Academy Grad and Student Pack a Punch with Special Effects for Captain America
Though it may be Chris Evans that audiences see as the hero on-screen in Captain America: The First Avenger, an Academy of Art University alumna and student did some of the heavy hitting behind the scenes. Animation & Visual Effects student Gentry Davidson worked as a stereoscopic rotoscope artist, and grad Jaymie Lam worked as a compositor on the film.
Personal Project by Gentry Davidson
Click to Enlarge
Rotoscoping for live-action films involves tracing an object’s silhouette, also called a matte, to extract the object from a scene for use on a different background.
“The only part that’s different [for stereoscopic rotoscoping] is extending your edge out a couple of pixels, creating more internal shapes and compensating for motion blur,” Gentry explained. “Once the mattes were created, compositors were able to grade the various shapes, creating depth maps, thus converting 2D film sequences to 3D.”
While still a student at Academy of Art University, Gentry has worked on both Captain America and Thor, an earlier film set in the world of the Avengers graphic novels.
Personal Project by Gentry Davidson
Click to Enlarge
For Gentry, the stunning visual effects in movies were a lifelong passion. “Visual effects was always on my mind as a kid from watching clashing lightsabers in Return of the Jedi to the astounding dinosaurs in Jurassic Park,” he said.
However, it took him some time and encouragement to choose to turn his passion into a profession. “After high school, I worked various unfitting jobs, putting VFX on the backburner, but still holding onto the excitement since comic book movies were starting to flourish at the time,” Gentry said. “In 2005, I met my fiancé and she convinced me to pursue my passion, uttering the phrases, ‘It’s never too late to go back to school’ and ‘If you love what you do, you’ll never work a day in your life.’”
Personal Project by Gentry Davidson
Click to Enlarge
As a compositor, Jaymie works to combine a variety of images, including live-action film and animation, into one seamless shot on screen. “These elements usually come from many different sources because they were either shot at different times or created at different times,” said Jaymie. “If we did our jobs right, no one would know we did anything at all.”
She decided to pursue a BFA degree in Animation & Visual Effects at Academy of Art University because of her love of film. It was during her time at the Academy that she was introduced to compositing and decided to focus her studies there. Later, she came back to earn her Animation MFA.
Personal Project by Gentry Davidson
Click to Enlarge
During her career, Jaymie has worked on compositing for films such as Thor, Alice in Wonderland, Rango and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. “I’ve been very lucky to work on many films. They were all exciting, since they each had something different to do,” she said.
Both Gentry and Jaymie have begun their careers doing what they love. As Jaymie puts it, “My future plan is to keep compositing. It’s a lot of fun, and I look forward to work every day.”
Related:
|
