Role: Shoot Supervisor, 3D Lead.
Task: To create a photoreal Mohammed Ali CG head replacement. Ali is one of the most recognisable and iconic athletes of all time, replicating him was to be a real challenge. Unlike many head replacements, we were not able to benefit from facial scans but were instead left with the task of manually sculpting and texturing Ali. It was key to select and approve a specific age and selection of references for Ali to avoid contradicting information of how he should look.
To help with the head tracking we rigged up numerous remote witness cameras around the boxing ring. These were slated and synced before each take before being complied in 2D on return. These cameras could then be used in conjunction with our set model, to accurately place and understand our Actors movement in each shot.
The rig was a blend of shapes for key poses, volume preservation and fully manual controls for the animators. The hair was created using The Mill’s proprietary hair tools and the skin shaders took into account animated sweat maps and displacements for skin wrinkles.
The spot was submitted to the VES.
Lead Artist Credits:
Paul Liaw - Lead Modeller
Kevin Ives - Lead Shading/Texturing
Ren Hsien-Hsu - Lead Rigging
Alex Allan & Navdeep Singh - Anim
Corey Brown - Lead Compositor and fellow Shoot Supervisor