Uncharted Territory Shoots Independence Day: Resurgence VFX Plates with URSA Mini 4.6K

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Blackmagic Design announced today that production company Uncharted Territory used an URSA Mini 4.6K EF to capture visual effects (VFX) plates for the film Independence Day: Resurgence.

After Independence Day redefined the event movie genre, the next epic chapter, Independence Day: Resurgence delivers global spectacle on an unimaginable scale. Using recovered alien technology, the nations of Earth have collaborated on an immense defense program to protect the planet. But nothing can prepare us for the aliens advanced and unprecedented force. Only the ingenuity of a few brave men and women can bring our world back from the brink of extinction. The film stars Liam Hemsworth, Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman and more. Led by the films VFX producer Marc Weigert and VFX supervisor Volker Engel, the Uncharted Territory team used an URSA Mini 4.6K to capture VFX plates for two of the films key sequences. The first focused on peoples reaction to destruction raining down from the alien invasion. To capture the chaos, the team set up a shoot of a crowd fleeing the incoming spaceship and debris.

Bryan Grill, VFX Supervisor at Scanline VFX, worked with the Uncharted Territory team on the shoot. We didnt have a blue screen, so we were hoping for blue skies to shoot against. Unfortunately, the weather didnt cooperate and it was an overcast day, so we knew a lot of rotoscope would be needed when bringing in the footage, said Grill. Fortunately, the URSA Mini 4.6K gave us plenty of range with its RAW footage and it really helped us in the post process. We could easily convert the RAW images to linear images and have them work in our pipeline. The URSA Mini 4.6K had everything we needed to capture the elements for the shot.

Photo Credit: Courtesy Twentieth Century Fox. & 2016 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All Rights Reserved. Not for sale or duplication.

The second sequence was to capture a crowd as they listened to President Lanfords address (played by Sela Ward) on the Capitol Mall outside the White House. The original footage of Lanfords speech was shot on a blue screen stage, so the Uncharted Territory team needed the VFX plate footage to be high quality to match. For that, they turned to the URSA Mini 4.6K.

We needed to have a lot of latitude with the footage because the elements were going to be used in multiple ways. They had to be able to be shrunk, enlarged, stretched, cut out, moved around, however we needed it, explained Douglas Hans Smith, additional VFX Supervisor for the film. Since the crowd was going to be placed around the President on all sides, we needed to use multiple lighting scenarios to capture different angles so theyd match the sun in the shot. We shot outdoors on an exterior blue screen stage and we ended up doing more than twenty setups that day to get everything that we needed.

Since we were doing so many different setups, we were cycling people through really quickly. Agility was key, and the URSA Mini 4.6Ks size really came in handy. With the camera, we were able to run around and quickly get the shots we needed so we could move on to the next setup, Smith continued. When planning the shoot, we were a little nervous about the lighting because there was a lot of contrast and some of it was very harsh with the backlight. We didnt want it to clip or for the highlights to peak, but ultimately we had no cause to worry because the URSA Mini 4.6K did beautifully and the highlights were perfect. The cameras dynamic range was a life saver.

Photo Credit: Claudette Barius - TM & 2016 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All Rights Reserved. Not for sale or duplication.

About Blackmagic Design

Blackmagic Design creates the worlds highest quality video editing products, digital film cameras, color correctors, video converters, video monitoring, routers, live production switchers, disk recorders, waveform monitors and real time film scanners for the feature film, post production and television broadcast industries. Blackmagic Designs DeckLink capture cards launched a revolution in quality and affordability in post production, while the companys Emmy award winning DaVinci color correction products have dominated the television and film industry since 1984. Blackmagic Design continues ground breaking innovations including 6G-SDI and 12G-SDI products and stereoscopic 3D and Ultra HD workflows. Founded by world leading post production editors and engineers, Blackmagic Design has offices in the USA, UK, Japan, Singapore and Australia. For more information, please go to www.blackmagicdesign.com.

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