The New Force at Lucasfilm

conq writes "BusinessWeek has an interview with the heads of George Lucas' gaming and movie divisions, and discusses with them how they are getting closer and closer to integration. From the article: 'Pre-visualization, which is a big thing that George has been pushing lately. It's a tool that directors would use to quickly mock up the ideas of a story and see what's going to work. It's really like building up a preview of a movie in a video game world. Instead of using static story boards, you can really just get in and create 3D content and camera moves directly. It's the best example of the kind of collaboration we've got going on.'"

Pre-visualisation?

[Audent]

You mean, there was actually a vision? With the Star Wars prequels?

Where?

Come on, it was bad enough Han Fired Second but to make Yoda into Hong Kong Phooey and Darth Vader into a whiny teen... puhleeze.

Worst Use of Natalie Portman Eva.

Some actual visualisation would be nice.

Mocap suits

[Runesabre]

They could (if they haven't already) hook up actors with mocap suits or whatever devices needed to translate live actor movements instantly onto the 3D avatars on the virtual stage to really speed things up.

Sounds like a toy for mediocre directors.

[khasim]

How hard is it to visualize a shot?

#1. If it is real life with real actors, you already have years and years of experience looking at it in 3D. It's called "life".

#2. If it's computer animation, it's fake so it doesn't matter. They create what you want them to.

This is where "art" comes in. It's not just directing, it's lighting and cinematography. Playing with a toy isn't going to make your movies any better.

Visualisation is the only thing he's good at now.

[khasim]

I hated Episodes I & II and still haven't seen Episode III.

But, look at each still shot. They look good. The characterization sucks. The plot sucks. The dialog sucks. The timing sucks. The motivation sucks. None of it has any logical flow behind it.

But the still pictures are very nice.

Welcome to 1999, George

[Dracos]

Peter Jackson and WETA started using pre-vis before production began on LOTR.

Other firms may have used it even earlier.

Re:Visualisation is the only thing he's good at no

[rewinn]

> The dialog sucks

Worse than sucks; it's unnecessary. If you eliminate the dialogue entirely, not much changes. It's that visual. The dialogue adds ... not much positive.

Every word after Obi-Wan cuts off Skywalker's legs is a negative, e.g. "I loved you man!" is something no actor needs to say; it's evident from the acting. The worst lines in all six movies is when the dying Portman (shades of "Love Story") says, "I think I'll spoil one of the plots points of the next movie by telling the audience that Luke has a sister named Leia on Alderan."

The series is a lot of fun and makes "Lord of the Rings" look pretentious, but really: didn't Lucas ever watch Star Wars?

Re:Visualisation is the only thing he's good at no

[bckrispi]

The characterization sucks. The plot sucks. The dialog sucks. The timing sucks. The motivation sucks.

Actually, the charaterization and plot were far beyond what Lucas did in the Original Trilogy. It's just that whiney, disgruntled "George Lucas Raped My Childhood" fanboys can't reconcile these facts when faced with a minor character like Jar Jar and five minutes of difficult "love" dialog.

I think I speak for the entire Star Wars fan community when I say, with all candor, "quit your fucking bitching already".

Seeing Lucasfilm made me excited, then sad.

[SynapseLapse]

I saw that and for a split second I thought I would be seeing more from the old company that brought us Zak McKracken and Maniac Mansion. Some of us still fondly remember the old adventure games.

I'm sick and tired of their recent obsession with 3d, it just doesn't look as good. I would love to see a 2d adventure game from them that would run natively at 1600x1200 and scale down to lower resolutions.

Can anyone honestly look and tell me that this 3d Sam & Max [samandmax.net] has more artistic style than this 2d Sam & Max [samandmax.net]??

Or this [samandmax.net] is better than this [samandmax.net]?

I'm not opposed to 3d games mind you, lord knows I didn't buy this Nvidia board for running OO.org faster and Grim Fandango was utterly phenomenal. I'd just like to see Lucasfilm games, lucasarts, whatever, spend more time in making a well written, well crafted worlds and games, rather than just "Wow, it's an adventure title, but in 3d!"

Re:Sounds like a toy for mediocre directors.

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't think you really understand what goes in to creating a film. For each scene in a film, there are practically an infinite amount of possibilities for the lighting, movement and position of actors, camera placement and angles, and any combination of the above. A storyboard is usually laid out for to get an idea for the general flow of the film. Then, even the best director will usually whittle down the possibilities to a handful or more...for many, many scenes. For each blocking combination, the types of cameras, angles, and general placements have to be reset. Same goes with lighting colors, intensities, angles and placements. Sometimes even the actors' entrances, exits and lines need to be redone to fit the blocking in the scene. The man hours required for all this, for each scene, are immense and therefore, so are the costs. All this, with relatively little action and/or special effects. By using a 3d program where some of this can be "pre-visualized", where actors, cameras, lighting, can be re-adjusted and rough ideas of special effects included, potentially could be a tool to cut down on time, cost, and improve overall quality of a film. I'm not saying that it should be a crutch for bad directors, but that it could be a good tool if used correctly.

Like Machinima?

[Buddy_DoQ]

Wait Mr. Lucas, you mean you're just now hearing about Machinima [machinima.com]? We've been doing it for 10 years now! Well, with Lucas on board maybe the market for niche pre-vis real time 3D tools will kick up finally. All I can say is, open source Lucas, OPEN SOURCE!

Re:Visualisation is the only thing he's good at no

[Nasarius]

I think I speak for the entire Star Wars fan community when I say, with all candor, "quit your fucking bitching already".

Maybe you do. I used to be a huge Star Wars geek. I read all the novels, bought the "reference books", absolutely loved the X-Wing games, etc. I quit when Episode I came out. I don't see how you can even compare the quality of the prequels with the incredible stories that other authors have written. Not just Zahn, but nearly every writer has come up with far better material than Lucas. The stories suck. The dialogue sucks, and not just the abysmal Anakin/Padme crap.

writing?

[mccoma]

how about you spend some of that money on actual writers.......

is this new?

[Dionysus]

Hasn't Lucas always done pre-visualization? I remember the making-of documentary of Return of the Jedi, and they used Star Wars action figures to create the speeder chase scene. I would think the only difference between then and now is that they are doing everything in the computers.

Re:Sounds like a toy for mediocre directors.

[Chabil Ha']

Sounds like a toy for mediocre directors.

If you think that Peter Jackson is a mediocre director, sure. The Lord of the Rings included *numerious* pre-visualization shots. If you watched any of the bonus content on the DVD's, you would see some of the pre-vis stuff on the Mines of Moria scenes where the Fellowship is being chased by the Orcs. I think the movie was fabulous, and if pre-vis made the movie any better (which IMHO it did) then let the mediocre directors continue their work.

Visualization has at least two benefits that I think of right off the top of my head.

1. You as the director may be able to visualize what needs to happen, but communicating that to other people can be difficult if you don't have ESP. This allows the artist to communicate an idea to other people via a medium that is easy to conceptualize. Yes, that's what story boards are for (like the article says), but

2. It allows you to build a set without going through the costly motions of actually having to do it. This goes for virtual sets as well. While this method seems a lot more expensive than hiring a graphic artist to draw it in 2D story board cells, 3D permits you to make changes without having to redraw a whole frame, this in turn allows the crew to explore changes and make iterations very quickly. It also makes a good point of reference for those who are responsible for creating CG add-ins to the movie.

A good example of integration

[Edmund Blackadder]

Let me give you a good example of the "integration" of the movie and gaming divisions of Lucasfilm. I remmeber when I saw phantom menace there was a half an hour part of the movie that had nothing to do with the rest of the plot or the development of the characters.

It was the pod race. I kept thinking "why is this in the movie" ... "and why in the world do they spend so much time introducing various racer characters which are obviously completely unrelated to the plot" ... "and why are the big jedi who are supposedly on an important mission waiting for this kid to race around" ... but then the pod race started looking familiar to me... it reminded me of a lame PS1 racing game called wipeout (i think). And then I thought wow ... they have this whole thing in the movie only so that they can sell a lame clone of a PS1 game.

Sure enough a day or so after i saw people playing a wipeout clone which features the phantom menace pod race.

I guess this is what they call synergy in the movie business.

A few things....

[two.oh]

I'm worried about a few things that the article discusses. Yes, it sounds exciting that LucasArts and ILM are doing collaborating in the future. What I'm afraid of however, is that in the CG industry, there seems to be a technological 'progression' that trivializes the purpose of the traditional (ie. concept artists, storyboard artists, etc.)

Sullivan discusses that pre-viz is a good and modern solution, but he doesn't mention that pre-viz can also be slower and less fine tuned than the work of a storyboard artist. Illustrators can offer style, better/faster continuity, and the ability to develop an entire shot rather than developing rough 3D-geometry. If it were up to me, I'd keep both around.

So sure, the technology and tools get better, but it doesn't necessarily make a better film.

Disney made that mistake with their cel animation department, and they all got laid off (thank god for Lassater).

Square did it with Final Fantasy and threw away the storyline.

ILM seems to be a very traditional studio in the sense that they follow a typical pipeline for production. I just hope they clearly understand the benefits of keeping these illustrators around.

Re:Visualisation is the only thing he's good at no

[Mr_eX9]

Actually, the charaterization and plot were far beyond what Lucas did in the Original Trilogy.

That's only because Lucas didn't direct Empire Strikes Back or Return of the Jedi. The reason he did more for the prequels was because he wrote and directed all three of them--the quality of this increased contribution is debatable.

I love Star Wars, and even if the prequels were complete insults to cinema (which I don't think they are) that's not going to change. However, I do think that JarJar added nothing to the story and that the relationship between Anakin and Padme was portrayed and written poorly. I've heard better romantic dialog out of my high school classmates than the sappy, uninspired dialog in episodes II and III.

Fortunately, Lucas is amazing with the his visuals, and always has been--any movie he's involved in is worth seeing once for all of the eye candy. Sadly, that's where Lucas' creativity ends, leaving plot and character to suffer as a lower priority than the little creatures that are crawling around in the background.

Bottom line: The prequel trilogy is basically a fireworks display. You watch the movies for brilliant colors and explosions--if you're looking for philosophical statements, characters you can relate to, or a convoluted plot, you're going to walk away displeased or quite possibly enraged.

Re:Visualisation is the only thing he's good at no

[bckrispi]

It is inconceivable for a writer to rewrite his/her fiction novels

Three words for you, pal. "Bull fucking shit".

If you pick up a copy of "The Hobbit", you will find that there are some glaring differences when compared to the first printing of the story. In the original When Gollum lost the riddle game, he was a good sport - showing Bilbo to the door and letting him keep the Ring . Read that again, slowly, and imagine how pointless the Lord of the Rings would have been if Tolkien *hadn't* revised his story to fit in with his grander vision.

Re:Visualisation is the only thing he's good at no

[drsquare]

But, look at each still shot. They look good.

Really? I thought it looked like one huge computer game. Is this what passes for special effects these days? 2001 had more realistic looking space ships and that's ancient.

Re:Visualisation is the only thing he's good at no

[masdog]

Thank you! Its about time there was some sense in the Star Wars community. The movies, despite their problems, weren't THAT bad.

Sure, Anakin Skywalker went to the darkside because he was desperate to prevent his visions of his wife's death from coming true. No one would ever be tempted by the devil to save the woman (or man) they love from death?

And yeah, that love dialog from Episodes II and III sounded like it came from two socially inept, isolated teenagers who had never been encouraged to explore their feelings.

The Prequels really stood out in some areas, but were disappointing in others. Yes, the dialogue could have used work in most cases. Kevin Smith should have been brought in to ghostwrite on the project. Sometimes, the characters would have been better off saying nothing at all.

That isn't to say that the dialogue was all bad. In Episode III, I thought some of the interactions between Obi-Wan and Anakin were pretty good. The dialogue of the other Jedi, while dry in some spots, really wasn't terrible.

I think the biggest reason why a lot of people didn't like the prequels is that it is hard to live up to the originals. In some ways, Lucas had to fit certain characters into a mold so they would develop into the ones we see in the original trilogy. I'm no author, but I suspect that it would be very hard to do and could cause problems. And yes, the acting was a bit wooden, and that is clearly Lucas's fault. He isn't an experienced director, and he didn't know how to handle his characters.

Re:Will it be coder or a debugger?

[nEoN nOoDlE]

pre-production isn't about getting wiz-bang camera zooms. It's about getting the whole film from your minds eye to the screen so you can debug problems in story and structure before you encounter them on set, as well as giving everyone a good idea of what the director wants. This is just the digital equivalent of making good storyboards, and storyboards have been around forever. Alfred Hitchcock used to storyboard his movies and cut those boards down to the number of frames a shot should be. This technology just makes that process quicker and more intuitive.

Re:Hmm...

[Gleng]

Lucas is like that kid you knew at college, who had all the best guitars, amps, effects pedals, and recording and mixing equipment, but was still having trouble stringing three chords together.

Still, he's earning more in a second than I do in a month, so he must be doing something right.

Re:Visualisation is the only thing he's good at no

[Tim C]

I'd say the people who complain endlessly and needlessly about 1-3 have simply forgotten how to be a child.

That's probably closer to the truth than you realise. Most of those people will have first seen (and fallen in love with) 4-6 as a child, and as such they have a special signifigance to them.

They've seen 1-3 as adults, with an adult's view of things, and they simply can't compare to their childish recollection of 4-6. Sure, they've seen 4-6 as adults too, but you know the old saying, "first impressions last".

I didn't think 1-3 sucked that badly, but then neither did I consider them awesome. On the other hand, while I certainly enjoy the originals, I didn't consider them to be life-altering either.

Lucas' vision proves he is terrible

[gosand]

I heard somewhere that Lucas doesn't like directing actors because the actors may not act in the way he wants them to, and he prefers CG because the actors do exactly what you want them to do.

George Lucas is an idiot. He bitched for years that the original trilogy wasn't what he wanted, they weren't his real vision, etc. And they were fantastic. With the prequels, he was promoting how his vision could finally be realized - and it sucked. He got what he wanted, and the movies were terrible. They were annoying and trivial, the ONLY redeeming quality about them was that we knew where there story was going. If these movies had come out in order at Lucas' hands, the series would have died. The only reason the originals were good was because Lucas wasn't as involved with them. The more he got involved, the more the movies went downhill. You can pick them apart and analyze them, but in essence, they were just mediocre movies that capitalized on their legacy.

I have to say that I haven't seen Episode III yet, but I really have no desire to see it. This isn't about Lucas ruining my childhood or anything that tragic - it's just that he makes terrible movies. No computer-generated anything is going to help him with that. He is a talentless hack who got lucky long long ago, in a galaxy far far away.

Re:Hmm...

[kniLnamiJ-neB]

I'd mark that Insightful if I had mod points... good analogy!