VFX artists: Double Negative - Total Recall

In early september I went to see the film Total Recall, a 2012 remake of the 1990 film. Although the film lacked a compelling plot, I was blown away by the quality of the VFX, created by the production company Double Negative.

The film features an extensive use of various Visual Effects techniques, such as compositing, virtual set extension and green screens.

For the motorway chase scene, there was a heavy use of Green Screen and Virtual set extension. Due to the chase scene being set in a futuristic London, the virtual set needed to take visual cues from the existing city, with much of the architecture taking cues from existing landmark buildings in London, such as Westminster Abbey and St. Paul's Cathedral.

During early stages of filming the combat robots initially were stunt actors in physically crafted costumes, Double Negative would then edit out portions of the actors to allow for the audience to be able to see through the gaps in the robots chassis, that could not be created physically. However Double Negative found this to be far too time consuming due to the difficulties in keying out and tracking the actors, so instead opted to recreate the drones as 3D models and placed them into the footage digitally.

For possible future projects I would like to have a greater use of virtual set extension, as I have found the work on Total Recall to be impressive, as well as enjoying constructing my own virtual sets.