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Morphing dreams

Visual effects are actively contributing to the commercial success of films, writes K.JESHI

PHOTOS: S. SIVA SARAVANAN

CREATING MAGIC With technology Stills from Koi Mil Gayaand

For the layman, the song sequence `Silsila yeh chaahat ka' in Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Devdas is nothing extraordinary. But, Aishwarya Rai dancing in the rain with a lit lamp that refuses to go out wouldn't have been possible without technical expertise.

According to Arun Gowtham, CEO of Syncline FX Private Limited, based at Bangalore: "A team of more than 40 people worked for more than a year to digitally create the flame. Other sequences in Devdas like the honeybee buzzing around Aishwarya's face as she sleeps in the moonlight and the train shot in the climax were also digitally created as was the live action song Boom Boom where animated junk dances in Shankar's Boys. The scene with aliens in the spaceship and the background in Koi Mil Gaya, also proves that visual effects are an asset to achieve what otherwise cannot be done. These scenes were made possible by spending countless hours in digital studios."

Devdas

Arun Gowtham says visual effects in India is graduating from the tacky to the sophisticated and is actively contributing to the commercial success of the feature films.

Apart from domestic projects, Arun has worked in Hollywood projects like Basic and Roller ball and in animated series like Piggley winks and Pet aliens. His forthcoming projects include graphics in C/O Footpath, directed by ten-year-old Kishen of Bangalore (which involves lip syncing for animal characters and is to be dubbed in eight languages), and other Tamil and Kannada projects.

"Film makers here are more creative and those sequences in their colourful dreams which are not practically possible to shoot are being done with the help of technology. It all depends on how you master technology to improvise your creativity. Graphics can be used to capture risky sequences like dashing against a car, fire sequences, falling down from a building and manipulating crowd. Computer graphics images can also camouflage mistakes that happen while shooting," he adds.

Changing preferences

He says the audience wants `an Indian story with international style'. "Production cost is heavy for such projects and more time is required. The movie Koi... took more than two years to complete. As of now, Bollywood uses visual effects in a big way followed by the Telugu and Tamil industry. Even the Kannada film industry is growing. Last year we worked in more than 10 Kannada projects to add visual effects from titling to the credit list," he adds.

He says techniques like `digital intermediaries' (as seen in the song `suttum vizhi' in Ghajini), the footage of the song is scanned and visual effects are added later.

Techniques like `ramping' in fight sequences, where a punch begins slow and ends on a fast note are being widely used to create an impact. The trend of 3D-animated episodes is also catching up.

Arun Gowtham

" Crescent Computers in Mumbai is already doing if for TV channels. It is possible to make 3D-animated feature films too. We can start with content creation (24-hr programmes) for 3D episodes in channels like cartoon network and later pitch in for multinational clients," he adds.

Arun adds that more and more foreign studios are looking at outsourcing work to India, so the potential is immense.

What we need is state-of-the-art studios, technology and manpower to meet the demand. As far as the gaming industry is concerned, he says it still has a long way to go. "A lot of R&D is required because we need to conform to standards set by Microsoft. We can start with pilot gaming projects to clients in Italy, Korea and Japan, which again calls for huge investments," he adds.

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