MKJo
12-18-2008, 14:38
With the voice talent in place, filmmakers turned to the animation team to build the visual elements for “Bolt.” Says director Byron Howard, “The level of animation on this film is pretty stunning, especially with the animals. We did a lot of research to capture the essence of a real dog. The more you believe in these characters, the more you think that they’re not just cartoons moving around on the screen. The more you care, the more your heart goes out to them.”
The canine star of the film was one of the key priorities. For animator Becky Bresee, part of the team that worked on the Bolt character, this assignment was challenging and lots of fun.
“We did lots of research and spent a lot of time observing dogs here at the Studio. I even filmed my own dog at home to study things like how their eyebrows move when they’re looking at something. Puppies and dogs in general tend to be spur-of-the-moment. They’ll just turn on a dime; they’ll be doing one thing and then suddenly they’re off in a different
direction.”
Animator Amy Smeed adds, “It was helpful for me to get into that dog mode and get down on all fours to act out being a dog. We had lots of lectures on dog locomotion and behavior, and we had three or four dogs come in so that we could study how they walk and trot, and see their different expressions when they’re happy or angry. John’s voice gave us a lot to work with because it was so expressive with lots of ups, downs and nuances.
“I love animating Penny,” continues Smeed, “She’s one of my favorite characters because she gets to show her action mode as well as her off-screen persona as a girl who loves her little dog. She’s really two different characters and has a lot of heart when she’s not on the set. I love the scenes where she’s playing with her dog. She genuinely cares for Bolt.”
Animating Rhino proved to be one of the most challenging assignments on the film. Supervising animator Clay Kaytis explains, “In the beginning, animating a hamster in a ball seemed so complicated. Every shot required calculating which way the ball would move if he shifted his weight. We had some great software guys who developed a ball that we could basically move around and it would solve the rotation problem. It took a lot of getting used to but luckily we got to a point where each animator could approach it in a different way.”
To help them capture believable movements for the Rhino character, the Studio adopted a hamster named Doink for observation. Doink was filmed from below as he walked on a sheet of plexiglass so that the artists could see how the feet would work in the ball. They were able to study how a hamster twitches and makes hand gestures, and how the ears and nose move.
Unlike many computer-animated films that have a limited number of locations and environments, “Bolt” is a virtual road picture that takes its trio of animal travelers from New York City to Hollywood with colorful detours in Ohio, Nevada and points in between. On top of that, the filmmakers chose a look and style for the film that suggested a looser, more painterly approach. This decision would push the boundaries of the medium and take “Bolt” and company on a journey as colorful as the cast itself.
Director Byron Howard explains, “Paul Felix, our brilliant art director, had the idea of giving the backgrounds a painterly look to soften it. CG is great in a lot of ways, but the thing that it does best is create perfectly straight lines and perfectly curved, smooth surfaces. There can be a tendency for things to look too hard- or clean-edged. So Paul and a bunch of geniuses actually created software to put brushstrokes onto the edges of objects and backgrounds throughout the entire film. It gives the film a warm, lived-in look, and it makes it much more comfortable to watch.”
“Paul’s a big fan of Disney history and he loves the look of the old hand-painted backgrounds,” adds director Chris Williams. “He really wanted to try and get some of that into the CG era. He came up with something very rich and textural for Bolt’s world. It feels very inviting.”
Collaborating with Felix and the filmmakers to create the look of the film was Adolph Lusinsky, director of look and lighting.
“Another major influence on us in creating the look for ‘Bolt’ was some of the early ‘70s films—especially the groundbreaking work of director Robert Altman and legendary cinematographers Gordon Willis and Vilmos Zsigmond,” says Lusinsky. “They found beauty in natural light. We were interested in presenting our world as it is, instead of something idealized.
We mixed the painterly approach with cinematography techniques—lighting, exposure and different lenses—to create a really unique world of textural quality. It feels very tangible and adds a lot of realism.
“A lot of times in CG films, the hard edges can take you out of the picture, so we wanted to add a level of realism by not providing too much detail,” continues Lusinsky. “For example, with computers it’s possible to show bricks on a building going back to infinity; you can count every single brick. In our film, you might see the first few bricks on a wall really clearly, but once you go back 30 feet, it might become very abstracted to a simpler read. This was a completely different approach than we’ve taken before.”
Lusinsky and his team traveled all over the country, including RV parks in Ohio, the desert outside Las Vegas, shipping yards in San Francisco, and the streets of New York City to study lighting conditions and how they might relate to the film. The design and lighting team were able to capture the essence of these locations and put them to use in the film.
Spencer observes, “We wanted the film to have the feel of a live-action film in terms of lighting. Realistic lighting is the key to believability even though our world is caricatured. We didn’t want it to feel like it was manufactured by the computer.
“One of the ideas that John [Lasseter] always talks about is creating a believable world,” continues Spencer. “We have a cat, a dog and a hamster living in the real world so we worked hard to create a believable world for our characters that the audience would embrace.”
The canine star of the film was one of the key priorities. For animator Becky Bresee, part of the team that worked on the Bolt character, this assignment was challenging and lots of fun.
“We did lots of research and spent a lot of time observing dogs here at the Studio. I even filmed my own dog at home to study things like how their eyebrows move when they’re looking at something. Puppies and dogs in general tend to be spur-of-the-moment. They’ll just turn on a dime; they’ll be doing one thing and then suddenly they’re off in a different
direction.”
Animator Amy Smeed adds, “It was helpful for me to get into that dog mode and get down on all fours to act out being a dog. We had lots of lectures on dog locomotion and behavior, and we had three or four dogs come in so that we could study how they walk and trot, and see their different expressions when they’re happy or angry. John’s voice gave us a lot to work with because it was so expressive with lots of ups, downs and nuances.
“I love animating Penny,” continues Smeed, “She’s one of my favorite characters because she gets to show her action mode as well as her off-screen persona as a girl who loves her little dog. She’s really two different characters and has a lot of heart when she’s not on the set. I love the scenes where she’s playing with her dog. She genuinely cares for Bolt.”
Animating Rhino proved to be one of the most challenging assignments on the film. Supervising animator Clay Kaytis explains, “In the beginning, animating a hamster in a ball seemed so complicated. Every shot required calculating which way the ball would move if he shifted his weight. We had some great software guys who developed a ball that we could basically move around and it would solve the rotation problem. It took a lot of getting used to but luckily we got to a point where each animator could approach it in a different way.”
To help them capture believable movements for the Rhino character, the Studio adopted a hamster named Doink for observation. Doink was filmed from below as he walked on a sheet of plexiglass so that the artists could see how the feet would work in the ball. They were able to study how a hamster twitches and makes hand gestures, and how the ears and nose move.
Unlike many computer-animated films that have a limited number of locations and environments, “Bolt” is a virtual road picture that takes its trio of animal travelers from New York City to Hollywood with colorful detours in Ohio, Nevada and points in between. On top of that, the filmmakers chose a look and style for the film that suggested a looser, more painterly approach. This decision would push the boundaries of the medium and take “Bolt” and company on a journey as colorful as the cast itself.
Director Byron Howard explains, “Paul Felix, our brilliant art director, had the idea of giving the backgrounds a painterly look to soften it. CG is great in a lot of ways, but the thing that it does best is create perfectly straight lines and perfectly curved, smooth surfaces. There can be a tendency for things to look too hard- or clean-edged. So Paul and a bunch of geniuses actually created software to put brushstrokes onto the edges of objects and backgrounds throughout the entire film. It gives the film a warm, lived-in look, and it makes it much more comfortable to watch.”
“Paul’s a big fan of Disney history and he loves the look of the old hand-painted backgrounds,” adds director Chris Williams. “He really wanted to try and get some of that into the CG era. He came up with something very rich and textural for Bolt’s world. It feels very inviting.”
Collaborating with Felix and the filmmakers to create the look of the film was Adolph Lusinsky, director of look and lighting.
“Another major influence on us in creating the look for ‘Bolt’ was some of the early ‘70s films—especially the groundbreaking work of director Robert Altman and legendary cinematographers Gordon Willis and Vilmos Zsigmond,” says Lusinsky. “They found beauty in natural light. We were interested in presenting our world as it is, instead of something idealized.
We mixed the painterly approach with cinematography techniques—lighting, exposure and different lenses—to create a really unique world of textural quality. It feels very tangible and adds a lot of realism.
“A lot of times in CG films, the hard edges can take you out of the picture, so we wanted to add a level of realism by not providing too much detail,” continues Lusinsky. “For example, with computers it’s possible to show bricks on a building going back to infinity; you can count every single brick. In our film, you might see the first few bricks on a wall really clearly, but once you go back 30 feet, it might become very abstracted to a simpler read. This was a completely different approach than we’ve taken before.”
Lusinsky and his team traveled all over the country, including RV parks in Ohio, the desert outside Las Vegas, shipping yards in San Francisco, and the streets of New York City to study lighting conditions and how they might relate to the film. The design and lighting team were able to capture the essence of these locations and put them to use in the film.
Spencer observes, “We wanted the film to have the feel of a live-action film in terms of lighting. Realistic lighting is the key to believability even though our world is caricatured. We didn’t want it to feel like it was manufactured by the computer.
“One of the ideas that John [Lasseter] always talks about is creating a believable world,” continues Spencer. “We have a cat, a dog and a hamster living in the real world so we worked hard to create a believable world for our characters that the audience would embrace.”