The rise of Virtual Production

Michael Legato. © Disney Enterprises, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

The past few weeks have seen numerous productions halted, including ‘Mission: Impossible 7’ and ‘The Batman’, due to the impact of Covid-19. However, now studios are turning to virtual reality to get film and TV productions back on track.

Using game engines like Unreal and Unity, combined with high-power graphics cards, camera tracking, as well as VR and AR, filmmakers are now able to create scenes across the physical and digital worlds. Virtual production is nothing new. It’s already been used in a number of high profile productions from ‘The Lion King’ to Disney’s ‘Mandolorian’ TV series. But right now, the critical advantage is that virtual movie sets can be assembled by people working from home and the detail of a shoot can be manipulated by remote directors.

I spoke to Ben Grossmann, Oscar-winning and Emmy Award-winning visual effects supervisor, virtual production supervisor on ‘The Lion King’, and co-founder of ‘Magnopus’ — an AR/VR company that developed the systems used in the creation of the film — about virtual production and what it means for the film industry.

I first met Ben at Unite Vision back in 2017, where we discussed the future of immersive. UNITY.

“At its simplest form, we’re building a game called ‘Filmmaking’, and we’re building the world of the film in the game. Instead of guns or jet packs, we give the players traditional film equipment like cameras, dollies, and lights. When you’re using VR to make the movie, it’s as though you’re standing on a film set in the real world, even though it’s all virtual. You can pick up a tree and move it. You can grab the sun and change the light. You can become a character and give a different performance.”

Grossman described an advantage of virtual production as “empowering the filmmakers to create shots based on what ‘feels’ right, rather than looking at a computer and trying to guess where things should go when it’s not feeling right. And they can do it quickly without having to spend hours moving heavy equipment.”

THE LION KING — (Pictured) Caleb Deschanel. Photo by: Michael Legato. © Disney Enterprises, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

He went on to say: “The technology puts the tools of storytelling back in the hands of the filmmakers, rather than an army of technicians. This lets them explore ideas a lot faster with intuition and a stronger creative vision. Because you figure out the creative with fewer people, you’re taking a lot of the uncertainty out of post-production. Instead of spending months with dozens of visual effects artists trying to figure out what a shot should be, you are doing it with a couple of people in a few hours. Plus, you can edit the scene so you know exactly what the film needs to be before you send it to the hundreds of artists who will make it feel real.”

© Disney Enterprises, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Considering the practical advantages of virtual production — reducing logistics, time, and costs — in addition to the creative advantages, the migration towards the process is likely to continue long after the crisis ebbs. Furthermore, Grossmann made the point that because you can stand inside a movie you have built as a game, virtual production offers up new and interesting possibilities-like inviting the audience in too. “What would it be like if the audience watched the movie from the inside? What if they were characters? What would storytelling become if we did that?”

In terms of the future and what it holds, there is still much progress to be made. In Grossmann’s view, advancements in graphics cards to increase the quality, and the integration of AI to create the virtual worlds faster, will be key developments. He revealed that “as AI gets better, it can even provide the intelligence behind the characters we create, giving them personalities and performances we can direct.”

Virtual production might also open up the industry. Ben pointed out that there are so few filmmakers in the world because learning the language of cinema typically requires millions of dollars of equipment and a large film crew. “What if every kid could have the tools in their bedroom? We all remember playing with toys when we were kids. It was an infinite world of imagination where anything was possible! What if making movies was that easy?”