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Scanner Lead Animator Interview
In my first blog I promised to talk in more detail about the production process. Rather than just tell you about it, I've included some portions of our style guide here for you to take a look at. It was an essential part of making the film. Unlike WAKING LIFE which worked by having a uniquely different vision from scene to scene, A SCANNER DARKLY has a distinct look and feel. I also thought it would be more interesting for you guys to hear from someone who actually helped make it all happen, one of our lead animators Lance Myers. Here’s a Q&A; I did with him the other day specifically for this blog.
For a larger view, please click on the images
Tommy Pallotta: Can you tell me a little about the animation process:
Lancy Myers: The process used on A Scanner Darkly is subcategory of animation called rotoscoping, which involves tracing over live action footage. The software we used on this particular film utilized computer interpolation-- meaning the lines were automatically “in-betweened.” Each frame had to be painstakingly illustrated over in a painterly fashion. This produced a very distinct, floaty look, which really adds to the surreal, tripped-out feeling of the movie.
TP: How long does it take?
Style Guide 1
LM: Rotoscoping can be faster than other forms of animation, and using the interpolation software made it faster, but the amount of detail we were trying to include was daunting. To keep the production on schedule, each animator was striving to finish about 100 frames a week. That's about four seconds of animation. 50 animators were working full time for 18 months.
TP: How do you assign the animators?
LM: As a lead, it was my job to assign scenes to animators based on their strengths. Some animators were better at backgrounds, some better at particular characters, and some could do a little of everything. At a certain point we were on a weekly quota, so I tried to strategize by breaking scenes up among several artists to get them done and rendered as fast as possible. That's when the style guide really came in handy to achieve consistency within a single scene.
TP: How was the style bible used?
LM: The story needed to feel cohesive -- to make the film feel like a visually unified piece of work. Also, the characters were played by very recognizable actors, so it was important to stay accurate with their rendering. With more than 50 animators with varied backgrounds and styles, this proved to be no easy task. It was a real challenge for us and after a few false starts and some restructuring we quickly devised the "style bible." Looking back, this should have been done before production instead of rushing to put it together after we had already started.
TP: How does this process differ from other animation?
LM: Other forms of animation involve creating a caricature of motion from scratch. This involves an understanding of the way things move. In rotoscoping, the action is all filmed beforehand, so the movement is already captured. A different skill set is required here. It's not as important to understand motion as it is to understand how to artistically interpret a series of real images. For this production, more illustrators were hired than actual traditional animators.
Style Guide 2
TP: Where different characters animated differently? How?
LM: Yes, each member of the cast presented unique challenges. For instance, females are often more difficult because femininity is not as visually forgiving. If a male's proportions are slightly off, it's not as noticeable-- it can look distorted and uneven without looking wrong.
TP: What was unique about animating Woody Harrelson?
LM: Woody was very animated, so to speak. He was very over-the-top, which taught me a lot about acting and animation. Rotoscoping him really appealed to the traditional animator in me. He was the only blonde main character, which made him a bit more difficult. Blonde hair like his tends to have many complicated shades of brown, yellow, and even green. His facial scruff was also a tricky element capture properly. Darker whiskers can be rendered with black strokes, but lighter whiskers tend to get lost in the flesh tones of the face. Instead of single strokes, more complicated fields of color were used to suggest that he hadn't shaven. And Woody was probably the most erratic actor, save for Robert Downey Jr. When the two of them were on screen, the animation became very challenging, but also much more fun.
TP: For people who might be interested in getting into animation, what was your background before SCANNER?
Style Guide 3
LM: I learned traditional animation at a studio here in Austin called Heart of Texas Productions. At Heart of Texas I worked on Space Jam, Anastasia, Quest for Camelot, and Prince of Egypt. Then I moved into the video game industry, where I started working in 3D animation. Titles shipped include Barbie's Pet Rescue, Mickie Saves the Day, Rugrats: All Growed Up, Turok:Evolution, and Vexx. Now that Scanner has wrapped, I'm back in the gaming business, leading a team of artists on a Spyro title for the Nintendo DS.
For more information about Lance Myers, and for samples of his work, visit http://www.lancefever.com/
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What does a Scanner see? Ask anything!
Thanks for all the kind words in the comments to my last blog entry. Sorry it’s been awhile since my last post. I came crashing down from the high I was on at Cannes with a pretty big thud – in the form of a nasty stomach flu. Some of your posts got me thinking that maybe I should put together A SCANNER DARKLY FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions). But, instead of just picking a topic, I think it might be cool to open up it up to you to post questions about the production and how you get a movie like this made. I will answer all questions to the best of my ability for the next week.
A good place to start the discussion is by reading this excellent article by RES magazine available for download here. It is a well researched and written piece about the history of the project and Philip K Dick. (You will need Adobe Acrobat, IE, or a .PDF reader to access the file.)
====UPDATE=====
June 13, 2006
Thanks for all the questions! I am closing the blog to questions this week and will get to answering them all here. I will also then put together a easy to read FAQ and repost in about a week.
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Cannes premiere of A Scanner Darkly - one hell of a way to spend your birthday!
May 25th was my 38th birthday and the world premiere of A SCANNER DARKLY. It was a surreal way to celebrate, especially considering the journey we've been on to get the film made, at what is probably the most decadent over the top film festival in the world.
To think two years ago we were running around Austin with a small crew using consumer video cameras, no make up, no frills craft services, just a group of people running on passion and enthusiasm for the same book. There were so many times over the last few years I wondered if the film would even get completed. At times it's been incredibly challenging, emotional, and draining, but always amazing.
To have it all kind of culminate in Cannes is more than I could have hoped for. I really have to thank Rick, Robert, Woody, Winona, and especially Keanu for making it all happen. Their passion really fueled the project and kept it alive at times when I thought the studio might give up.
Being somewhere like Cannes with them was just a kind of magical way of bringing it all together. I arrived there after spending a few days in a sleepy Italian town with my girlfriend. To say that it was a culture shock would be putting it mildly. I've never been to Cannes so I wasn't sure what to expect. I had heard enough to know that it would be hectic, but I don't think anyone can prepare you for the kind of intensity you experience being there with a group like Keanu, Robert and Rick. This rush of energy and excitement just takes over. Until..the press conference.
I've done a lot of panels and industry events where you're talking to other filmmakers or aspiring artists- nothing to prepare someone for a full on press conference at Cannes with the entire international entertainment press corp. I was really surprised by the questions, especially about the actors personal drug use. What pros Robert and Keanu are - they not only handled it in stride, they were straightforward, honest and just plain hysterical.
I loved that the press really dug into the novel and drew comparisons to today's world. To think when Philip K. Dick wrote this book, the idea of this kind of intrusive surveillance was considered paranoid and even delusional. With today's political climate, it doesn't seem like science fiction when you read the newspaper headlines. Rick in particular really responded to these questions. I didn't expect him to get so political and I was really happy that he spoke up and really articulated his concerns about people's willingness to give up their privacy and individual rights. It's not a time for complacency. Maybe that will resonate with some people.
The other question that came up was about the audience for this movie. I think when you have names like Keanu Reeves and Richard Linklater people think it's a bigger movie than it is. The people in this movie made it b/c they love the book and they really wanted to create a different kind of PKD movie experience. One of the first trade reviews wasn't positive, in fact it seemed malicious. This is always an awkward time, when you let something that you have worked on for so long out to the public. When talking to Rick we reminded ourselves that we never thought it was going to be for everyone - we all know that. All we can hope for is that we served the author and the story well. That definitely put this entire thing into perspective and let us go on to enjoy the premiere, which I almost managed to miss...
It was an insanely hectic day, and everyone was running around doing a million things at once. Add French cell phones and jet lag to the mix and I was primed for a disaster. I walked out of my hotel room at Hotel Du Cap as planned expecting to see everyone loading into the cars to go to dinner. Instead I was greeted by a lone valet who had no idea what I was talking about. Total panic. Had I come all this way only to miss the premiere??? I didn't know what restaurant we were meeting at and I couldn't reach anyone on cell. My French being what it is, I got nowhere with the hotel concierge. After a few anxious moments Rick appeared in the lobby. They had changed the time and I hadn't got the message.
So off we went to a small dinner with the cast, Rick and some people from Warner Bros. It gave us some time to catch up and reconnect. I was reminded how amazing these actors are - totally real, genuine people you can just sit back and have a beer with. It's strange to think of them in the context of celebrity. The juxtaposition between them at dinner and then being with them on the red carpet, it's just night and day. The madness of the cameras, people calling their name.
Once in the theatre the response towards Rick, Robert and Keanu was almost primal, with clapping, stomping and cheering. I believe there is a lot of good will towards the cast and the story. Rick and cast get on stage and Rick greets the audience in what could be described as French. He did a terrible job, but all in good spirits. The lights went down, the film started and I held my breath. Cannes audiences are notoriously harsh and several films have been booed over the course of the fest. When the end credits came on I braced myself and the clapping began, then a standing ovation. I hadn't experienced a screening like that since the premiere of WAKING LIFE at Sundance in 2001. To connect with an audience is always the goal.
By the time we got back to the hotel everyone was pretty exhausted. We had a few drinks outside, very low key and called it a night. Rick and the cast had a full day of press starting at 8am so back to work we all had to go.
So, that is a recap of what happened, as I do this I assume I will get more into the backstory of how this movie was made and what hurdles we had to avoid in the two years of production. The excitement of this fest is in pretty stark contract to the difficult production, so expect more of that in future entries. I have to say that as wonderful as these premieres are if you make a movie for this experience it wouldn't be worth it. You have to love the entire filmmaking process both good and bad in order to keep doing it but it sure is nice icing on the cake and a hell of a way to spend my 38th birthday.
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