictures performed visual heroics in bringing three mutants to the movies with the company's work on Banshee, Havok and Darwin for FOX Studios' "X-Men: First Class."

Working closely with legendary VFX designer John Dykstra, Luma took art created for "X-Men: First Class" (XMFC) in conjunction with original comic book renderings and elaborated on those concepts to push the characters and effects further - bringing iconic characters and their abilities from the comics into a photorealistic 3D environment. Luma handled character design for all three characters, utilizing their in-house designer, Loic Zimmermann to achieve the enhanced look.

Luma was ahead of the game on Havok's design from the outset, having brought in a body double for the actor playing that role in order to get a representation of the physical movements involved during Havok's energy ring attack. This preemptive initiative (taken during the bidding stage of the process) proved to be vital to the working process between Luma and FOX Studios.

"Visual effects companies can invest as much time and money into technology as we like, but the most vital part of VFX is understanding the needs and best workflow for the client," said Payam Shohadai, Executive VFX Supervisor. "Putting our efforts into establishing a strong first pass with Havok set the tone for our relationship with FOX and John Dykstra."

Havok provided a challenge in bringing a 2D comic book character into the 3D realm. The character's ability, which involves hurling rings of red energy from his body, doesn't easily translate from a line drawing on the page to a moving image. To make the effect to work in a visually believable way, Luma designed its own custom rigging and then added multiple layers of Fume effects to create "hot spots" of higher energy concentration on each ring. This conveys a spinning motion and feeling of heat as they are emitting from Havok's chest.

"The collaboration between John Dykstra, Luma and FOX Studios was ongoing in the development process for each character's design," said Luma Pictures VFX Supervisor Vincent Cirelli. "Through John's clear direction we were able to establish character effects that stayed true to the original comic while working in the context of the photography."

One of XMFC's most interesting characters, Darwin, is a shape-shifter whose ability is that of reactive evolution, or almost instantaneous mutation into various forms to protect him from harm. For every scene Luma was involved in for Darwin, a new, precise digital double and plate replacement had to be created to incorporate the actor and his transformation, which ranged from growing gills to sprouting a tortoise shell to turning into pure, shimmering molten metal.

"Upon receiving a cyberscan of Darwin, our modeling team rebuilt the mesh and detailed it inside of Zbrush. The lighting department then generated a complex system of 3D procedural textures to transition between a digital human, fire, metal, and molten rock that maintained the actor's subtle performance while morphing from one property to the next," remarks Richard Sutherland, CG Supervisor.

"The Darwin character was everyone's favorite to work on due to the complexity of the shots and the novelty of each transformation," said Raphael A. Pimentel, Animation Supervisor. "There is also more room to maneuver in Darwin's design, as he is one of the newer characters in the X-Men world. We had the latitude to play a bit more with the look and feel of his character's abilities on screen."

Banshee, a flying character with a supersonic scream, required Luma to work with green screen elements in addition to digital double creation. Additionally, they were tasked with creating Banshee's signature shriek. Albeit difficult to design initially, the supersonic scream was made more manageable by its similarity with the underlying method used to execute Havok's ring attack. During the early processes used in defining XMFC's characters, Luma was able to use these similarities to let the characters play upon each other until distinct effects were separated and finalized.

The end result for Banshee's attack was a concentric ring design inspired by actual physics renderings of sound wave movement through space. Luma then accentuated those conceptual drawings with its proprietary rigging toolsets to create the geometry for the effect. This was combined with fluid simulations spawned by the animated geometry inside of Maya. Luma's software team created tools that allowed artists to visualize the results inside the Maya viewport.

In addition to the character animations, Luma Pictures also worked on several green screen sequences throughout the film, as well as the design and creation of the massive radio telescope that serves as a staging ground for several pivotal scenes.

About Luma Pictures
Luma Pictures is a leading provider of visual effects services to Hollywood with a reputation for artistic integrity, technical innovation and efficient production. The company recently served as one of the lead visual effects providers on Thor (Marvel Entertainment) and The Green Hornet (Columbia Pictures), as well as the Academy Award-nominated True Grit (Paramount). Some of the studio's other recent credits include: Battle: Los Angeles (Columbia Pictures), Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief (Fox 2000 Pictures), The Book of Eli (Warner Bros), and multiple Academy Award-winner No Country for Old Men (Paramount Vantage). Current projects include Captain America: The First Avenger (Marvel Entertainment) and Underworld 4: A New Dawn (Lakeshore Enterainment). http://lumapictures.com

X-Men: First Class