Our friends over at Comicus have posted an interview with 'The Base Studio' about their work on converting Captain America: The First Avenger to 3D. Most interesting is their mention that, "Secret rumors have been floating around about another super hero movie." Could they be referring to The Avengers? Below are some brief excerpts (where they also talk about working on The Smurfs) but you can read the whole thing by clicking on the link below.
When did you start working on Captain America and on Smurfs? And when did you finish?
The Base Studio began working on Captain America in February of 2011. Smurfs started slightly before that in late January.
How many people did work on both movies? Which technology did you use in the two movies?
We had a total of 75 people at our company. On Captain America we did some traditional visual effects work, set extensions within a matte painting sequence, on top of doing rotoscope work for 42 minutes of the film for it's 2D to 3D conversion. On Smurfs we used proprietary methods for the 2D to 3D conversion process which includes custom programs and scripts created by our pipeline TD, Charles Pina.
Our guess is that particular beautiful 3D effects will be applied to Cap's shield, especially when it is tossed. Having already worked on Thor, this is not the first time that you deal with a "flying" weapon. From your point of view which has been the major difference between the hammer and the shield?
Thor's hammer by nature is a more organic and complicated shape. It required specific roto shape construction to aid in the conversion process, however, Captain America's shield is a simple round shape so conducting work on it was actually “easier” for our artists. (I use the word “easy” lightly, because at the end of the day each portion of the stereosopic conversion process is quite difficult and tedious)
Has the director Joe Johnston also joined your work? If so, how? And which directions did he give to you?
While working on the visual effects shots for Captain America, we had calls with Marvel Studio's production each day. Their visual effects supervisor would communicate with us and provide feedback on our shots. The director of the film interfaced with the supervisor who would relay to us as a visual effects vendor.
Which are your next projects? Any other superhero we should expect?
We are currently working on a 2D to 3D conversion for an IMAX feature film and starting production on 3 music videos for well known music acts here in the states. Secret rumors have been floating around about another super hero movie, but I can't say which one. Thanks again for interviewing us!
With an all star cast which includes Chris Evans as Captain America, Sebastian Stan as Bucky, Hugo Weaving as Red Skull, Hayley Atwell as Peggy Carter, Tommy Lee Jones as Col. Chester Phillips, Stanley Tucci as Abraham Erskine and Dominic Cooper as Howard Stark,
Captain America: The First Avenger will be released in 3D on July 22, later this year!
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