The Mill and Mill+ continue their collaboration with Neversoft and Infinity Ward for the Intro to DLC 3 - Awakening in Activision's 'Call of Duty Ghosts: Extinction Mode.'
Creative director Paul Mitchell of Mill+ spoke to us about the inspiration for the DLCs: "They're all based on the game itself. The creative drive for each DLC came from Neversoft and Infinity Ward. It was a very close collaboration to meet the overall vision of the game."
This sequence sees the military attempt to reach the Ark, which contains the Cortex, only to be foiled by a pack of gargoyles. Mitchell and 3D lead artist Felix Urquiza of The Mill led the CG animation and design teams.
Mitchell comments: "Lots of time was spent on the action performances during the motion capture shoot, which we then used in CG. We used a lot of stunt work and crash mats to get the explosion shots. There was also quite a bit of environment work done to get the cave just right, and on top of that we really focused on the details of the gargoyles."
Urquiza adds: "Part of the challenge for the DLC 3 was the size of the shots to light and render. These shots involved lots of wide shots with multiple glowing creatures and a lot happening all in one scene. When you're dealing with lots of bioluminescence, it's hard to find that balance of lighting without hurting the overall scene. The shots also dealt with a lot of red spill lighting, which also proved difficult to balance out, and with all the action happening in the shot we had to be careful in our balance of light to make it look just right.
"With the battle of time, having the right team to tackle these obstacles was very important. We had two modelers, three lighters and three compositors. With this small team and tight schedule, every artist put in lots of hard work and stayed focused without sacrificing quality. With these types of jobs it's important to do so and at the same time have fun. As CG artists, these are the projects we all dream of working on - and with the creative door open, these can be really fun to do!"
View more Extinction DLCs here.
Editing Company: Mill+
Editors: Luke Kraman, Victor Jory
VFX & Design: The Mill
Executive Producer: Kim Wildenburg
Director & Creative Director: Paul Mitchell
Senior VFX Producer: Will Lemmon
Art Directors & Lead Compositors: Eugene Gauran, Ed Laag
3D Lead Artist: Felix Urquiza
Storyboard Artists: Brian Yang
Lead Animator & Pre-vis Artists: Blake Guest
Matte Painter: Rasha Shalaby
Graphic Animator: Justin Demetrician
Compositors: Eugene Gauran, Ed Laag, Victor Duncan
Effects Artists: Hartwell Durfor, Denis Gauthier, Jenna Kind
Lighting & Rendering: Robert Chapman, Kenzie Chen, James Ma, Felix Urquiza
Modeling & Texture: Felix Urquiza, Maggie Toh
Rigging: Fabian Elmers
Animators: Tracey Cotta, Blake Guest, Billy Vu, Juan Zavala
Smoke Artist: Tim Robbins
Production Coordinator: Antonio Hardy
Developer: Neversoft, Infinity Ward
Publisher: Activision Publishing Inc.
Director: Scott Pease, Peter Day
Cinematic Director: Sylvain Doreau
Story: Brad Santos
Audio: Stephen Miller, Charles Deenen