The Golden Compass
As a principal supplier of visual effects for The Golden Compass, Cinesite created some of the most spectacular sequences in the film.
This work included the creation of daemons. In Philip Pullman’s parallel universe, every person has a “daemon” companion, an embodiment of their soul which takes the form of an animal. Children’s daemons have the ability to transform into different animals, before settling on one animal that most closely reflects the person’s character once they reach adolescence. Cinesite was responsible for all non-talking daemons in The Golden Compass, a total of around 15 distinct photorealistic animals, although versions were adapted to create many more.
There are many spectacular modes of transport in The Golden Compass, and Cinesite created most of them. The Sky Ferry, which transports Mrs Coulter and Lyra from Oxford to London, was created entirely in CGI.
The quadrangle sequence was filmed at Queen’s College, Oxford University and reference was taken from an HDRi system to capture the lighting on location. The design of the dirigible was devised by Production Designer Dennis Gassner. The Ferry displays the red and gold livery of the Magisterium (government) with the Magesterium logo on its side. Flaws on the surface of the Ferry including dirt, divots and defects in the skeleton were all added by Cinesite to aid realism and an appropriate sense of scale.
Cinesite also created the Noorderlicht ship, which transports Lyra and the Gyptians to the frozen North. Wide shots utilised a fully CG ship, built with Maya using reference from detailed blueprints supplied by the production’s art department and the basic 3D model created for previzualisation purposes. Texture artists went to the existing set piece and took photographs that were used extensively to create realistic texture on the ship. The ship model required a high degree of complexity and detail, and various tools were written to handle the rendering using RenderMan.
Actors were filmed using motion capture so that the ship would be populated with busy Gyptian sailors and deck-hands, along with their CGI daemons.
Cinesite Visual Effects Supervisor Sue Rowe filmed a boat of similar proportions sailing down the Wash estuary at the required speed. Back at Cinesite, the boat and camera movement were both tracked, so that the computer generated ship would sit precisely in the wash from the real ship. The real ship did not have a paddle, so Cinesite’s team also wrote Houdini simulations to generate procedural ocean surface, as well as other proprietary scripting to ensure that the splash and waves from the paddle and back of the ship are absolutely realistic.
At the climax of the film, there is a battle between a massive army, a group of children set free from Bolvangar by lead character Lyra and a group of witches, led by Serafina Pekkala (Eva Green), who are friendly to her cause.
The action was filmed in a large green screen set, with artificial snow on the ground. Cinesite Visual Effects Supervisor Sue Rowe took theodolite measurements for reference, which were essential for recreating a digital version of the set, which would be necessary for tracking purposes during post.
Visual Effects Supervisor Mike Fink went to Svalbard before principle photography had even begun and shot reference plates for us. We took these views and projected them on to 3d mountains, painting a 360 degree dramatic sky and finally replacing almost of all the snow from the set digitally.
Eventually, the approach was adapted to create a fully 3D environment, which proved useful in the end because it allowed the film-makers more flexibility to create new shots. Cinesite’s team created CG snow, with the mountains modeled as polygons and rendered as subdivision surfaces through a proprietary PRman pipeline. Matte painted textures were then projected onto the geometry. The actors were filmed almost entirely against green screen, although some shots were entirely CG, including digi-doubles, daemons, sky ferry, Lee Scoresby’s balloon, witches and arrows. Some of the epic battle scenes are almost entirely computer generated.
Lee Scoresby’s balloon was created as a three sphere CGI construction with a gondola-like platform in the centre. Scoresby (Sam Elliott) and other actors were filmed against green screen on a full-sized construction of the gondola section. Cinesite modeled the rest of the craft in computer graphics, including the wires which attach it together, then tracked it into the real section.
