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[00:00:00] Intro

[00:00:00] Rob Bredow: Great screenwriters say you get one conceit per film. You can make it anything you want. And Michael Gracie's like, yep, that's going to be the conceit Welcome to the Lighter Darker Podcast where we talk about the creative process of filmmaking and the art of visual storytelling. Thanks for joining us for episode 11, uh, 11 of 20 planned for our first season.

[00:00:21] We release every other Tuesday. Uh, I'm here with my co host Todd.

[00:00:27] Todd Vaziri: Hey, I'm Todd Vazari, Compositing Artist and Compositing Supervisor at ILM.

[00:00:32] Rob Bredow: And as always our producer

[00:00:35] Jenny Ely: Hello, Jenny Ely, Production Manager at ILM.

[00:00:38] Rob Bredow: And I'm Rob Bredow, Chief Creative Officer at ILM and SVP of Creative Innovation at Lucasfilm. And we all work together in the visual effects, animation, and immersive entertainment industries. And today is really fun. We're going to have an Oscar episode. We're going to talk about the five shows nominated for the Best Visual Effects Oscars and a little bit about that process. It's going to be really fun to dive into some of the artistry there. Before we start, we have to take a short detour back for some, uh, information correction for misinformation corner generated on this very, our very own podcast here, Todd.

[00:01:11] Misinformation Corner

[00:01:11] Todd Vaziri: Well, uh, in the last episode, uh, Amy mentioned that, uh, the, uh, traditional matte paintings that were done at ILM were done on shower doors. And, uh, in the middle of that episode, I, I said, I don't know about that. I think that might be some mythology. It might not actually be shower doors.

[00:01:30] Rob Bredow: And I got to tell you, I've heard this mythology, uh, repeated in the hallways of ILM for all 10 years that I've been here. Probably once a week, I hear

[00:01:38] Jenny Ely: Same.

[00:01:39] Rob Bredow: by a matte painting, telling the story of the shower doors, Todd.

[00:01:42] Todd Vaziri: Yep. So, uh, I, I, that it was in my mind that it was mythology and I, I did a little bit of digging. Uh, uh, talked to Craig Barron, who ran the painting department in the eighties here at Industrial Light and Magic

[00:01:56] Rob Bredow: That's a pretty good source, Craig.

[00:01:58] Todd Vaziri: pretty good, pretty good. So, uh, this is what Craig wrote me about that. The glass. Paintings for Star Wars movies and other Cinemascope projects by the matte department were created on two and a half foot by six foot aluminum framed glass. I'm not aware of any shower doors that are only two and a half feet wide. These were, of course, custom made by a glass company that also happened to produce shower doors, which could be some of the source of that mythology. It was also important that the glass was clear and of good optical quality, as we sometimes can't see. So this is a picture of the Star Wars projected images through the glass or behind the glass to combine the live action with the paintings. This is not the kind of glass that you find at Home Depot. pretty, pretty clear,

[00:02:42] Rob Bredow: Pretty definitive. We're definitely shattering Amy's dreams.

[00:02:46] Jenny Ely: Well, I will, Todd,

[00:02:49] Todd Vaziri: hold on, hold on, I also got J. W. Rinsler who wrote, literally wrote the books about the making of Wars, It is, quote, this is a myth. Several matte painters from the original Star Wars told me the shower door theory is not true. Also, Harrison Ellenshaw, who did some matte paintings on the Star Wars movie,

[00:03:08] Rob Bredow: Yes.

[00:03:09] Todd Vaziri: way true. So, anyway, that, that's, that's a sort of, that's my reporting.

[00:03:15] Jenny Ely: however,

[00:03:16] Rob Bredow: Those sources are pretty well placed. I got

[00:03:19] Jenny Ely: yes, but Todd, I will see your three sources and I will raise you a Ralph McQuarrie.

[00:03:26] So Amy from our last episode also got a message from one of Ralph McQuarrie's old pals who said that Ralph himself used to pick up shower doors from the hardware store. Tie them to his truck and drive them into work.

[00:03:41] According to this source, Ralph made a point that with shower doors, you also knew you were getting tempered glass. So I guess he wanted to be sure.

[00:03:50] Rob Bredow: That is amazing.

[00:03:52] Todd Vaziri: Where does this leave us?

[00:03:54] Rob Bredow: This will never resolve. We're going to be in the misinformation corner forever.

[00:03:58] Jenny Ely: it lives on in VFX mythology, but I'm just happy because, you know, Todd's almost always right about this stuff. And this time I have a source that says he might not be, so.

[00:04:09] Rob Bredow: Is this an anonymous source from, from, from Amy? Amy wants to keep the myth alive. Is that, is this what we're discovering?

[00:04:16] Jenny Ely: This is an anonymous source, but, um, I, uh, I, I want to believe this. So I'm going to believe that, that this is true.

[00:04:25] Rob Bredow: Okay, well this is good.

[00:04:26] Todd Vaziri: can be true. Both

[00:04:28] Jenny Ely: Otherwise, otherwise we've been, we've been lying to people on ILM official tours for years, telling them that they're seeing shower doors,

[00:04:37] Rob Bredow: No, there is a, there is a, there is a yes and version of this, isn't there, Todd? Which is, um, the doors came from an official source that had really clean glass. All the things you just described by all the people who are the experts who were in the room at the time. That has to be true. And then, did Ralph also pick up some shower doors himself?

[00:04:55] Yes. Sometimes I paint one on a shower door. I don't know where they went out of the doors one time. I don't know

[00:05:01] Jenny Ely: shower door gate continues, shower

[00:05:04] Rob Bredow: If anyone has any more information, please send it to Jenny we'll continue the dialogue

[00:05:11] Jenny Ely: I will keep your, I will keep your identity secret. I will protect my sources.

[00:05:16] Rob Bredow: Lighter darker continues Okay, so this is the Oscar episode. So we won't just talk about shower doors. By the way, I did the math um 30 inches isn't that narrow for a shower door. That's totally possible for a real shower door. So anyway, it is possible.

[00:05:32] Jenny Ely: People were smaller in the eighties.

[00:05:36] VFX Oscar Nomination Process

[00:05:36] Rob Bredow: Oscar Nomination Episode. How, um, how did we even get here? Because we're down to the five movies that got nominated for this year's Oscar for best visual effects, which is really fun. But 350 eligible pictures Um, and some of you have participated and have seen this process and the bakeoffs, but maybe many of you aren't familiar with how we get to this nomination.

[00:06:01] And it's a really, it's a, it's a very involved process. It's a very cool process, I think. So the Academy year forms what's called a Visual Effects Branch Executive Committee or gets abbreviated sometimes BEC. It's about 40 to 50 experts in visual effects. These are Academy members in the visual effects branch. I've been doing it a while. Um, half of that branch executive committee is made up of people who run for the positions and get voted in. Um, and so these, anybody who's in the visual effects branch of the academy can, opt in to be, to potentially serve on the branch executive committee. Then the other half is made up of appointees from the governors.

[00:06:45] And this is to make sure we get enough, differing expertise and diversity in the group of the branch executive committee. So we want to make sure we always have special effects representation. We want to have people who have animation experience. We want to have a, we want to have that, all that experience in the room when we're debating these films. And the BEC is the group that narrows the field from the 350 down to. 10, which is known as the shortlist. Um, and that is what makes it to the bake off. But the process isn't just a one step process. First, uh, we take all the eligible movies this year that were over 300. And we divvy them up amongst the BEC members. Everybody has to watch 10 to 15 movies that get doled out. So every movie gets seen, or at least researched heavily. Hopefully you get to see every movie, but some movies are really hard to see. Um, it can be difficult to stream, uh, or to get to a theater to see some of these movies. But in general, every movie is watched.

[00:07:47] from end to end by at least one BEC member. Probably more, actually, because especially the ones that have a lot of visual effects, a lot of people are seeing. Then, in a single meeting, we go through every one of those, let's say it's 350 movies, and um, put those on a ballot, the ones that have significant visual effects that could potentially be contenders to get a nomination. Uh, and usually um, there ends up being 50 or 60 movies. uh, deserve to be on that ballot, if it, if it's, uh, the movies that tend not to end up on the ballot tend to be a lot of documentaries or things that have very, very minimal visual effects. So any contenders end up on that ballot. There's discussion about some of the relative merits of those films.

[00:08:29] And then, uh, a secret vote is taken, and that is, that narrows it down to not the 10 on the shortlist, but in this first round, it just narrows it down to 20. Because the idea here in the process is to cast a wide net. To make sure we're including any movie that could potentially earn a nomination, we want to make sure it's on that list. And then we give the branch executive committee a week or two to go see, for every member, to see all 20 movies. Because usually, some movies make that list that you haven't seen. And you want to make sure you're making an informed vote. Um, so everybody has to go away, to watch all 20 movies. Uh, if it's only a week, you have to watch a lot of movies every day.

[00:09:05] If you're not keeping up with the work. Um, and those 40 to 50 people regrouped a week or two later this year, we had two weeks and, um, we get together and we watch a before and after real for each of those movies that the producers and the visual effects supervisors and the team, the creative team that led that movie. Have created for us. They're nice and short. They're variations on the three minute before and after reel that you're going to later see in the bake off. So you get to watch these. Three minutes before and after reels, one after another for all 20 films, which can then help inform everyone's vote. They've seen the movie, they've seen the before and after reels, hopefully have enough information, done some research, enough information to vote for which of these 20 should make the shortlist. And then, a few days after that secret vote, we end up with the shortlist, which this year, our shortlist was, uh, Alien Romulus, Better Man, Civil War, Deadpool and Wolverine, Dune Part 2, Gladiator 2, Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, Mufasa the Lion King, Twisters, and Wicked. and those were, just the, just those ten films were in the bake off. Um, Todd and I were talking before this, there's, there's some films, there's some amazing films this year. I mean, it's hard to make that shortlist.

[00:10:24] Todd Vaziri: First of all, I'm glad you described the coverage that is required by the Executive Committee about every single film that's eligible being seen or researched by someone on the Executive Committee. So, I mean, like, I just looked at the Best Picture nominees, and every single one of the Best Picture nominees has visual effects. Every major movie has visual effects of some kind or another. And until we really know what those visual effects are, a little bit of research, a little bit of viewing, uh, you can't make an informed decision. So I'm so glad that the executive committee does that kind of canvassing. Um, but, you know, even to get to that ten, you look at some of these films that didn't even make the final ten, like, The Substance which had just crazy, amazing, uh, practical and digital work Uh, the Zemeckis movie Here, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Godzilla X Kong, Furiosa, Challengers, which had some stunning shots. Um, The First Omen. Uh, I just saw a visual effects reel for Horizon Chapter One. Just amazing work to set the scene of that movie. And even a movie like My Penguin Friend, which could not exist without visual effects, uh, in one way or another.

[00:11:31] I mean, they didn't even make the bake off. And it just shows you how competitive things are right now in our wonderful branch of the work that's being done today. It's crazy. Those didn't even make the bake off.

[00:11:43] Rob Bredow: So yeah, it is, the, the narrowing process is arduous, but also super challenging. You never know exactly who's going to make that, those 10 films, and you're right, every year we have way more. Films that are highly qualified can even make the bake off. Now, the bake off is an event that you and I've been going to for many years.

[00:12:03] People love the bake off. Uh, we did it virtually this year because it happened to take place, uh, at the same time, the fires were hitting LA really bad that week. So we were grateful that Academy staff helped us pivot to an all virtual event and we could hold our, our live event, but, uh, you know, Do you want to just talk a little bit about the setting of the Bake Off?

[00:12:21] I can walk through what that process is, but it's really fun to get to see these films back to back.

[00:12:25] Todd Vaziri: The Bake Off is just an incredible event. It's four hours, just, if you love visual effects, this is the place to be every year. Um, each of the 10 films gets to provide an introduction, usually by the head of department visual effects supervisor, typically. And while they're making that introduction behind them, a two to three minute reel gets to play, uh, to, uh, help illustrate some of the work that's being done.

[00:12:54] It's not just finals that they can actually provide behind the scenes footage and plate photography and animation of their reel.

[00:13:02] Rob Bredow: and that was an enhancement that was made just a few years ago, four or five years ago, and it's such a good improvement to the process, because all the work is so seamless until you see the before and after. It's sometimes hard to even know what was done using what technique.

[00:13:14] Todd Vaziri: Right. Um, and then that is concluded with a now 10 minute reel of finished footage. This is the footage that, uh, if you, if you had a film print back when we were doing film projection, you had to

[00:13:27] Rob Bredow: Yep.

[00:13:27] Todd Vaziri: together pieces of a release print, uh, of the finished product. Uh, 10 minute reel. uh, very quick, uh, brief Q and A at the end and then onto the next picture.

[00:13:41] And we do

[00:13:41] Rob Bredow: Onto the next picture.

[00:13:43] Todd Vaziri: four hours. It's

[00:13:44] Rob Bredow: It's so much, it's so much fun, and you know, I go into the bake off, um, having seen all the movies, uh, research them. I, I try to be as knowledgeable as possible, but every time when you watch the movies back to back, you see those reels, it's just getting to see them in a beautiful environment, like the theater that we screened them in, um, getting to see them back to back, it does inform your vote.

[00:14:06] Even more, you get to see all that work side by side, and it's always hard to compare, right? The work is always such high quality,

[00:14:12] Todd Vaziri: Yeah.

[00:14:12] Rob Bredow: It really does inform your vote, which I'm really proud of. The Academy uses it for that.

[00:14:17] Jenny Ely: Are the reels ever released to the public?

[00:14:20] Rob Bredow: The, um, they're designed for the voting process. Some studios do release those 10 and 3 minute reels to the public to help inform, um, it, well, other, other voters, but also just to kind of advertise how great the movies are. Um, 10 minutes is a good, meaningful excerpt of the movie, so I see the 3 minute reels, uh, make the internet more frequently than the 10 minute reels.

[00:14:43] but in terms of attending the bake offs, it, there was a time in the past that it was open to the public, but it is a voting meeting and they want to keep it very controlled, but I understand that in addition to an academy member being able to bring a guest, so if you have a friend who's an academy member, they're allowed to bring a guest to that event, so if you know somebody, that's one way to get in. But in addition to that, VES members are allowed to attend if they bring their VES membership card, if space allows in the meeting. So, of course, space is reserved primarily, then this is a physical meeting that usually takes place in L.A. But those seats are reserved for Academy members and their guests. But if space allows, which usually, Space does. and VES members can queue up and attend, which I think is fantastic. And I celebrate the fact that people I loved, before I was an Academy member, I loved going to the bake offs. It was just such an amazing education and a celebration of the work of the year.

[00:15:35] Todd Vaziri: Absolutely.

[00:15:37] Rob Bredow: Okay, so we're walking through the nomination process. We got to the shortlist, we got to the bake off. The bake off, the ten, are voted on by the entire branch of the academy. Uh, the entire visual effects branch of the academy, I should say. Um, so that is the group. That's about, well, I can't remember how many members we have.

[00:15:54] There's like ten thousand people in the whole academy. And I think we're like 800 or 900, I should look it up. Um, so we have a lot of people who are eligible to vote, uh, but in order to vote, they have to have watched all those reels, and, uh, new this year, they have to agree to have seen all 10 films in order to vote, which I think is great.

[00:16:14] We want informed people helping to narrow the field. And from there, we get to our five nominated films, and from there, the entire Academy votes on, uh, of those five films. Who is most deserving for best visual effects of the year and that winner will be announced on the Academy broadcast. So

[00:16:32] That's something for, uh, industry folks that have to understand that the, uh, each branch determines their own. nominees and with the exception of best picture and the final Oscars, the final nomination, the final winners are voted on by the entire Academy, which is, you know, it's important to remember that.

[00:16:54] That's right. So when, when people are on stage thanking the Academy, they literally are thanking those 10, 000 people who voted for them that narrowed the field. Um, and the Oscars this year are on Sunday, March 2nd. I think they start earlier. They started earlier last year, starting at 4 PM. They started at 4 PM again this year, which is great.

[00:17:12] That's Pacific standard time. Um, that's a good time. So I think it helps the East coast folks, uh, get to stay up for the last part of the show. I think it's, I think it's a good choice to move that up one hour. Okay. So that's, that's the Academy version for visual effects of how a bill becomes a law, how a movie gets a nomination or a win. and what we wanted to do on the rest of this show is go through and just celebrate the artistry of all five of these remarkable shows. Um, a couple of these are shows that ILM worked on, but we're just here to honor all five of them. Um, it's incredible work. And, you know, you've heard people say it's an honor just to be nominated.

[00:17:50] Uh, hopefully you can, you can get a sense of how much of an honor it is to be nominated for an Oscar. Getting narrowed from 350 eligible pictures down to five by a jury of your peers is really, really an honor. And the Academy does a great job for all the nominees, I think making them feel, um, Special and appreciated. Um, and Todd and I are both Academy members. Uh, we're not going to say how we are voting. not going to try to tell you how to vote or who we think is going to win. Uh, that's not what the show is about. This is going to be about talking about some of the specific things that we noticed in these movies that we think are awesome and worth celebrating.

[00:18:27] Exactly. Okay. Jenny, do you want to take us to our first nominated film?

[00:18:32] Nominee Highlights

[00:18:32] Jenny Ely: Yes. And we're going to go through these in alphabetical order in case you're wondering what kind of order this is. All right. So first up we have Alien Romulus and the nominees for Alien Romulus are Eric Barba. Nelson Sepulveda-Fauser, Daniel Macarin and Shane Mahan.

[00:18:47] Todd Vaziri: Yeah, what an incredibly gorgeous movie, this one. I mean, you, you know, pulling back to the sheer beauty of science fiction dread and horror of the original movie. This one, uh, Alien Romulus absolutely delivers and not just mimicking the original alien in any way, shape, or form, uh, it sets up the, the geography of, of what the characters are dealing with in such a way that you always understand where everybody is.

[00:19:17] Rob Bredow: Yes.

[00:19:17] Todd Vaziri: It's always dreadful. It's always scary. And the visual effects had a huge part of that.

[00:19:22] Rob Bredow: Yeah, for sure, I just wanna call out the chest-burster scene in this film happening on a ship as it's going out of control, right? More out of control that mimics the horror of what's happening inside the ship. And a chestburster before. We aren't. We know what's coming and we're dreading what's coming, and the scene is dragged out to kind of intensify that emotion. And the actual practical effects that the team did to create that chestburster and the way they got the, the, you can actually see the character breathing. Um, you can see the blood pulsing through the semi translucent skin. Um, and there was some digital enhancement done on that work as well. But I got to say, I've seen a lot of the behind the scenes material, that particular creature was very successfully pulled off in camera.

[00:20:14] This wasn't one of those cases that you sometimes hear about where they'll do a creature on set and it gets 90 percent replaced in post. The chestburster scene was heavily, heavily, uh, achieved on set practically, which is very, very tricky work to do.

[00:20:28] Todd Vaziri: Yeah, I was going to mention aspects of the visual effects that I really liked, I mean, other than what I already said, the environments and the ships that were partially miniatures and partially CG, the miniatures being photographed in such a way to emulate the aesthetic of the original alien films. Absolutely worked really well for me. Um, the rings of the planet that

[00:20:50] Rob Bredow: Yes.

[00:20:51] Todd Vaziri: that you, that you, we, we look out, they're omnipresent. They're always out there in the windows. Uh, and it's a, and a constant threat, especially when that clock is launched. Then the ship actually collided with it.

[00:21:04] I absolutely love the geography of all that. Everybody understood the scale, understood the threat. Um, absolutely beautifully pulled off.

[00:21:14] Rob Bredow: the perfect ticking clock, right, for a movie like this. Set in the vastness of space, but you give this geography, like you're describing, and the fact that we're getting closer and closer to these rings over time, and it can accelerate at that point where it actually runs into the rings.

[00:21:28] Those shots, uh, were animated by the team at Weta FX, and they did it was really, really beautifully executed.

[00:21:36] Todd Vaziri: and then having seen about a lot of the breakdowns, uh, uh, in terms of the xenomorph itself. I absolutely was fooled on a certain couple of shots. I thought some were CG that were practical. Some were practical that were CG.

[00:21:47] Rob Bredow: I love it.

[00:21:48] Todd Vaziri: uh, practical that had, uh, a limb, uh, added in computer graphics or, uh, you know, the combination.

[00:21:55] I was totally fooled. And while you're watching the movie, you're never thinking about that stuff. You're just thinking about the momentum and the danger of everything.

[00:22:03] Rob Bredow: I love the xenomorph shot where we're first introducing multiple Xenos and they're coming up that tunnel. And we, we are looking down that tunnel and they're coming up at you and it's a strobe light behind you, you get those silhouetted Xenomorphs. That shot is, you know, they feel like spiders, but you know they're much bigger than that. The fact that, um, they feel as believable as they are is real, is really good success on the part of the team.

[00:22:28] Todd Vaziri: Absolutely.

[00:22:29] Rob Bredow: Another standout sequence for me was, I loved the concept of being able to turn gravity off and on. And when they get trapped and they, and they turn off gravity and everybody goes floating through and you can end up with the xenomorph acid floating in the air in this beautiful pose.

[00:22:44] That was, it was, it's so, it was a great design and a very, very suspenseful sequence. I love the way that was executed.

[00:22:52] Todd Vaziri: It definitely puts a different spin on the acid for blood once it's in zero G and you're just kind of trying to navigate around it like, uh, like nothing we've ever really seen before. I thought it was a great sequence.

[00:23:04] Rob Bredow: Yeah, there's so many solid, solid sequences in that film, really beginning to end, and I think you called it out right at the very beginning, Todd, the photography, the beautiful photography to integrate into. And we've talked before on this podcast how important it is, and one of the things that I would say differentiates good visual effects from great visual effects is that collaboration with the cinematography. And, and with, when you have a cinematographer. Like, um, on Alien Romulus, it is such good work to build on. Throughout the production of the film, there were a lot of references made to Gallo's cinematography, even during those all CG shots and those all, those CG and miniature shots. And he actually consulted during the post production as well, helping to keep the look consistent end to end, which I think is always a nice thing when that happens. Great, well, that is a good first look at Alien Romulus. Um, why don't you take us to, uh, movie number two, Jenny?

[00:24:05] Jenny Ely: All right, the next movie is Better Man. The nominees for Better Man are Luke Miller, David Clayton, Keith Herft, and Peter Stubbs.

[00:24:14] Todd Vaziri: It's funny, the discourse around Better Man, especially here in America, is like, well, we don't even know who Robbie Williams is. Well, that's why they made the movie.

[00:24:21] Rob Bredow: That's right.

[00:24:23] Todd Vaziri: Like, there's a lot of movies I didn't know anything about the main character before they made the movie.

[00:24:27] Now you need to see the movie.

[00:24:29] Rob Bredow: Yes.

[00:24:30] Todd Vaziri: what an enjoyable movie that is.

[00:24:32] Rob Bredow: Oh man, and if you aren't aware, I guess we should have warned everyone, there's going to be spoilers in this episode, but hopefully that's obvious. But if you aren't aware of the conceit of this film, It is, um, It's kind of unbelievable that a film like this was able to get made. Because, well, like, like you're pointing out, not everybody in the U. S. knows who, who Robbie Williams is, right? but Michael Gracey, of course, was very familiar with him, and if you've heard him talk about the inspiration for this film, he has wanted to do this ever since he did Greatest Showman and, he grew up, Michael Gracey's Australian, he grew up knowing, uh, this music, of course, um, but he tells a fantastic story of Robbie Williams inspiring the cast on, on The Greatest Showman to actually have the confidence and kind of delivery. They, um, they were, they were inspired by the fact that, you know, whether or not Robbie Williams is the best singer in the world, he's one of the best performers in the world for sure. And that's the kind of energy they wanted to bring to that movie.

[00:25:37] And, and Michael Gracey actually got to know Robbie Williams during the production of that film. And then just started talking to him, started getting his story, and realized he wanted to tell his story. He didn't want it just to be, uh, your standard biopic. So the conceit of this film, if you haven't had a chance to see it, it's, it's Robbie Williams, and it's a biopic of Robbie Williams, except he's played as a monkey version of himself for the entire film.

[00:26:01] Todd Vaziri: of course.

[00:26:02] Rob Bredow: But nobody acknowledges it. No one says, you know, like, why is that guy a monkey and everyone else is a human? It's just, it, that's just the conceit. And, you know, I've heard, You know, great screenwriters say you get one conceit per film. You can make it anything you want. And Michael Graceys like, yep, that's going to be the conceit of this movie.

[00:26:17] And boy, did Weta, Weta FX did the characters, the characters throughout this movie, I think end to end. Um, and it is very, very nicely executed.

[00:26:26] Todd Vaziri: Yeah, um, one thing that, um, that blew me away, uh, seeing the before and after reels, um, was the typical way we would do this, would maybe potentially be a human in costume, uh, and you would do a head replacement or a hand replacement or, or have, um, uh, makeup effects on the hand, uh, hairy hands or something like that.

[00:26:48] No. computer graphics, top to bottom, which puts a little bit of, uh, I mean, yeah, the monkey aspect of the character has to be completely believable, the hair, the eyes, the skin, the everything. Yeah, not to mention all the clothing, and all the interactions, and all the paint outs that are going to be required. Um, really an incredible accomplishment for this movie.

[00:27:13] Rob Bredow: One of the standout sequences in the film, and this one they actually have put online if you haven't seen it, it's the Regent street scene in Better Man.

[00:27:21] And, um, Again, hearing from behind the scenes of the production, this, nobody shoots on Regent Street in London, right? It's like closing down Times Square.

[00:27:32] You just can't close down Times Square. You can't close down Regent Street. Um, this was set at night, they had worked their butts off. This was more of an independent film, and it wasn't a huge 250 million blockbuster film. As you can imagine, they had to back into a budget that made sense for this movie. So they worked really hard to get all the permits, and they rehearsed the dancers, they rehearsed the stuntees, they rehearsed the team to pull off this Regent Street musical number in the middle of the show, which is about four or five minutes long. It's very ambitious. Um, interior, exteriors, mixed, all these different components. So they had the whole system down, that was the whole thing. Um, sadly, the week that the Queen of England died and they shut down everything right the day or the week that they were going to shoot on Regent Street. And there were no permits going to be issued for filming, of course, that week, especially some big musical, big loud musical number that was going to happen.

[00:28:28] So they lost their permits. That was their whole shooting window. There was no extra time to go back. so Michael Gracey and the producers, um, looked at various options, but it's kind of a pivotal story point of the movie, right? It's where he comes into the confidence of, of figuring out who he's going to be as he's part of this boy band. So, uh, Michael Gracey just, like, stuck on, we've got to get back to Regent Street. They did a reshoot much later, so the effects team had to, um, manage those shots much later in the production cycle than was ever planned for. And they got three more nights in Regent Street. I think it was like six months later, it was much later in the production schedule, and put together that pivotal scene for the movie. And it wasn't just adding the monkey, of course, there's like, I think, 18 seamless stitches

[00:29:16] Todd Vaziri: Oh,

[00:29:16] Rob Bredow: in that sequence alone.

[00:29:18] Todd Vaziri: notes say 36 pieces of photography.

[00:29:22] Rob Bredow: Amazing. Oh, right, because

[00:29:23] Todd Vaziri: and after reel, there's, uh, there's some breakdowns of the rotoscoping that was required to take certain dancers off of one plate and then add them to another plate to aid in that transition from one plate to another. And my head started to hurt just

[00:29:37] Rob Bredow: Yes.

[00:29:37] Todd Vaziri: the editorial aspects of a shot this complicated. It gets really crazy really fast and you don't even think about it. You're watching the movie. Don't even think about it. You're just like, you're just watching an incredible number.

[00:29:50] Rob Bredow: I was, the first time I saw the movie, I'm like, okay, well they had to have shot this blue screen, but the, but they're so close to these buildings. Okay, how much of this did they build? And then to find out later that they went to the real Regent Street. I don't know. You just don't see that in these kinds of movies.

[00:30:06] Todd Vaziri: It's pretty incredible. Um, the other thing I wanted to mention is the, uh, the, the photography style of this movie, um, there was a, there was a fair bit of diffusion and shooting directly into practical uh lights a lot. So you're getting a ton of flaring, a ton of lens aberrations and ton, you know, and again, my compositor a part

[00:30:27] Rob Bredow: Yes.

[00:30:28] Todd Vaziri: like sweating every time I have to see that a third of the frame or a quarter of the frame is going to be a computer graphics element that has to fit in with all of these flares. And that's sometimes a frame by frame, uh, section by section, uh, manual process. And again, you're not even thinking about it. It looks completely authentic and completely real on camera.

[00:30:50] Rob Bredow: They talked a bit about their lens simulation package that they built for mimicking these flares. Maybe we can revisit this on, you know, our lens flare episode number 20 coming up, Todd. Uh, but of course, always match all the warping of the lenses and the vignetting and all that kind of things, but with these old lenses with so many flares, they had to characterize the lenses in ways that apparently hadn't been done before, at least there, uh, to that level of detail.

[00:31:16] So that's, that's pretty cool to see that done, uh, because it blends really perfectly.

[00:31:21] Todd Vaziri: Yeah.

[00:31:22] Rob Bredow: And then, you know, the actor who plays Robbie Williams was in every shot. And Todd, you already mentioned the paint out work. For that is really substantial, but then also matching his performance so articulately and bringing through his human performance on the monkey as clearly as they do I mean the movie lives or dies on that performance and it for me it really worked

[00:31:46] Todd Vaziri: And notice how we're not even talking about that part of the aspect of the show. The animation, the performance capture, the, the interpretation of all that data into a real performance, just a real character acting alongside all the other human actors. It's just normal.

[00:32:03] It's

[00:32:03] Rob Bredow: they used head cams for a bunch of shots, so they had a nice, close facial reference, I understand, and used the latest technologies at WetaFX to get that transferred onto their rigs. But if you look at the, um, The credits, there's a lot of animators on this show. This is not a, just to be clear, this is not just a technical process.

[00:32:21] It's a very technical process, but it is powered by artists, by animators, by lighting TDs who are taking all that onset reference and putting it in and compositors frame by frame, painting all that in it's a really, really good artistry.

[00:32:36] Todd Vaziri: Totally agreed.

[00:32:37] Rob Bredow: Okay, well that's better man. Uh, Jenny, do you want to take us to, uh, nominated film number three?

[00:32:42] Jenny Ely: Yes, next we have Dune Part 2, and the nominees are Paul Lambert, Stephen James, Rhys Salcombe, and Gerd Nefzer.

[00:32:53] Todd Vaziri: another incredible movie. ,

[00:32:55] Rob Bredow: a visual feast.

[00:32:56] Todd Vaziri: whoo, It's like, uh, expanding, you know, like any good sequel. It takes what was great about the first movie and then, oh yeah, you ain't seen nothing yet in terms of scope, in terms of scale, um, in terms of, uh, battle scenes. Um, yeah. thing that, uh, uh, the to and, and the tea, almost the tease of the sandworms in the first film where, you know, we definitely get to see, uh, some of the, uh, power of the sandworms on Arrakis in the first movie, but tease how, uh, somebody could ride one of the sandworms and

[00:33:34] Rob Bredow: Yeah.

[00:33:36] Todd Vaziri: to be depicted in such a way as it was done in Dune Part 2. just incredible. Um, I, I, I think I've watched that sequence probably a dozen times. And I, uh, I, I'm such a sucker for, uh, setting up the, the geography of something like that where you understand the scale. of what is about to happen, and the audience is never really confused as to what's about to happen, where, um, uh, your main character is on the edge of a dune, and, uh, he sees the sandworm coming, and the way he runs to kind of catch up to where he, the sandworm is about to gather, and then, The dune collapsing underneath him and then the chaos of that moment and then eventual success.

[00:34:23] And you know, you're, the audience completely understands how this is working and you know, very little dialogue, very little

[00:34:30] Rob Bredow: Yes.

[00:34:31] Todd Vaziri: It all just works. And every single shot just looks fantastic. Yeah.

[00:34:38] Rob Bredow: great example of something that would be so difficult to pull off. And, there's a ton of practical sand and grit in those shots. But also, you know, billions of particles simulated by the teams at DNEG, um, who did that work. Uh, really, uh, And you, you, I can't tell the difference between what's what, and I, I care a lot about that kind of effect work, and I, you can't piece apart, you can't tell what's practical, what's digital, it's really, really seamlessly done. And the fact that, I, I understand they did that stunt of, um, that actor, or the stunt, the stunt double, um, running along that ridge, and they actually pulled a, rig through the sand to collapse the sand so the stuntee could, that down shot over them, they could do that, elements of that practically. Now when you see the before and after on there, you can see the digital artists are doing a huge amount of heavy lifting there too to finish out the environment, to add more debris into the air.

[00:35:33] But that's a really nice example of the combination of best of special effects, best of visual effects working together, and stunts too.

[00:35:39] Todd Vaziri: And it informs the physics of the whole thing. It informs, um, how to present scale, uh, and, and mass for something like this. And one of the key things about something like Dune Part II is that Uh, the, the director never cut to the types of shots like the camera of God type shots where

[00:36:01] Rob Bredow: Yes.

[00:36:02] Todd Vaziri: it's, it's, it, it looked like a struggle to photograph this action sequence as opposed to now we're going to give you a bird's eye view of the whole scene, or now we're going to fly from bird's eye view right into over the shoulder of the character.

[00:36:18] No, it was the camera work. And, uh, shot design, uh, mimicked what the emotional, uh, part of the story, which is this is, uh, this is a discovery. This is an education. It's hard for him to be doing this, and it totally gets mimicked in how it was executed. Uh, just really brilliant stuff.

[00:36:42] Rob Bredow: So we can't talk about Dune II without talking about the infrared photography and the black and white scenes. Um, I just, I mean, Greg Fraser was a DP on this show, and we've had a number of collaborations with Greg. He's an amazing DP, and this is a, is taking a chance. You're talking about a major Hollywood blockbuster, and you're gonna do part of it in black and white.

[00:37:01] You're gonna do it infrared with all, um, they were mentioning, You know, they had to test everything because every costume, of course, photographs differently in infrared than you would expect. So you have to test everything in front of the camera. I mean, you always do costume tests, but nothing where the camera's completely transforming, everything is going to look at, but I thought it had a striking effect in that sequence and really helped, what is that called the Jedi prime sequence where they're doing, they're setting up that, a big Coliseum type, the type scene with a showdown with the fighting. I mean, just, I thought it had a really nice look.

[00:37:33] Todd Vaziri: It's like you're watching this and you're like, I, it's one of those moments where. Truly never seen a sequence like this before in terms of this type of look. And, and it's not like a couple of shots here, a couple of shots there. Uh, they put their whole heart into the sequence then in terms of the weird look of the sequence to the point where like the, the fireworks looks like amoeba exploding and stuff.

[00:37:55] It's

[00:37:55] Rob Bredow: Yes.

[00:37:56] Todd Vaziri: just totally nuts. I, it's truly an alien landscape, a truly alien environment.

[00:38:03] Rob Bredow: Yes. And then the um, the blue eyes, I was reading, they didn't really focus on this in the breakdown too much, right, they just kind of glossed over it, but there was hundreds of shots, right, of processing that too, like, it, all the big stuff, the worm writing, sequences, the things that are in your face, you know you're there for the visual effects, but also just a ton of little details in this movie.

[00:38:24] Todd Vaziri: Yeah I mean and, and of course the battle sequence at the, I mean, we could be talking about this forever. It's a, again, everybody understands the scale of these things. Like, uh, a very few, um, uh, crummy cameras of God. You,

[00:38:38] Rob Bredow: hmm.

[00:38:38] Todd Vaziri: you understand the momentum of who's winning, who's losing and how they're getting surrounded.

[00:38:42] Uh, just, it's just remarkable stuff.

[00:38:45] Rob Bredow: Yeah, really, really great visual storytelling. And a huge epic scale, for sure. Great. Well, that takes us to, uh, nominated movie number four.

[00:38:57] Jenny Ely: Alright, next up is Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, and the nominees for this one are Erik Winquist, Stephen Unterfranz, Paul Story, and Rodney Burke.

[00:39:09] Rob Bredow: So much fun. Beautiful, beautiful work, huh?

[00:39:13] Todd Vaziri: What can you say about Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes? I just, uh, and I, I particularly loved, uh, director Wes Ball's, um, Enthusiasm for the visual effects teams that worked on this movie, uh, very publicly. uh, praising them and considering the visual effects team as a, uh, integral partner in how this movie was getting made as important as any of the actors, cinematographer, production design, you know, just a very key part of it.

[00:39:43] And, you know, Hey, we appreciate that director Wes Ball, thank you.

[00:39:47] Rob Bredow: One of the sequences, actually two sequences I love in this movie, are both surrounded by water. There's the river sequence where you get this emotional moment, a fantastic visual storytelling that pairs with the loss of a major character in the film, and then the end of the film when the, um, giant structure gets flooded and you've got all of these characters, um, interacting with the water and the sets, um, more of that. You know, the river sequence, uh, was a practical river that had been made by the special effects team. So it wasn't an existing standing. It was a river that was, it was water that was brought in, it was pumps that were brought in to make those fake rapids, which looked fantastic. And then those were significantly enhanced with digital visual effects and the artists at, uh, Weta actually, Weta effects did that. Um, they did that. Did I think about all the heavy lifting on this movie? Um, and then that, the missile, missile silo flooding sequence, I think most of that was synthetic was CG and end to end, including those sets. And

[00:40:51] Todd Vaziri: That's right.

[00:40:52] Rob Bredow: it really is, it's a digital takeover of the movie for that climactic end scene in a, it is completely believable.

[00:40:59] You have no idea what was photographed and what was digitally created.

[00:41:02] Todd Vaziri: I have a couple stats here. There are 1500 visual effects shots made for the film. There are only 38 shots in the movie that have no visual effects component at all. 33 minutes of the movie are entirely digital. From top to bottom of the frame.

[00:41:22] Rob Bredow: 33 minutes.

[00:41:24] Todd Vaziri: just, the, the, the camera work, the performances, the, everything feels so naturalistic. Um, I, it's just gobsmacking. I, it's just incredible, incredible work.

[00:41:34] Rob Bredow: It's interesting. Um, I would have guessed this movie would have had 2, 200 shots because it's so action packed. So it's interesting that it's a relatively low shot count movie and I guess that really speaks to how long we're sticking with those intense action moments, which is, it does not make those shots easier, uh, folks. This is, uh, living on these shots, letting them breathe as Wes Ball did and his editorial team did with the visual effects team here. Um, it definitely leans into. Uh, some of the things that make those kinds of long shots challenging for visual effects artists.

[00:42:09] Todd Vaziri: And, similar to some of the other films we talked about, performance capture aided by animators, actors driving the performances and then animators interpreting that and making sure to maintain the integrity of that performance and making it work for the scene. The simulation on the hair, on the costumes, on the, the, the spittle, the, the weapons, the water interaction with you in the hair.

[00:42:34] It's mind blowing stuff. Mind blowing stuff.

[00:42:39] Rob Bredow: That really is remarkable, uh the, when they're doing that tree sequence, and it's lighting on fire, working its way up, that's another example. Um, you've called this out a couple of times for these shows that are nominated this year. Huge, complicated action sequence in a dynamic environment, and yet you're never lost.

[00:42:57] You understand what the ticking clock is. You understand the geography of the situation. When somebody jumps, you know how hard they're going to fall because you know how high they are. This is really expert planning, blocking, um, cinematography, uh, animation coming together.

[00:43:12] Todd Vaziri: And when you wait, when you make a movie like this and you decide, okay, this is the type of movie it's going to be. And, um, we are going to. Having humanoid creatures do humanoid things, having actors and stunt people performing them, uh, to again, uh, give a sense of scale and mass and volume to the actions. It makes all the difference in the world. This is not magical realism. This isn't a fantasy movie. This is something that you want to believe that, uh, that you were, you trained these apes and you were able to film these apes doing these certain things. And, um, it totally comes through in a movie like this, that the way this movie was put together, um, again, not, uh, at no point are you questioning how heavy these things are.

[00:44:03] Could they have actually done that? Could they have jumped from here to there? No, it just seems, feels very plausible for this type of movie.

[00:44:12] Rob Bredow: Uh, Todd, do you know, I, I don't know the answer to this question, but, You said 33 minutes, all computer generated,

[00:44:18] Todd Vaziri: That's

[00:44:18] Rob Bredow: um, CG animated. So did they do mocap sessions outside of principle of photography for that or do you, I don't actually know whether, if that was driven differently or the same.

[00:44:28] Todd Vaziri: I can't tell you. I don't know the answer to that question.

[00:44:31] Rob Bredow: Yeah. clearly when the monkeys are in the water and everything, it's diff, it's a difficult motion capture environment to capture. So I can, I can only imagine there was a ton of hand key framed animation that blended seamlessly in with the rest of the work.

[00:44:45] Todd Vaziri: Incredible stuff.

[00:44:46] Rob Bredow: impressive. Okay. Four movies, uh, down.

[00:44:49] We've got one to go.

[00:44:51] Jenny Ely: All right, and last up, we have Wicked. Pablo Helman, Jonathan Fawkner, David Shirk, and Paul Corbould.

[00:45:00] Rob Bredow: I mean, this is great to end on Wicked. It's so, so fun.

[00:45:04] Todd Vaziri: I mean, uh, talk about, uh, daunting, uh, to this beloved, beloved show. And okay, we're gonna, okay, amazing, amazing show. But how are you gonna make that work for the silver screen? How are you going to inspire, uh, the awe that you should be seeing when you see Emerald City for the first time? And boy, oh boy, they pulled it off.

[00:45:27] A combination of. The incredible sets and the incredible digital effects work that worked along with the sets. Uh, just stunning.

[00:45:39] Rob Bredow: Yeah, I mean, end to end, everything you just highlighted and there has been a lot of press and well deserved press about the scale of the sets. But when you get to see those before and after, every one of those shots was touched up with digital visual effects. And artists adding in, uh, you know, they built sets up to 40, 50 feet tall, but there was always more in the shot than was there practically.

[00:45:59] Which is. I mean, just, you, there's no, um, detecting any of the seams. You can't tell what's digital and what's practical when you watch the movie.

[00:46:07] Todd Vaziri: Yeah. Yeah. It's really, really remarkable. I mean, there's a, not to mention all of the environments, but some beautiful creatures, uh, animal work, talking animal work in this movie. And, uh, I'm going to, I want to touch on one aspect. The flying monkeys that they're not flying at the beginning,

[00:46:28] but they eventually become flying monkeys and not, not just the extremely terrifying sequence of them attacking our main characters, but the, um, transformation. When the, when the, let's just call it the curse that is put upon, um, these poor monkeys, uh, the amount of empathy that I had for what they were going through is something I wasn't expecting.

[00:46:54] Rob Bredow: Yeah.

[00:46:54] Todd Vaziri: really felt the pain. That they were going through, uh, when the, uh, when their bodies were changing and the wings and feathers were coming, were breaking out of their bodies. Um, I thought that was an incredible accomplishment from the animation team. And of course all the, uh, The simulations and it felt, it felt completely honest and plausible, but the emotional aspect of the pain that they were going through of having their dark dream come to life, it worked on me in a level that I didn't expect.

[00:47:30] Really, really good stuff.

[00:47:32] Rob Bredow: and the setup of that into the end of the film, into Defying Gravity, and to have the actors actually singing on wires, being flown around a large soundstage, um, Those elements, when you see them in the before and afters, those are amazing looking elements. So incredible work from the stunt teams, from special effects, from the teams working together to make that happen on set. And then, you can't skip over the contribution of the digital effects teams, um, putting in all those new capes, adding all the dynamic aspects that there's just no way to ever get on a soundstage for defying gravity, all those moves, you know, some completely synthetic, uh, many of which are hybrid between what they could capture on stage and what could be enhanced in post production. It's, uh, you can't miss the end of that film for that. That's for sure.

[00:48:21] Todd Vaziri: Yeah, yeah, just really, really gorgeous stuff. And it's just such a, what a, the quality of the visual effects all, and the fantasy aspect of it all. Talk about in sync, everything works very well together. Uh, you've got talking animals as professors of these classes. It, you, you totally buy it.

[00:48:42] You totally buy it. Uh, it's, it's, it's really great stuff.

[00:48:46] Rob Bredow: Set you. The Defying Gravity and some of those end sequences were done by ILM, but, uh, a lot of those creatures, Framestore actually brought to life too, so it was a collaboration between those two big houses, and I think other houses that also worked on the film, but Framestore and ILM were the two lead houses, you know, I kind of started by talking about the end, but the opening one of this movie, where we actually reveal the Yellow Brick Road, we kind of get the geography of the whole place, is so wonderful, and it kind of, of course, ties back to the original Oz, uh, original Wizard of Oz is, is, uh, I think that shot's like two and a half minutes long, but it's completely seamless in the film.

[00:49:19] Todd Vaziri: Mm hmm. to dovetail with that when, um, uh, the big finale, when she breaks through the glass. and, you know, the new chapter begins with her character. Uh, all of the emotion that goes along with it completely works. The animation, the, the momentum, I was all in at that

[00:49:39] moment.

[00:49:41] Rob Bredow: Yeah. It works really, really well. It's super fun. And the 10 minute reel that they cut, you know, one of the things that the 10, the, when you watch a cut down version of any of these reels, you realize how hard it is to condense, you know, what's in most of these movies is two hours worth of visual effects work, trying to condense it down to 10 minutes, but watching that 10 minute reel reminds you how. How complicated it was technically to keep everything in sync with these songs, right? So it is truly an almost two hour music video, right? Everything had to be in sync with the music and every bit of choreography had to be tied back to that. So where we have some flexibility on a lot of our movies and make some editorial changes and tweaks here and there, everything has to take that music into account from the very, very first moment.

[00:50:24] Todd Vaziri: On these action movies that we work on, it's like, oh, we, we ask editorial, you know, this would work really a lot better if we gave this a little bit more, um, a tail at the end, ten more frames, or could we really kill some of this stuff at the beginning? And, and, uh, know, they're, they're more than willing to, to work with us on that. First thing where it's synchronized to a song. You, you have to plan ahead and it is there. It's unforgiving. You have to make sure that those moments happen at certain sync points. So from an editorial animation point of view, it makes it that much harder.

[00:50:59] Rob Bredow: Since we're talking about the music and the dancing, um, I didn't realize that they replaced all the dance floors with the, with the show floor. So you've got hundreds of shots where you have to fix the ground, uh, to give the dancers a surface to perform on. So one of the reasons the performances are so good is those artists who do the task of erasing the dance floor that you didn't even know was there.

[00:51:18] Todd Vaziri: Yeah.

[00:51:19] Rob Bredow: So many nice details.,

[00:51:20] Jenny Ely: there's a distinct theme of monkeys this year with the nominees. Were they all, are they all, were they all made in different ways for all? It sounds like they were all created with different methods for all three of these films, right?

[00:51:34] Rob Bredow: Yes, actually, um, you know, I think that the most commonality is probably between Better Man and Planet of the Apes, both done at WetaFX, um, using, leaning into motion capture technology and head cams, um, that seem of a similar generation, wouldn't you say? From everything we have seen in the before and after, I'm sure there's quite a bit of shared technology and definitely artists who have that experience there.

[00:51:59] Although, if you look at those sets of characters, they're quite different. You know, Better Man made a lot of different creative choices with the way they stylized the face and brought the human performances in and of course sculpted all his tattoos into those kind of things versus Planet of the Apes that, um, you know, has had a very grounded, you know, more, uh, Variations of monkeys, but all based on real monkeys that we've seen.

[00:52:20] But of course, delivering all those lines, it's really complicated work. Yeah, and then Wicked's monkeys were done at ILM. Different sets of technologies. That was almost all hand animated, but some motion capture reference that I think the team brought in. Yeah, different teams of artists on that one for sure. Well, this was really fun to go through the five nominated films. Uh, a special congratulations to the three ILMers that we just have to call out who have Oscar nominations this year. Pablo Helman was a visual effects supervisor, head of department for Wicked. David Shirk was the animation supervisor for Wicked.

[00:52:53] So big congratulations to them on their well deserved nomination. And then Nelson Sepulveda-Fauser, uh, was ILM's visual effects supervisor on Alien Romulus. So it's super fun to have three folks going to the Oscars, uh, oscar nominated supervisors and animation supervisors. Um, it's very, very fun to celebrate their work and everyone else's work this year.

[00:53:16] Jenny Ely: And we will have all three of those gentlemen on our next show.

[00:53:20] Todd Vaziri: right.

[00:53:21] Rob Bredow: Something to look forward to. We'll dive into their two shows, uh, in more detail. That'll be really fun.

[00:53:27] The Martini

[00:53:27] Rob Bredow: Well that takes us to our martinis. Um, Todd, what'd you bring for us today?

[00:53:31] Todd Vaziri: Uh, it's uh, my martini is a drink. coffee.

[00:53:37] Rob Bredow: There you go.

[00:53:38] Todd Vaziri: of us need

[00:53:39] Jenny Ely: I'm interested. I'm interested.

[00:53:41] Todd Vaziri: Um, in my household, I am the only coffee drinker. So if you have multiple coffee drinkers in your house, uh, you know, getting a coffee maker and, and buying a big ton of coffee, that's the way to do it. But I'm the only drinker.

[00:53:54] So I do a single cup pour overs every day. And, uh, that works for me. Um, gotta grind whole beans. Come on, you gotta do that. And if you're looking for good whole beans, and if you're not happy with the grocery store, I get mail order coffee.

[00:54:10] Rob Bredow: Nice.

[00:54:11] Todd Vaziri: I've used two brands in the past, uh, both Trade Coffee and Yes, Plz coffee, and that's Y E S P L Z coffee, uh, both fantastic. Uh, whole bean coffee, you can get it, um, at, at whatever frequency you want, you can decide, uh, how often you get it. So, um, if you're, even if you're just a one cup a day person and you're the only person drinking coffee in your household, you can get the proper frequency for that. Uh, I love it, it just, I don't have to think, I don't have to remember to get it at the grocery store and, uh, the quality is always there. It's fantastic. So, uh, my martini is Trade Coffee or Yes, Plz mail order coffee

[00:54:53] Jenny Ely: how do you drink your coffee? Do you drink it black?

[00:54:56] Todd Vaziri: A little bit of cream. That's it.

[00:54:58] Rob Bredow: There you go, Nice, Jenny?,

[00:55:03] Jenny Ely: Yeah. Okay. So in December, I visited the Nurtured by Nature Animal Sanctuary and Otter Rescue, which is just outside of San Diego. Um, this has been on my bucket list for years. I've, I always see this on Instagram and, uh, social media, and it's just been something that I've always wanted to do. So this is a nonprofit organization.

[00:55:24] And started in, uh, 2003 by a couple named Kevin and Wendy Yates, who also founded the group Animal Educators. And that was started as a way to bring nature based education to kids in classrooms, but it evolved into animal encounters that bring awareness to conservation efforts. So this is not a petting zoo or an overcrowded tourist trap.

[00:55:44] The rescued animals are very well cared for and everything about the experience is crafted in the best interest of the animals. So if the animals are tired or don't want to hang out, then you just don't see them that day. They don't make them do anything they don't want to do. Uh, they only allow about eight people at a time to visit the sanctuary.

[00:56:00] And I think the visitors do have to be over 16 years old. But you meet sloths, you get to feed foxes from your hand. Pet armadillos. Hmm.

[00:56:11] Rob Bredow: You meet sloths, did you say? I'm

[00:56:13] Jenny Ely: Yeah, I, I met one. I watched it fall asleep, hanging upside down. I have a selfie with it that I will show you. Um, his name was Belt. If you're interested in his name, um, capybaras, which are my personal favorite, um, a fatty capybara named Capyccino crawled into my lap while I fed him potatoes.

[00:56:32] So there's nothing left in the world that I need to do now. Um, and then at the end of the tour, you get to swim with otters. So, I was in, this was one of the most incredible things I've ever done. Uh, I was in a warm pool with four otters for almost an hour. Uh, they're so rowdy and fun. They climb all over you.

[00:56:50] You can play tug of war with them, with their toys. You give them ice cubes to play with. Um and if you wear like a baggy T-shirt, they will just swim right up in your T-shirt and just hang out in there. So, and the experience is very, uh, it all feels very ethical and controlled. Wendy, who's one of the owners and operators and her daughter, uh, Wendy was in the pool with us the entire time.

[00:57:11] It was very educational and controlled. The caretakers gave us all the necessary instructions to be sure that the otters were safe and also having a great time. And then at the end, they do a little presentation about their conservation efforts and the organizations that they partner with, and you learn how to stay involved.

[00:57:26] And I will say that, uh, once you, you will commit to a species, once it has crawled in your shirts with a toy and cuddled up with you like a little wet velvet blanket, so it was just an incredible, incredible experience. I highly recommend it.

[00:57:41] Todd Vaziri: that's

[00:57:42] Jenny Ely: so Nurtured By Nature, Animal Sanctuary and Otter Rescue. It's, um, I think it's about an hour. East of Carlsbad. So it's in the Carlsbad, San Diego area. I will link to their website in the show notes and their conservation partners, and maybe a picture of me with an otter. So

[00:57:59] Rob Bredow: you go.

[00:58:00] Jenny Ely: That's my martini. Yeah.

[00:58:01] Rob Bredow: sounds amazing.

[00:58:02] Jenny Ely: Yeah. That's fantastic.

[00:58:03] Rob Bredow: mine is not nearly as cute, um, but, uh,

[00:58:07] Jenny Ely: Not much is.

[00:58:07] Rob Bredow: the house. Not much as, um, I learned, but this was called, uh, just the last couple of weeks and you may have heard of a French cleat picture hanger. Um, it is, it is a picture hanger that has a bottom half and a top half and they're very flat and the basic idea is, uh, Let's see, if you make like a, an L with your hand, the bottom half would, uh, well no, it's not really an L. More like a U with your hand. There you go, a U with your hand. Um, and, and then you make the opposite U with your other hand, and they kind of fit together. That's kind of how these picture hangers, um, you have one that's on the top, one that's on the bottom, and they kind of fit together. That's kind of how these picture hangers hang stuff on the wall.

[00:58:45] On the wall. So I've seen them around studios where you put a rail on the wall and then you just have the opposite shape on the back of your, either a poster or often for storyboard hanging, you can just move these around really conveniently. I didn't know they were called a French cleat. And then once you know what they're called, you can Google them and buy them. Um, I've used, since I've learned what they are, I've used them to hang movie posters around the house because, um, it's not the most easy convenient thing to get on the wall, right? Because you have to plan where the rail is and the exact size, and you have to make sure everything's straight, but it's a really nice, secure way and, um, a very flat way to get something attached to the wall.

[00:59:24] Cause it's exactly like, if you get a small one that can be like. 3 sixteenths of an inch, uh, very, very thin. So your art stays very, uh, flush to the wall, which really looks nice.

[00:59:35] Todd Vaziri: That's

[00:59:35] Rob Bredow: and it's very secure. So I've got a poster that I really like that's signed by Ron Howard. So that one is up with a French cleat.

[00:59:42] I know it's not going to fall off the wall, even in an earthquake. Uh, and then you can hang heavy things with a French cleat. I hung, um, a, uh, a mantle above the fireplace. And if you do the right offsetting, you can actually get it to hang. Almost completely flush against the wall. So, um, anyway, French cleats are neat, and they, they, high capacity, uh, uh, flush mounting systems. So there you go.

[01:00:05] Outtro

[01:00:05] Rob Bredow: So thank you so much for listening to the Lighter Darker podcast today. If you have a question for the show or you have an idea for a future topic, email us at lighterdarker@ilm.com. Our Social media links will be in the show notes along with the links we talked about during this episode.

[01:00:20] You're going to find all those at ilm.com/lighterdarker. also where we post the transcripts. if you like the show, like and subscribe. We're on YouTube, we're on Apple Podcasts, we're everywhere you get your shows. So please point your friends to it. We really appreciate your referrals. We want thank Industrial Light and Magic for hosting the Lighter Darker podcast. This show is produced by Jenny Ely and myself, Rob Bredow. Today's episode has been edited by David Dovell. And we want to thank ILM's PR team led by Greg Grusby who work behind the scenes to make all this happen. Congratulations and good luck to all the Oscar nominees. And thank you for listening to the Lighter Darker podcast until next time. May your pixels be both lighter and darker.

[01:01:05] Jenny Ely:

[01:01:06] Rob Bredow: