New Deal Studios: Creative InspirationsIntroduction| 00:00 | (Music playing)
| | 00:06 | Matthew Gratzner: What visual effects were created for
was to do something you couldn't do for
| | 00:10 | real, and that's all it comes down to.
| | 00:11 | Shannon Blake Gans: Various miniatures you'll see on our
walls and basically, this is what we can
| | 00:16 | keep, things we haven't blown up, that
are too big, or have gone back to the studio.
| | 00:21 | Robert Chapin: I mean, there's software and there's tools
available nowadays to help you do this,
| | 00:25 | but there is nothing that can compare
with taking of bunch of C-4, or
| | 00:28 | whatever these guys rig, to just make them
blow up and shoot at high-speed.
| | 00:32 | Ian Hunter: I think the art has
to drive the science more.
| | 00:35 | Let's think about what we want to do,
and then we'll figure out how we're going
| | 00:37 | to do it. The science follows.
| | 00:39 | Michael Theurer: And then it is actually placed within
the set and the camera is animated as it
| | 00:44 | would move to facilitate the shot.
| | 00:47 | Shannon Blake Gans: It's part of building our
reputation as artists in the industry.
| | 00:51 | If you want to just kind of do the bare
minimum effort, you're not really going
| | 00:55 | to go anywhere, and we
have places we want to go.
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| Workspace| 00:00 | (Music playing)
| | 00:08 | Welcome to New Deal Studios.
My name is Shannon Gans.
| | 00:11 | We have two buildings in Marina del Rey.
| | 00:13 | This building is our stage and
digital department, and this building is our
| | 00:17 | workshop and our digital art department.
| | 00:19 | So let's go take a look.
| | 00:21 | We have several sections of this building.
| | 00:24 | It's just a one story industrial park
that we've taken over, over the years.
| | 00:28 | In this area, we do a lot of
pattern making and fabrication detail.
| | 00:33 | For example, this is - we're
rebuilding the Betty spaceship from 'Alien
| | 00:38 | Resurrection,' and we'll put all the
detail here, and then, in our molding and
| | 00:43 | casting department, we'll
make molds and casting pieces.
| | 00:48 | One thing to note is we don't just
build models and miniatures. We started out
| | 00:52 | doing that 14 years ago, but the
creative talents apply to various parts of
| | 00:57 | the industry, such as building sets,
we do a lot of props, specialty props, as
| | 01:00 | well as specialty costume pieces.
| | 01:03 | Various miniatures you'll see on our
walls and basically, this is what we can
| | 01:07 | keep, things we haven't blown up,
that are too big or have gone back to the
| | 01:11 | studios, and in this room,
there's more of the main fabrication.
| | 01:15 | We have a paint department,
molding and casting department.
| | 01:20 | This is a main construction area.
| | 01:23 | This is the garbage truck from
'The Dark Knight' and these buildings, which I
| | 01:27 | love and are my favorite,
are from a music video, actually.
| | 01:30 | They wanted a Burton-esque town.
| | 01:32 | We are a fairly high tech miniature effects shop.
| | 01:35 | We design everything in 3-D in the
computer before we build it in 3-D, physically,
| | 01:41 | out in our model shop.
| | 01:42 | So we have a rapid prototyping machine.
| | 01:44 | It's an inkjet printer, but hot
wax, and you can build a 3-D item.
| | 01:50 | We use various software programs for designing here.
| | 01:54 | We primarily use Rhino and SolidWorks.
| | 01:56 | SolidWorks is an engineering program,
and that's for mechanical effects and we
| | 02:01 | can even run simulations on the effects
rigs that we're building, to see where
| | 02:07 | the points of failure might be.
| | 02:09 | It works out really well. On the 'Watchmen,'
we used that for the falling water tower.
| | 02:13 | So this is our stage. This building was
built in the late 50s as a sound stage
| | 02:18 | for a company that did military
training films, and so they made films like
| | 02:22 | 'How to Arm an Atomic bomb,' and things like that.
| | 02:25 | Yeah, and they even had
miniatures for simulated training.
| | 02:28 | It was a furniture fabrication
company for a short time and then Doug
| | 02:32 | Trumbull brought visual effects to the marina
area, and for the past 30 years it's been
| | 02:35 | a visual effects stage.
| | 02:36 | For the lighthouse, we built this
miniature rock, which was used as elements
| | 02:41 | we shot inside, outside and on location,
whatever was needed, but still, you can
| | 02:45 | see there is a high level of detail
here to match Dante Ferretti's designs.
| | 02:51 | So from our stage, we transition into
the digital department. We started this
| | 02:54 | in 2004, with just two little
computers in this room, and you can see we're
| | 02:58 | a nice, small boutique company.
| | 03:01 | This room is where we do previz work
and planning that works in concert with
| | 03:06 | our digital art department, and then as
we go through the process of build-and-shoot,
| | 03:10 | the department will export data
to help us with photography and then, in
| | 03:14 | the end, do compositing and animation.
| | 03:16 | We're going to walk you into our
screening room and DI suite now.
| | 03:20 | You can see we have miniatures hanging.
This is from 'Pitch Black,' and that is
| | 03:24 | from the 'Good Shepherd.' It used to be
just a basic screening room for dailies.
| | 03:28 | We had two film projectors, and
recently, last year, we took one of the film
| | 03:32 | projects out, donated it,
and we have a nice 2K digital.
| | 03:35 | So as we come to the end of tour, you
can see this fabulous hallway. We just
| | 03:39 | finished building this out.
| | 03:41 | It's an office for Matthew
Gratzner and Ian Hunter, my two partners.
| | 03:45 | You can see we even have a drafting
table, so we'll do traditional drawings and
| | 03:48 | then take them into the computer.
Because we can do everything here, from
| | 03:52 | build, shoot, digital,
| | 03:54 | the next transition for us is
producing our own content, kind of the
| | 03:58 | production model of Peter Jackson
and George Lucas, have a service based
| | 04:01 | company and our production company.
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| Starting & evolving the studio| 00:00 | (Music playing)
| | 00:08 | Ian Hunter: New Deal Studios got started,
first, as Hunter-Gratzner Industries.
| | 00:11 | I freelanced around for little bit
and Matthew has his own company, and we
| | 00:15 | worked together and we found that we
actually sort of meshed really well in
| | 00:18 | terms of work style and ethics, and we
basically had the same ideas, in terms of
| | 00:24 | how to approach a project and how to
get it accomplished, and because of that,
| | 00:28 | we found that we could
actually work the other really well.
| | 00:31 | So the company I worked for stopped,
and I was out in the road, and at that
| | 00:37 | point, because we worked together so
well, we decided that we should actually
| | 00:40 | form a company together.
| | 00:42 | Shannon Blake Gans: I was in the undergrad
program at USC Business School, for entrepreneurship,
| | 00:47 | was the emphasis, and I had to write
a business plan for my senior project,
| | 00:50 | and I was working with these two, and we had
these opportunities coming up, and we started.
| | 00:55 | Launched the company 14 years ago.
| | 00:57 | And we revisit that plan, actually.
Because the industry is changing so quickly,
| | 01:04 | earlier in the years it was like once or
twice a year, we would sit and talk and
| | 01:07 | reevaluate the plan, and where the
market is, and where we want go and kind of
| | 01:14 | realign ourselves, and then these
days it's - life is moving so quickly at
| | 01:18 | every month, every week.
| | 01:19 | Matthew Gratzner: It was originally sort of an
art direction and miniature effects company, because
| | 01:23 | both Ian and I do a lot of concept
art and draw, but what we brought to the
| | 01:26 | table was moreso not just a sort of a
vendor, or a vendor-client relationship,
| | 01:32 | but somebody that could
actually provide creative work as well.
| | 01:36 | And then from there, we went on to digital
effects, which is sort of the next evolution.
| | 01:40 | And from that, we've gone into production,
and starting to develop our own content,
| | 01:44 | so we can sort of do it all in-house.
| | 01:45 | But the 21st-century studio is, funny
enough, almost like a 1930's studio, in the
| | 01:51 | sense that you have one facility that you
can build the sets or at least design the sets,
| | 01:58 | do the miniature effects, do the
digital effects, pre-plan, have offices set up
| | 02:02 | for casting, and art department and
effects, and essentially try to keep
| | 02:06 | everything under one roof so
| | 02:07 | you're not constantly going to all these
subcontractors to do the work. And then
| | 02:11 | you get into post, where
you can do the digital effects.
| | 02:13 | We have a screening room with a DI
suite so you can actually color correct
| | 02:16 | the film, and you are kind of starting
with a project from beginning to end,
| | 02:21 | without having to constantly go to
different sources, and other subcontractors to
| | 02:26 | get the work done, and keeping that
same vision from beginning to end.
| | 02:30 | That doesn't mean that a studio can't come
in and make suggestions and change things.
| | 02:33 | It certainly will happen and can happen.
| | 02:35 | But I think the idea the 21st century
studio is having a production facility
| | 02:40 | that is, as I said, like the old days
film where you're kind of trying to keep
| | 02:44 | it all under one roof. Everybody is
focused with one goal of making a really
| | 02:49 | great picture, a really great film.
| | 02:50 | Shannon Blake Gans: So as the company continues
to evolve, as well as the industry overall, and
| | 02:56 | business models are changing, we are
looking at what is New Deal Studios kind of
| | 03:00 | 3.0? We had Hunter/Gratzner Industries,
and then what we have been in the last
| | 03:03 | seven years is New Deal Studios.
| | 03:05 | And that is to be a production company,
as well as a service-based company, to
| | 03:10 | work on our films as well as others,
because we love working with all kinds of
| | 03:13 | creative people, and our goal is to
kind of create a new production paradigm,
| | 03:18 | kind of set a good example and help
kind of write that first draft of what
| | 03:22 | the future is with the new economy.
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| Approaching visual effects| 00:00 | (Music playing)
| | 00:07 | Matthew Gratzner: What visual effects were
created for was, it was essentially a technique to do
| | 00:13 | something you couldn't do for real,
and that's all it comes down to,
| | 00:16 | no matter how many running aliens,
dinosaurs, building crashing, airplanes
| | 00:19 | blowing up, and ships sinking, all that
aside. You go back to the silent era and
| | 00:23 | you look at the matte paintings, or the
double exposures or hanging miniatures,
| | 00:28 | where you have a model in the foreground,
and a live action in the background,
| | 00:30 | I mean, you go to back to,
you know, 1915 or 1920 or whatever,
| | 00:34 | they were done that way, not
because they wanted to tell to the audience,
| | 00:37 | "Look at this new great effect!"
| | 00:38 | It was that, "Well, we really can't build
Circus Maximus in ancient Rome. How we do that?
| | 00:43 | "Well, some guys in the art
department are going to put together this
| | 00:45 | "Coliseum model, we're going to hang it in
the foreground, and that's how we are
| | 00:48 | going to achieve the shot."
| | 00:49 | And it was because they couldn't do it for real.
| | 00:51 | So somewhere along the line, because it
became such an amazingly technical and
| | 00:55 | flat-out creative part of the business,
| | 00:57 | it sort of stands on its own, and
people forget that it's sort of a thing to
| | 01:01 | just bridge the story together.
| | 01:04 | The most exciting shows and the most
exciting opportunities we have are to work
| | 01:07 | on films that are not
necessarily visual effects films,
| | 01:10 | because it sets a challenge and you are
setting this bar at a point where none
| | 01:13 | of your shots can look artificial,
| | 01:15 | because you are shooting these
amazingly-composed, beautiful live-action
| | 01:19 | shots on the side of a cliff in
Massachusetts or you are in some
| | 01:22 | tremendous location inland and
| | 01:24 | now you are cutting from
that to a visual effect.
| | 01:26 | So there is nothing - you're not
dealing with sort of a superhero or a
| | 01:31 | supernatural experience.
| | 01:32 | It's just a very clear-cut production
photographed sequence that then has to
| | 01:40 | translate into a visual effects shot.
| | 01:42 | So the biggest challenge on shows like
that is that you can't turn around and say,
| | 01:45 | "Well, you know, I mean, there is a bit of
suspension disbelief because there is
| | 01:48 | going to be some sort of like CG
particle system," it's like no, no.
| | 01:51 | It has to look - when you see actors
and then you cut to a POV and it's supposed to
| | 01:56 | be a lighthouse on a cliff
with waves crashing against it,
| | 01:59 | and it doesn't exist, in
any capacity, in real life,
| | 02:02 | it can't cut to a visual effect shot.
| | 02:04 | It truly has to look like
it's part of the same movie.
| | 02:06 | And I think those films, while, again,
as I said, they are my favorite kinds of
| | 02:11 | films, are the most challenging.
They are also the most rewarding,
| | 02:14 | because people have no idea
what you did on the show.
| | 02:16 | And that to me, as I said, that's the
real benefit, or I should say the real reward
| | 02:21 | for a visual effects show is when
somebody says, "I have no idea what you did."
| | 02:24 | It doesn't really help getting other
work, because then nobody knows what you did
| | 02:26 | on the show, but it does help, in the
grand scheme of things, because you can
| | 02:30 | show people that not all visual effects
have to be some over-the-top explosion
| | 02:35 | or over-the-top crazy action
that could never be achieved.
| | 02:38 | Some of them can be simply to satisfy
something you couldn't do for real, even
| | 02:42 | if it is mundane. That's sort
of the exciting challenge,
| | 02:45 | particularly on a show like Shutter
Island, which takes place in the mid 50s.
| | 02:48 | So not only are you trying to
recreate a sequence that's believable, you are
| | 02:53 | recreating a sequence in a specific time period.
| | 02:56 | The advantage with working on 'Shutter
Island' and 'Aviators,' I get the chance to work
| | 03:00 | closely with Dante Ferretti,
who designs these amazing sets and
| | 03:03 | these amazing compounds and the sets are
unbelievable, and then we have to match
| | 03:10 | all that in smaller scale, which is
always a challenge. And then transitioning
| | 03:13 | the photography into digital effects,
| | 03:15 | we then go in and we take
our match clips of live-action.
| | 03:20 | We go through some of the
textures of that are from the miniature.
| | 03:24 | We'll use the miniatures as
texture maps onto digital models.
| | 03:27 | So really, again, having all the
techniques and tools at hand allow for us to give
| | 03:31 | a one consistent sort of
look throughout the whole picture.
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| Designing with vision| 00:00 | (Music playing)
| | 00:08 | Ian Hunter: You know, I guess looking back,
I have been pretty fortunate in that
| | 00:12 | when I started out as a kid,
| | 00:15 | I have brothers and we
used to go in the backyard.
| | 00:17 | Our father would give us model kits
and we would build them and
| | 00:19 | inevitably, we would put fire crackers in
them and blow them up, and do all sorts of
| | 00:22 | things that kids do for fun.
| | 00:25 | Along the way, I didn't think my
career path would ever lead me to where I
| | 00:29 | actually get to build models, fill
them up with explosives and blow them up and
| | 00:33 | film them up, doing all those things
that I used to do as kid, take for granted.
| | 00:37 | and actually do that for living.
| | 00:39 | So, it's very, sort of a privilege to actually do
this, and enjoy your job and be artistic.
| | 00:46 | The nice thing about Visual Effects now
is that the science has developed to the
| | 00:51 | point where you can do almost anything.
| | 00:53 | Programs such as SolidWorks and Rhino
that allow us to pre-design physical
| | 01:00 | effects, have allowed physical
effects also to sort of step up.
| | 01:03 | I mean the technical level necessary
to, say, do the crash that we did for 'The Dark
| | 01:09 | Knight' of the garbage truck is something
I don't think could have been pulled
| | 01:12 | off several years ago without the
ability to pre-plan and pre-design the effect.
| | 01:18 | So, the technologies allow
you to do almost anything.
| | 01:23 | Now that you have that in
front of you, you have that tool,
| | 01:26 | now you have got to figure
out what you want to do with it.
| | 01:28 | And that's where art comes in.
| | 01:29 | That's really important that you have
somebody that's not just a jockey behind
| | 01:34 | the box who may know the tool, but not
the aesthetic or not the theme behind
| | 01:42 | what they're trying to
present, and doesn't have a vision.
| | 01:46 | You really need to sort of cultivate, in
your mind, what you are going to create
| | 01:52 | and work towards that goal and have a
clear vision of that before you even
| | 01:56 | start putting it on paper, before you
start putting on the screen, before you
| | 01:58 | start building anything.
| | 02:00 | In 'Watchman,' we did a scene where
there is a tenement fire and the top of the
| | 02:05 | building is burning. The hero is
flying a ship, that's his owl ship and he goes
| | 02:11 | in, and decides the only way he can take the
fire out is to shoot the legs out of the water tank
| | 02:16 | that's on the rooftop.
| | 02:17 | The water tank falls down. The
water splashes, puts the fire out,
| | 02:20 | and his girlfriend, another
superhero, is able to save the people
| | 02:24 | inside the building.
| | 02:26 | Fairly straightforward, except, of
course, you are dealing with fire and
| | 02:30 | water, which in miniature is something
that you need to deal with in a really big scale.
| | 02:37 | And we also had a previz that was
already provided to us by the production, so
| | 02:41 | the director had a really specific idea of
how he wanted to get the camera to move, et cetera.
| | 02:46 | So what we did was we actually took the
previz and sort of back tracked it, if you will.
| | 02:52 | We built all the components in 3D first,
and then we actually tracked the camera
| | 02:57 | move from the previz to make sure that
we could actually get the Technic Crane
| | 03:01 | to go and do the actions that
were depicted in the previz.
| | 03:05 | And you through all that effort and
then when you are able to go out on set,
| | 03:10 | you actually have this lovely
set, which is plumbed for fire.
| | 03:13 | We actually had to make the fires
controllable. We had to actually get them
| | 03:17 | choreographed to the
action that was in the shot.
| | 03:20 | So all of these things had to be
worked out and built into a sort of dance,
| | 03:26 | if you will, of effects, which is the
motion of the flames, the motion of the
| | 03:31 | water tank, and the particular fires that
need to be going out when the water tank fell.
| | 03:36 | It was important to sort of all work
that out, and a lot of that
| | 03:40 | planning goes into the process, and then
the thrill is, after months of planning,
| | 03:46 | and weeks of building, and setting it up,
is you are out there shooting, and it's
| | 03:51 | over in 10 seconds, but that's all -
it all culminates into that one moment.
| | 03:57 | Is it equal art, equal science? I think
the art has to drive the science more.
| | 04:04 | I think the art has to come up with the
inspiration, or be the inspiration,
| | 04:11 | like, "What we want to do?
| | 04:12 | "Let's think about what we want to do
and then we'll figure out how we are going
| | 04:15 | to do it," and science
follows behind explaining the how.
| | 04:20 | So for us, it's always "What do we want
show in the shot? What do we want to get
| | 04:24 | by in the scene," and then we'll
figure out the mechanics behind that.
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| Digital workflow| 00:00 | (Music playing)
| | 00:07 | Michael Theurer: I am Michael Theurer.
| | 00:08 | I am the Head of the Digital Division
for New Deal Studios and something that is
| | 00:13 | kind of a characteristic for our
particular place in the studio is we can be
| | 00:17 | involved in the project from the
very beginning to the very end.
| | 00:20 | A real good case in
point is 'Night at the Museum.'
| | 00:23 | So, we had to create something
where we could expound upon the previous
| | 00:27 | work that had been done and
utilizing their first unit photography that
| | 00:32 | they had already done, making sure that would
work, with a ramped up version of the sequence.
| | 00:39 | As you can see, this is our stage and
the expanse of what this set was.
| | 00:44 | That's about a 90 foot set.
| | 00:46 | The camera is coming in and the sequence takes over.
| | 00:50 | And this is how that
sequence came out in the movie.
| | 00:52 | So, everything that you see
behind this people was a miniature.
| | 00:56 | So what we do on this side is we actually
have a previz that includes our set planning.
| | 01:02 | We have a set plan that shows where our
track and camera rig is going to be set
| | 01:07 | up in relationship to our model or to
our people that we are shooting, and then
| | 01:11 | it is actually placed within the set and
the camera is animated as it would move
| | 01:17 | to facilitate the shot.
| | 01:18 | During the previz, any sort of
animation that is done and camera animation,
| | 01:23 | camera choreography that is executed in
previz, used in conjunction with these
| | 01:28 | plans, that data is actually
ported out to our motion control camera.
| | 01:32 | It actually drives the motion of the camera.
| | 01:35 | And that really helps us tremendously.
| | 01:37 | We have had some particularly
difficult shots, 'Night at the Museum' being one
| | 01:41 | sequence that was very sophisticated.
| | 01:44 | And it really had to be planned out to
fit within the schedule that they had.
| | 01:48 | (Suspenseful music playing)
| | 01:50 | Amy Adams as Amelia Earhart: Don't look now,
Mr. Daley, but you're flying an airplane!
| | 01:53 | (Suspenseful music playing)
| | 01:57 | Some good examples of what we have
done for 'Shutter Island' where we had
| | 02:02 | basically extensions of
backgrounds that needed to be done.
| | 02:05 | Some of these shots are moving.
| | 02:06 | Some of them are lock off.
| | 02:08 | Often times, those pieces of footage
are provided to us, green screen material,
| | 02:13 | typically, where the
extensions are taking place.
| | 02:16 | And this is a good example of
a shot, how we would receive it.
| | 02:21 | And our work that goes into this is
usually a combination of matte painting extension work
| | 02:27 | that happens along with miniature
photography and we drop those backgrounds in.
| | 02:34 | Also, we will typically add other elements
| | 02:36 | and these elements we have dropped in
CG rain drops that basically are falling
| | 02:42 | through the set, so it really helps
integrate our major extensions with what is
| | 02:46 | happening in the foreground.
| | 02:48 | This was a very interesting shot that
they accomplished on set by placing the
| | 02:53 | staircase on a motorized turntable.
| | 02:55 | This is actually taking part during a
time in the movie where the lead
| | 03:01 | character is going through a breakdown.
| | 03:04 | This particular piece, the miniature
that was built for this, we were not able
| | 03:08 | to actually fit our camera up into the
miniature and get a rotating move, so
| | 03:14 | ultimately what we did was we sent a
still photographer up into the miniature.
| | 03:17 | He took a round of stills that
basically gave us the entire interior of the
| | 03:22 | building and then actually those
textures projected onto a CG model that was
| | 03:27 | used as a template to build our miniature.
| | 03:30 | For this particular purpose, it was
very helpful to take a CG approach on this
| | 03:34 | because the client was not sure,
ultimately, how fast he wanted to be moving up
| | 03:38 | and down the sequence.
| | 03:40 | Again, because of the nature of the
shot, and what was happening for the
| | 03:44 | character, they needed some latitude and it
was okay for this to be - feel slightly off.
| | 03:50 | So again, we could adjust the speed of
the ascent and also the tonality and what
| | 03:56 | was happening within the lighting
of the chamber to the client as they
| | 04:00 | determined what was going to
really effectively sell the shot.
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| Compositing digital effects| 00:00 | (Music playing)
| | 00:08 | Robert Chapin: My name is Robert Chapin and I am Visual
Effects Supervisor for New Deal Studios.
| | 00:12 | We are a very small shop and we will
staff up very quickly for production and
| | 00:17 | the idea is to be able to have a
freelancer come in and be able to sit down and
| | 00:21 | start work right away.
| | 00:23 | So if you have a lot of proprietary
software, or even, you know, some sort of
| | 00:28 | shot tracking system that takes them a few days
to ramp up, that is a few days we do not have.
| | 00:32 | So we use direct off the shelf software,
the most latest versions of Maya.
| | 00:38 | We were working Shake for a long time, but
Nuke actually proved better for us.
| | 00:44 | So we are trying to stay on top of the
technology, while trying to stay on top of
| | 00:48 | what the freelance, what the
community is using and what is easiest for a
| | 00:54 | freelancer to just jump in and start work.
| | 00:57 | As a Visual Effects Supervisor, I am
managing, obviously, other artists, but I
| | 01:03 | also sit behind the box. There
is a lot of Visual Effects Supervisors
| | 01:06 | that try to get out from behind the box.
| | 01:07 | I would like to be able to work on set,
but I also like to be able to keep a
| | 01:12 | handle on the tools as well, because
you want to be able to do that.
| | 01:15 | There is new stuff everyday so if you do not
have a handle on it, how can you tell your
| | 01:19 | artists what to do?
| | 01:20 | So I make it a practice to - you know,
and also we are a small shop too, so I am
| | 01:25 | working on shots at the same time.
| | 01:27 | Here is a couple of the shots that I worked on.
| | 01:29 | This is a lighthouse set.
| | 01:30 | They did not want to afford the
entire set, to build the entire set, so they
| | 01:35 | built this kind of one floor set with
a green screen roof, basic line ups on
| | 01:40 | set, lighting the models so it
would match and then bringing it in and
| | 01:44 | compositing it in Nuke.
| | 01:46 | One of the little touches we added too
is that as he mounts the staircase, we
| | 01:52 | have got movement in our staircase
and, of course, no movement in the model.
| | 01:55 | So, we actually had to take one of our
elements from our model and actually did
| | 01:58 | a little rotate to it.
| | 01:59 | And here is our end result.
| | 02:05 | This was one of the more elaborate
shots here, which involved motion control.
| | 02:09 | This is our Ward C shot.
| | 02:11 | So, while art department was building
their Ward C, they would send me the
| | 02:15 | model, the digital model, which then I would
take in and do a previz for the shot itself.
| | 02:21 | It's a very simple, little sweeping
move, and now what we have to do is
| | 02:24 | populate this with elements.
| | 02:27 | This is after a hurricane has come
through and wiped out everything.
| | 02:30 | So, we have got a lot of workers who
are on the ground and of course, our water
| | 02:35 | plate was an actual plate
that was shot in the Northeast Coast.
| | 02:39 | Here is our final shot so far.
| | 02:43 | As a freelancer for years, I specialized
in dynamics and particle dynamic stuff.
| | 02:48 | And there is stuff that
you still can't do right.
| | 02:50 | It's still really very
difficult to do water, to do fire, to do
| | 02:54 | explosions exactly right,
| | 02:56 | especially, as a particle dynamics guy,
if I was going to take this and blow it
| | 03:01 | up, I mean there is software and there
is tools available nowadays to help you
| | 03:05 | do this, but there is nothing that can
compare with taking a bunch of C-4 or
| | 03:10 | whatever these guys rig, these models,
to just make them blow up and shoot at
| | 03:14 | high speed. There is such dynamics and
such detail that you get, that you just
| | 03:19 | cant get, yet, with CG.
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| Designing with 3d tools| 00:00 | (Music playing)
| | 00:07 | Scott Schneider: My name is Scott Schneider.
| | 00:09 | I am a Digital Set
Designer for New Deal Studios.
| | 00:12 | What I am currently working on right
now is a prop, an action prop, for a
| | 00:16 | movie called Ben 10.
| | 00:18 | Now with the advent of Digital
technology and being able to model things in 3D,
| | 00:21 | we can actually do previz on things
before we build them, and pretty much
| | 00:24 | everything we do here in New Deal
Studios is now, we build it 3D before we
| | 00:29 | build it physically.
| | 00:30 | The reason for that is so that we can
take that file, and we can send it to a
| | 00:34 | machine that is a 3D printer.
| | 00:36 | This is a ThermoJet by 3D Systems, and
this particular machine prints in wax.
| | 00:42 | After I have modeled it in Rhino, or
Scott's modeled it in SolidWorks, we will
| | 00:46 | run it through the software for this,
which is very much like your print
| | 00:49 | software that you have for your printer at home.
| | 00:51 | And it lays it out on a platen.
| | 00:54 | The platen is inside here and we
actually have a part in here. This is the
| | 01:01 | platen. This black piece of
aluminum is the platen and the wax is
| | 01:05 | deposited onto the platen.
| | 01:07 | This is an example of a part that was
grown, was modeled in 3D, and then it was
| | 01:11 | grown and this is the wax.
| | 01:13 | Once the part comes off, it's pretty
warm, because it's melting of wax.
| | 01:18 | It goes into a fridge.
| | 01:19 | It gets chilled down enough to where
the support structure, as you can see
| | 01:23 | right in here, see how it's breaking out?
| | 01:25 | That support structure is what it builds
first, and that's where the part sets on it.
| | 01:31 | So that way you can actually
cut it off, cut the part off.
| | 01:37 | This is a process we go through
every time we remove the part.
| | 01:41 | And you can see it's making a lot of
dust there, but those are all the support
| | 01:46 | structures being broken off.
| | 01:47 | So then, there is the part.
| | 01:49 | And then we can just clean off
the rest of the support structure.
| | 01:52 | Now we can take that part, glue it down
to a board, make a box around it, pour
| | 01:56 | silicon over it, and then we pour a
rigid urethane inside of that. Once it cures,
| | 02:03 | the mold is flexible, and it pops right out.
| | 02:05 | It's allowed us to do things that we
wouldn't have otherwise been able to do in
| | 02:10 | the past, simply due to schedule.
| | 02:13 | And so we can't take things -- if when we
had to do it by hand, we couldn't take
| | 02:17 | things to the level of detail or
the level of quality that we wanted,
| | 02:21 | because there simply wasn't enough time to have
somebody sit at a bench and build that object.
| | 02:25 | These are all examples of
past jobs that we have done.
| | 02:31 | This is actually the grating for the
windows on Ward C for Shutter Island.
| | 02:36 | And you can see how small and thin they are.
| | 02:40 | Normally, in the past, the way we would
have done this is we would have done
| | 02:43 | acidex brass, which would have made
everything completely flat. You wouldn't
| | 02:48 | have this raised detail.
| | 02:49 | You wouldn't have the hinges raised.
| | 02:51 | So doing it in 3D, it allows us to add
extra details to them, which we weren't
| | 02:55 | able to really do very effectively, time-wise, in
the past. Now we can do very, very small parts.
| | 03:01 | These are all examples of mold masters.
| | 03:03 | These were for 'Dark Knight,' for
the Gotham City garbage truck.
| | 03:06 | Again, you can see here, these are
representational of positive and negative.
| | 03:12 | That's the inside of the lens.
| | 03:14 | This is the outside of the lens.
| | 03:16 | Negative key, positive key.
This represents one half of the mold.
| | 03:20 | This represents the other half.
| | 03:22 | So, once those molds come out, they'll
key together, and then I can just inject
| | 03:26 | material into those.
| | 03:27 | We still use the old techniques.
They are still valid, but we try to use them in
| | 03:32 | new and different ways.
| | 03:33 | If we can generate parts that give
us a good base to work on, we start with that.
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| Models & miniatures| 00:00 | (Music playing)
| | 00:07 | Greg Boettcher: My name is Greg Boettcher.
I am one of the model makers here
| | 00:09 | and was crew chief on 'Shutter Island,' here.
| | 00:12 | This whole lighthouse went through a
whole bunch of changes to get to what it
| | 00:15 | looks like right now.
| | 00:17 | This model was shot various times.
| | 00:20 | It was shot in front of green screens.
| | 00:21 | It was shot in front of sky,
just out in the parking lot.
| | 00:23 | We actually took it down to the beach.
| | 00:25 | We literally set it up at the
beach, so you can see the ocean just at
| | 00:28 | the right height, and rocks behind it, and it
was just all shot perfectly right in camera.
| | 00:32 | We had guys actually. There was
another rock cropping like further down
| | 00:35 | the road, and they had some of our guys like
scaring birds in scale for the lighthouse here.
| | 00:40 | The lighthouse itself was - a computer
modeled the actual shape, and then we had it
| | 00:46 | cut out of a piece of
styrofoam, like regular bead styrofoam.
| | 00:50 | And then we did like a joint
compound texture over the whole thing, and then
| | 00:55 | we took, like, real fine masking tape and made
all the lines for the bricks, stapled on
| | 01:01 | more texture all over the whole thing,
and then we pulled all the lines off with the
| | 01:04 | tape lines, and then that's how
you get all the bricks on there.
| | 01:07 | So, this is a model for the Ward C.
It's the big mental institution in 'Shutter
| | 01:13 | Island.' There's the various elements.
They actually had an actual full size
| | 01:18 | wall of this on set in Boston, and
then they had some - I think a full size
| | 01:22 | section of wall for this.
| | 01:24 | This is for an actual close up shot where the
camera actually drives right in front of it.
| | 01:29 | We did it just recently.
| | 01:31 | Basically, there is a shot where the
guys are in the car and they are looking at
| | 01:33 | it for the first time. The camera is
touching these bushes as it goes by.
| | 01:36 | It's how close we had to get to it.
| | 01:39 | I was outside just with a shaded
screen to keep the hard light off of it.
| | 01:44 | We prevized the whole thing in Maya first,
so we knew exactly how tall everything
| | 01:50 | had to be as far as the where the
camera had to be, to get to the angle for where
| | 01:54 | the actors are down in their car.
| | 01:56 | So, they had to scale everything out
and figure out the scale of this model
| | 01:59 | versus the scale of the guys
in the car, and all that stuff.
| | 02:01 | So, they did that all in Maya first,
because then they could figure it out and
| | 02:05 | know exactly what they needed to make.
| | 02:07 | They knew exactly, "I could only make
this high, and shoot this thing up 2 1/2
| | 02:12 | inches, and that would be just enough for the
right angle to make it look as big as it is.
| | 02:16 | So, yeah, a lot of times we'll do the
previzes in the computer, so we know exactly
| | 02:20 | what we need to get out of the whole thing.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| The Dark Knight| 00:00 | (Music playing)
| | 00:07 | Scott Beverly: On 'The Dark Knight,' one of our challenges is
we had two vehicles, one weighing about
| | 00:11 | 450 lbs, the other vehicle weighing,
what was the track shot? About seven?
| | 00:17 | Forest Fischer: Seven hundred, yeah.
| | 00:18 | Scott: About 700 lbs.
| | 00:19 | The models we had built closely mimicked
what they shot, first shoot, and
| | 00:23 | we tried to match them as best as we can.
| | 00:25 | But they were to collide together, and
the goal in it was to create as much
| | 00:30 | destruction as possible, on the trash
truck with not damaging the tumbler, which
| | 00:36 | was the Batmobile, at all.
| | 00:38 | What you saw on footage was the
choreograph of what we planned to be recorded, or
| | 00:43 | filmed, but all the mechanics that
basically drove the event, the crashing, the
| | 00:49 | impacting, that was on a
rig that you didn't see.
| | 00:52 | It was beneath the set.
| | 00:54 | And it basically took the brunt of the impact.
| | 00:57 | It was designed to do that. We had to
design skates that carried the vehicles,
| | 01:02 | and they basically had guided the cars
into where they were supposed to be at
| | 01:06 | the point of impact.
| | 01:08 | Forest: The other thing with that whole event
though that you don't - we had cameras
| | 01:11 | less than two feet from the event.
| | 01:13 | So if anything did go awry anywhere,
it could have been catastrophic to
| | 01:16 | cameras and lenses.
| | 01:18 | Scott Schneider: Take all that, all those things, the
cameras, the cars, and all that and all this
| | 01:21 | equipment that can't crash, is
moving at high speed, and then we cram it inside
| | 01:25 | a very small tunnel,
which is set as well.
| | 01:28 | Scott: When we did the shot, and I believe
it was our first take,
| | 01:31 | Forest: First take, yeah.
| | 01:32 | Scott: Our first take, when we shot the
| | 01:34 | footage, it worked
seamless as far as the impact.
| | 01:37 | It worked seamless as far as the truck
coming off the Batmobile, and then we did
| | 01:43 | the next shot, but when the director
saw the first take, absolutely loved it,
| | 01:48 | he said we were pretty much done and we
were kind of surprised, because we had two more
| | 01:53 | Forest: Setups to do
| | 01:54 | Scott: Setups to do.
| | 01:55 | Forest: Make the car turn around.
| | 01:56 | Scott Beverly: So the shot that you see in the movie is
our first take of that sequence, and we
| | 02:02 | were pleasantly surprised that we could nail it.
Usually, we're allotted about three.
| | 02:07 | Scott: Yeah, and the other thing is, though, they
continue to shoot. They had two weeks of shooting,
| | 02:11 | so they shot everything that they were
contracted to shoot. So they shot everything
| | 02:15 | that was boarded, and everything
was done in the animatic, exactly
| | 02:17 | frame-for-frame, the way it was done.
| | 02:19 | But the shot that got used was the very first take.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creative culture| 00:00 | (Music playing)
| | 00:08 | Shannon Blake Gans: One of our main focuses here is on
creativity, and that creativity can come
| | 00:13 | from any discipline.
| | 00:14 | The image on the screen is our final
product and so we approach visual effects
| | 00:18 | from the filmmaker's perspective, and
not just technologist, or the artist, or
| | 00:23 | the model maker, or the carpenter, or whatever.
| | 00:26 | The position you have, your
part of one big Rube Goldberg
| | 00:30 | experiment essentially.
| | 00:32 | Matthew Gratzner: If you actually set up a
place where you work, where you treat the people as you'd
| | 00:37 | want to be treated, surprisingly,
people enjoy coming to work.
| | 00:41 | And funny enough, that does work, and
the thing about the film business that we
| | 00:46 | didn't like was that there is
definitely a hierarchy, which has to be, you have
| | 00:51 | to have people that run jobs.
| | 00:52 | You have to have producers.
| | 00:53 | You have to have people who
are doing some smaller task.
| | 00:56 | But what you don't need is a caste system,
and that's kind of I sort of feel the
| | 01:00 | film industry sometimes goes,
| | 01:01 | where you have people that are - the idea
of paying your dues is that you've been
| | 01:06 | treated like garbage.
| | 01:07 | So, now that you have been treated like
garbage for a number of years, now you
| | 01:10 | can do that to somebody else.
To me, that's not paying your dues.
| | 01:12 | That's actually a very a
dysfunctional relationship.
| | 01:15 | So we kind of decided at the studio
that, well, because we don't have a big
| | 01:20 | corporation that's backing us,
we don't have a board of directors telling us
| | 01:23 | what to do, we'll just run the company
as if we ran the company, and we didn't
| | 01:28 | really have to answer to anybody.
| | 01:29 | So essentially, by treating people fairly
and treating them as you would want to be
| | 01:32 | treated, we find that
people enjoy coming to work.
| | 01:35 | They enjoy doing a good job, and it's a
much more healthy working relationship,
| | 01:40 | and healthy environment to work in.
| | 01:42 | Ian Hunter: People that are working really
long hours and you are expecting them to be
| | 01:45 | creative are actually less
creative, less efficient, and less safe
| | 01:51 | after too many hours. They literally
are getting too tired, and they can't
| | 01:54 | really do their job as well.
| | 01:56 | For us, it's sort of a selfish reason,
where we get less productivity if we
| | 02:01 | work people too long.
| | 02:03 | So we want to give people a breather.
We want to give them room to rest, and
| | 02:09 | come back, and be fresh and be
creative, and do the best work they can.
| | 02:14 | We encourage getting interns here.
| | 02:16 | We like to get people that are just
coming out of school, who are enthusiastic
| | 02:20 | about doing this kind of work.
| | 02:23 | Shannon: When we interview people, partially, its like
"Are you nice?" first and then, "Can you do your job?"
| | 02:28 | And because you have to work
as part of a team. This is a
| | 02:32 | collaborative industry.
| | 02:34 | It's kind of like, like attracts like.
| | 02:36 | So, you'll attract people who will
fit into the culture of the company.
| | 02:41 | When we interview, I want to hear from
people what are their goals and their
| | 02:45 | dreams. Everybody - you know, it's Hollywood -
| | 02:47 | everyone has a dream, and they all, often,
want to direct or produce and write.
| | 02:51 | And so, again, the common courtesy and
respect is looking for their interest.
| | 02:57 | This is a way station.
| | 02:59 | People come in, they develop skills,
and they move on, and we encourage that,
| | 03:02 | and we give 110% to our crew.
| | 03:05 | And we expect 110%.
| | 03:07 | We have all come a long way, like
I came from Florida, 3000 miles.
| | 03:12 | People come from all over the world.
| | 03:13 | We have somebody from East Germany that
wrote me a letter saying, on handwritten
| | 03:17 | paper I have it,
"Please let me come work for you.
| | 03:20 | "I love the film industry.
| | 03:21 | I want to be a model maker," or digital
artists that come from Japan and then work
| | 03:26 | their way here on their own,
against the will of their parents.
| | 03:29 | We have a wide range of amazing artists.
| | 03:32 | And so, they come here to be
artists and they want to have fun.
| | 03:34 | If you put them into this
survival mode and abuse them, how are they
| | 03:41 | going to open up and give
to the project creativity?
| | 03:43 | That's the whole point of what we do.
| | 03:45 | But providing that space to open up
allows all the employees and artists to give
| | 03:52 | to our projects, and it
just looks that much better.
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| Practical vs. digital effects| 00:00 | (Music playing)
| | 00:08 | Matthew Gratzner: Each discipline is a very
interesting study in creativity and difficulty.
| | 00:13 | I think the practical side of it -
everytime we go to shoot a model, on the
| | 00:17 | practical side, regardless of what is,
full-scale, miniature, whatever, it's like
| | 00:22 | you're shooting a Swiss clock every time.
| | 00:24 | It's like this immensely complicated
intricate thing that has to work, and
| | 00:29 | cannot fail, and usually you get one
shot at it. Sometimes you have two takes, but
| | 00:33 | sometimes you have one shot.
| | 00:34 | So you'll spend a lot of time
R&Ding, and figuring stuff out.
| | 00:37 | And then you get to the end of that
project and the pressure is very intense,
| | 00:41 | and now it's the time, like this has
to work and you are on set, and there is
| | 00:45 | no room for failure.
| | 00:47 | Then you have to shoot that and hope it
works, and I have seen, literally, six
| | 00:52 | months of work come to a conclusion of
a hundredth of a second of film time,
| | 00:57 | well, not film time, but a hundredth of a
second of real-time that ends up being like
| | 00:59 | four seconds of film or something.
| | 01:01 | And it's an amazing amount of a
stress built up to that point.
| | 01:05 | The digital side, on the other hand,
doesn't have that kind of stress.
| | 01:09 | There is stress to make a deadline,
certainly, but like if something doesn't
| | 01:12 | work, or doesn't look right, and you
kind of step back, and you say,
| | 01:14 | "Well, maybe we should work this a little bit more."
| | 01:17 | And you don't have hundreds of
people waiting on that thing to work.
| | 01:21 | So on the one hand, the miniature and
practical side, you have the stress of
| | 01:26 | 'this has to work on the day.'
| | 01:27 | But on the flip side, when you fire
an air mortar, or you blow something up,
| | 01:31 | nine times out of ten it's going to
kind of do what you think it's going to do,
| | 01:34 | and gravity is going to take over, and
the light coming down from above, if you
| | 01:37 | are shooting outside, is going to look
real, and the shadows are going to look real.
| | 01:39 | So you get a lot of free, so to speak, detail.
| | 01:42 | You get a lot of stuff that happens.
| | 01:43 | Certain physics are going to happen.
| | 01:44 | But then digital effects, well, the
pressure of getting it to work right that
| | 01:49 | first time isn't there.
The pressure is getting it to look real.
| | 01:52 | So I think those are the two -
it's like each one has their own sense of
| | 01:56 | creative difficulties.
| | 01:57 | On the one side, you have the ability to build.
| | 01:59 | I mean, I can take anyone of these
pieces from my desk, and probably have a
| | 02:03 | painter to do a great job painting it,
we light it, we shoot it, and I can
| | 02:05 | make it look 15 feet tall, just with
the right camera angle, right lensing,
| | 02:10 | but it's getting to that point,
which is a bit stressful. You're on set.
| | 02:12 | That's the stress of
making it work that first time.
| | 02:15 | Digital, on the other hand, how long is
it going to take to make this, any one of
| | 02:20 | these pens or pencils look
photographically real, and not feel like a rendered
| | 02:24 | object, and that's sort of the challenge there.
| | 02:27 | I think one of the biggest strengths
of digital work is the fact that you can
| | 02:32 | tweak it, and noodle it.
| | 02:33 | And I think the biggest weakness of
digital work is you can tweak it and noodle it.
| | 02:36 | And I think that's
one of the hardest things.
| | 02:38 | I have to say, when we were strictly
doing miniature effects, it was, I don't
| | 02:43 | want to say it was easier, but it was
certainly, there was an end to all of
| | 02:47 | what we were doing.
| | 02:48 | There was a point like, "Well, here is the model.
| | 02:50 | "We are now going to shoot it.
| | 02:52 | We have shot it. I hope you like it."
| | 02:55 | Now, we can go back and we can change it.
| | 02:57 | We can change an actor's eye line.
| | 02:59 | It gets to the point where - and I
think that's great, but I think that you
| | 03:02 | lose a certain organic fault, or
organic misstep, in digital effects that
| | 03:10 | starts looking kind of
artificial and created.
| | 03:13 | So the creative process overall, for what
we do, is different in every department.
| | 03:19 | And the creativity that some of our
mechanical effects guys have, they'll come
| | 03:23 | up with some insane way to launch a
projectile like 100 feet, and that's their
| | 03:29 | creative process in doing that
is some insane physical computation, or
| | 03:35 | physics computation as to how far
something can be launched and what it needs to
| | 03:38 | weigh and everything.
| | 03:39 | And that same creativity on the
digital side may be, "How do I make this
| | 03:43 | leaf blowing look real."
| | 03:44 | So it's actually a very
interesting process, but as I said, there is a
| | 03:48 | hierarchy, and there is a point where you do have
to sort say, "Okay, we need to move on from here."
| | 03:53 | And it's tough because you always want
to appease the clients, but you also have
| | 03:57 | to make sure it's working within the budget.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Taking care of business| 00:00 | (Music playing)
| | 00:07 | Shannon Blake Gans: So, in terms of talking
about going above and beyond, we try to do that on
| | 00:12 | every project, and we do that from
just putting a little extra money into the
| | 00:16 | project so it looks wonderful, because
we can see -- if by going a little bit
| | 00:21 | further, you get a lot of detail, and
the quality of the image is there, because
| | 00:27 | in the end, that's all people
remember is the image on the screen.
| | 00:30 | So, we will put extra time and effort.
| | 00:32 | We will put extra money.
| | 00:34 | It's part of building our reputation
as artists in the industry, and not just
| | 00:39 | technicians or craftsmen.
| | 00:40 | And as well, my philosophy is, if you
want to just kind of do the bare
| | 00:46 | minimum effort, you are not really
going to go anywhere, and we have places we
| | 00:50 | want to go, and its fun.
| | 00:51 | I mean, if you are having fun, then
it really isn't like extra effort.
| | 00:55 | Efficiency even is part of our workflow,
in terms of how we build things and
| | 01:02 | having multiple design - we have a
very solid design phase, and then we build
| | 01:08 | everything all at once and it
comes together as a finished product.
| | 01:11 | So we have very short schedules.
We will turn things around very quickly.
| | 01:14 | We try to keep everyone's head in the
game, and we have contests, and we have a
| | 01:19 | program where if, since you are a
kind of on that frontlines, dealing with
| | 01:23 | everything, if you see a way that we
can be more efficient and suggest it, and
| | 01:27 | then we implement it, we do $100 gift cards.
| | 01:30 | It's been that way since
the beginning of the company.
| | 01:31 | Like somebody suggested morning
meetings, so we voted and we did morning
| | 01:35 | meetings, or we changed timing.
So we are democratic in that way because
| | 01:41 | everyone is part of the process, and if
you feel like you have a voice and you
| | 01:45 | keep your head in the game, then
that helps me as a producer, and creates
| | 01:50 | greater efficiency, greater effort.
| | 01:53 | So it's certainly that we care about
our people, we want them involved, but it
| | 01:56 | definitely helps the bottom-line.
| | 01:58 | And as the industry changes and has
morphed over the years, I think that's part
| | 02:02 | why we have had longevity.
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| Client relationships| 00:00 | (Music playing)
| | 00:08 | Ian Hunter: One of the things that we
have here at New Deal Studios, which we work very
| | 00:14 | hard on maintaining, is our
reputation in the business.
| | 00:17 | More often than not, the clients know
that we are going to deliver what we say,
| | 00:22 | and more often than not, we are
actually delivering more than what we say.
| | 00:27 | And that's a hard-earned
reputation that we've tried to maintain.
| | 00:34 | Matthew Gratzner: The loyalty within clients is very
important, and it is the same with our employees.
| | 00:38 | We are very, very loyal to our employees.
| | 00:40 | If we have a crew that we work with
that we really like and individuals that we
| | 00:43 | really like, we always try to bring
them back on every project, because we know
| | 00:46 | that they are going to do a great job,
we enjoy the relationship and more
| | 00:50 | importantly, everybody kind of wins.
| | 00:52 | And the clients are the same way.
| | 00:53 | If a client trusts us to do the job, then
they know that we will do the best job we can.
| | 00:58 | If a client doesn't trust us to do the job,
we still are going to do the best job we can.
| | 01:02 | Shannon Blake Gans: The trust is so important
at the beginning of the project and then
| | 01:04 | maintaining it, because if you lose
it, then you spend all your time and
| | 01:07 | resources getting that back.
| | 01:08 | And trust is like virginity.
| | 01:10 | You only lose it once.
| | 01:11 | And you can't gain it back.
| | 01:13 | So, it's the best - you get the best
results if you can just - that constant
| | 01:19 | communication and managing the
expectations of the client and the process, and
| | 01:24 | helping them feel comfortable.
| | 01:26 | And often, if people haven't gone
through the process, you really have -
| | 01:30 | it's important to hold their hand and
explain to them every step of the way,
| | 01:33 | "These are the challenges you are
going to see, and experience.
| | 01:36 | And these are best practices and here
is what we are doing to help you," because
| | 01:41 | miniature effects, from the miniature
effects side, particularly, not many
| | 01:44 | people have experience with that.
| | 01:46 | So we try to communicate as much as
possible, and push information up the line,
| | 01:52 | like as much progress photos, and
progress reports, and video and tests, and
| | 01:57 | whatnot, so that they know,
| | 01:59 | many of our clients I have worked with this,
year after year, know when they come
| | 02:02 | here, they don't have to worry.
| | 02:03 | They can just assign us a shot, or a
sequence. They can walk away and deal with the
| | 02:07 | rest of the show, and they know when
they come here they are going to get more
| | 02:09 | than what they paid for.
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| Interview with Lynda| 00:00 | (Music playing.)
| | 00:09 | Lynda Weinman: Hello! I'm Lynda Weinman, and I'm here
on a Creative Inspiration series with New Deal studios.
| | 00:15 | I'm very honored to get to have an
interview with Shannon Gans, who is the CEO
| | 00:20 | and co-founder of New Deal Studio.
| | 00:22 | Welcome and thank you for joining us.
| | 00:24 | Shannon Gans: Thank you for having me.
| | 00:25 | Lynda: I'm always so intrigued with a
creative company that is led by somebody with
| | 00:30 | a business background.
| | 00:31 | It's a little better rare, I think, and
I'm curious if you could talk a little
| | 00:35 | bit about how that part of your
background has been effective in your
| | 00:40 | partnership with your studio.
| | 00:42 | Shannon: For me, being the business side
is very creative, so I actually find running
| | 00:47 | the business to be my art.
| | 00:49 | And that has helped because, you know,
my two partners are the creatives, and
| | 00:55 | having a business perspective balances
our ideas, and you know our plans for the
| | 01:01 | future and how we run our projects.
| | 01:03 | So it's like 'I really you really want
to do that' and it's like 'Well, we kind
| | 01:06 | of these parameters you have to work
within,' and evening having parameters kind
| | 01:10 | of makes you exercise creative muscles
to get done what you want to get done in
| | 01:14 | a certain schedule and budget.
| | 01:16 | Lynda: Did business school
prepare you for the real world?
| | 01:19 | Shannon: It did, to some extent, because
I went through the entrepreneur program,
| | 01:22 | Lynda: Uh huh.
| | 01:23 | Shannon: so half of our class was people
coming in and sharing their experiences,
| | 01:28 | which made it very attainable, because
you got to hear the good and the bad.
| | 01:34 | And that aspect of it I think really
prepared us, but there's certain things, like I
| | 01:38 | only had two classes in accounting.
| | 01:39 | Accounting is a big part of business,
and having a nice advisory board has been
| | 01:44 | helpful for me in that area.
| | 01:45 | That's not necessarily a natural
aspect for me of business is accounting.
| | 01:50 | Lynda: How has the business had to adapt in
the digital economy, and also in the new economy?
| | 01:57 | Shannon: We've adapted with using the
technology to help make us more efficient and to
| | 02:06 | work with the new techniques, like laser
cutting and rapid prototyping and using 3-D
| | 02:12 | modeling programs to help us plan the
projects so that we are more efficient, as
| | 02:17 | well as using technology to help make
the operations more efficient with cloud
| | 02:22 | computing and, you know, backing up
our data and, you know, using online
| | 02:28 | calendars to get everyone on board has
really helped us become more efficient,
| | 02:33 | where you've had to be.
| | 02:34 | There's downward pressure on schedule
and budget from the studios, and that has
| | 02:39 | helped us a great deal to
continue to be relevant.
| | 02:42 | Lynda: One of the things that our
filming crew noted about New Deal Studio was
| | 02:47 | just how all of the employees seem to
like working there so much, and what is
| | 02:52 | your business philosophy about having
that respect of the employees and the
| | 02:57 | importance of that?
| | 02:58 | Shannon: You know, have to have a place
you love to go to, and as a creative person,
| | 03:03 | you want to open up and give to a project.
| | 03:05 | And I think if you create a space that's
safe and fun and comfortable, people will be
| | 03:10 | able to open up and really give more
to your project. And I want to have fun
| | 03:13 | where I work, so that's part of why I
own a business. And so that's part of my
| | 03:18 | philosophy and what we've put into
the culture of the company.
| | 03:22 | We come from all over the world to work in
Los Angeles and work in the film industry.
| | 03:27 | It should be fun, and you know, putting
a lecture effort into managing yourself
| | 03:30 | and your resources so that you do have
time for fun I think is important, and
| | 03:35 | that you just create a better project.
| | 03:36 | So it's a matter of economics, as
well as, you know, like a want to have a
| | 03:41 | great place to work.
| | 03:42 | Lynda: I think it's a great philosophy.
| | 03:44 | Do you work with a lot of
freelance people, or do you prefer to work
| | 03:49 | with in-house employees?
| | 03:50 | Shannon: We work with both.
| | 03:52 | We have a core team and then 15 or so
people, and then it depends on where we're
| | 03:57 | at and what projects we're working on.
| | 03:59 | And then we will expand to 125, and so
each person is an individual, and they
| | 04:05 | all work, you know, hard and come to
the company with enthusiasm and
| | 04:11 | excitement, and so it doesn't matter.
| | 04:14 | But I look for people who are
passionate and have a good attitude.
| | 04:18 | I can tell within 10 seconds
whether I'll hire you.
| | 04:20 | Lynda: Wow!
Shannon: I know that sounds strange, but it's true.
| | 04:22 | And whenever I have been indifferent, then
there's always a reason, and eventually that
| | 04:28 | person grows out of the company, but we're us
a stopping place for people in their careers.
| | 04:35 | They come in, grow, and learn, and
contribute to our projects, and then we help them
| | 04:40 | move on, and so the having that 'we'll
help you when you help us' attitude really
| | 04:44 | makes a big difference I think, as well,
in getting people behind an idea and
| | 04:49 | our concept of our
company and where we're going.
| | 04:52 | So they'll support us more.
| | 04:54 | They say people come to work
with 40% discretionary effort.
| | 04:57 | How do you get that out of them?
| | 04:59 | And so that's part of how I work with
it is to just kind of help people develop
| | 05:03 | themselves so that they can move on.
| | 05:05 | And we've had people come back and hire us.
| | 05:07 | Artists that have moved on in their careers
will come back and hire us, which is exciting.
| | 05:11 | So you know you're doing a good job.
| | 05:12 | Lynda: Yeah, that's it
that's a very unusual philosophy.
| | 05:15 | I don't think of many companies that
really encourage their employees to go out
| | 05:19 | and, you know, go beyond what they're doing.
| | 05:23 | I think a lot of businesses are so self-
centered, just thinking, you know, how
| | 05:26 | can I get the most work out this person?
| | 05:28 | But that's, that philosophy
sounds like it's really paid off.
| | 05:31 | Shannon: It has paid off in spades.
| | 05:34 | We give them the lynda.com
subscriptions so that they can enhance their
| | 05:38 | skills because they - everyone
has a dream of what they want to do,
| | 05:42 | particularly in creative fields.
| | 05:46 | People have to have a day job, but
they always have their projects that they
| | 05:49 | want to work on, so helping them helps us.
| | 05:52 | Again, I love people and respect
people and you know, being able to work with
| | 05:57 | the artists is a big part of why I do
what I do. But I also know how
| | 06:02 | I'd like to be treated and just
exercising my philosophies through managing
| | 06:08 |
| | 06:09 | the company I have seen like, you know,
a great way to get the most efficiency
| | 06:15 | out of people as well.
| | 06:16 | Again, it's economics in
addition to a philosophy.
| | 06:19 | Lynda: Mhm. And what is your
philosophy in regards to clients.
| | 06:23 | What do you do for client retention?
| | 06:26 | We try to make their lives as easy as possible.
| | 06:29 | There's so much pressure on a
director, and his career and producers,
| | 06:34 | and even in new media as well.
| | 06:37 | People are always building their
careers and developing a new economy
| | 06:43 | with the web, and so our job is to
anticipate needs and listen and deliver the
| | 06:50 | best product possible at a great price.
| | 06:53 | And if you can make someone's life
easy, they'll always come back to you.
| | 06:57 | Often people, our clients will say,
"Oh, we know we can just give you a
| | 07:00 | sequence and walk away, and it'll be done great,
and we can to shut up and smile and drink coffee."
| | 07:03 | And that's what we want.
| | 07:05 | And they'll always refer us because
that's all about repeat clients and referrals.
| | 07:09 | Lynda: And relationships.
| | 07:11 | Shannon: And relationships.
| | 07:12 | People do business with those
that they trust and they like.
| | 07:14 | Lynda: Absolutely. And with your background
in the entrepreneurial program, do you have any
| | 07:21 | thoughts about education and
teaching business skills to others?
| | 07:25 | Shannon: Absolutely.
| | 07:27 | I think, just in general, for artists,
since this is Creative Inspirations, I
| | 07:32 | have found that artists, technologists,
scientists and entrepreneurs all kind
| | 07:38 | of think the same way.
| | 07:39 | The mind of the muscle, in my opinion,
so our minds are kind of developed the
| | 07:42 | same way, and so it's easy
to jump around I have found.
| | 07:44 | I have family that are, were scientists,
and I'm a tech geek, my father was an
| | 07:49 | engineer, and we all just kind of
think the same way. And so I find that you
| | 07:54 | manage them the same way.
| | 07:55 | And so I believe I have a strong just
kind of personal mission to to help with
| | 08:04 | education, to help people help themselves,
| | 08:06 | constantly working with our artists to
educate them on business as much as I can.
| | 08:10 | We have kind of our informal
New Deal university with articles and
| | 08:16 | books and lynda.com,
which has been amazingly helpful.
| | 08:21 | People just, some people just haven't
thought about like continuing education.
| | 08:24 | You need education and coaching your
whole life, especially these days with
| | 08:28 | things changing so quickly.
| | 08:30 | And I find that artists really do
respond and understand business concepts.
| | 08:35 | It's often common sense.
| | 08:36 | And just kind of helping them
understand and frame some of the concepts
| | 08:41 | for them in their own language or
how it applies to their business
| | 08:45 | makes a big difference.
| | 08:46 | And even I'm volunteering for
SIGGRAPH Vancouver in 2011,
| | 08:52 | and putting together an entire day
based on business and bringing keynote
| | 08:56 | speakers and talking about finance and
creating an advisory board and working with them.
| | 08:59 | Lynda: Wow.
| | 09:00 | I think that something that is so needed.
| | 09:02 | Congratulations for getting
that going. That's exciting.
| | 09:05 | Shannon: I love education. I'm passionate.
| | 09:07 | That's why I'm so excited to be here.
| | 09:09 | Lynda: And what is, what is the
future looking like for New Deal?
| | 09:14 | Are there any upcoming
projects that you're excited about?
| | 09:17 | Shannon: There are.
| | 09:18 | We always continue to expand and evolve
of our company and often are looking at
| | 09:25 | our business plan, several times a year now.
| | 09:28 | And we are working on creating our
own content, so not just being a service
| | 09:32 | provider, but creating our own
projects and not just a film project but
| | 09:37 | developing the whole
transmedia plan around that.
| | 09:40 | As I said, I'm a tech geek myself so
creating iPhone applications and
| | 09:45 | rich Web sites and games and just,
you know, applying our perspective, our
| | 09:50 | creative point of view.
| | 09:53 | We've done quite a bit of
creative agency work as well.
| | 09:57 | And so that's what we've been working on.
| | 10:00 | So we have a feature film and a
television show that were working on.
| | 10:03 | And we have this digital agency and
we're producing commercials as well.
| | 10:09 | And our goal, when I wrote the business
plan at USC in undergrad, was always to
| | 10:16 | produce our own content.
| | 10:17 | So it's nice to be there, at
that moment, at the right time.
| | 10:20 | That's kind of how I feel where we're at.
| | 10:21 | Lynda: Well, congratulations on all of
your success and also kind of doing business
| | 10:27 | the way that you think it should
be done and that you want to do it.
| | 10:30 | You know, it's inspiring and we really
appreciate you sharing your thoughts and
| | 10:33 | philosophies with us.
| | 10:34 | Thanks so much for having me!
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