Bill Desowitz recently caught up with Sheena Duggal of Sony Pictures Imageworks to discuss the promotional 3D short she directed about the Chicago Spire, the towering, twisting, opulent residential development project.
What was Sony Pictures Imageworks doing recently at Autodesk's World Press Days in San Francisco, which is a conference dedicated to the non-entertainment sectors? Presenting its four-minute promotional short, Inspire, which was made with Maya to convey the holistic beauty of the Chicago Spire: the spiral structure designed by famed Spanish architect, Santiago Calatrava. When completed in 2011, the Spire would be the world's tallest all-residential building (soaring 2,000 feet with 150 floors).
Visual Effects Supervisor Sheena Duggal (Spider-Man 3, Superman Returns and Ridley Scott's upcoming Body of Lies), who directed the 3D-animated short, discussed with VFXWorld how it was made and how Calatrava's theme of an imaginary smoke spiral and snail shell inspired her. Utilizing seductive imagery, Duggal communicates how the Spire is a curvaceous ode to beauty and how its structural design would be an inviting place to live amid the legendary Chicago skyline along Lake Shore Drive.
Bill Desowitz: How did you come to make this work?
Sheena Duggal: We were talking to Garrett Kelleher, who is the owner and developer of The Spire building, and one of the owners of Lightstream Pictures, about another project. And the Spire came up in conversation, and since we had done Spider-Man and other projects where we created photorealistic environments, we discussed the possibility of bringing something to the table. And so I was brought on by Jacquie Barnbrook, who is the producer. And I came up with the idea and pitched it to Mr. Kelleher and he suggested I pitch it to Mr. Calatrava. And he pretty much loved the idea.
BD: How long did you work on it?
SD: We worked on it intensely for about four months [with a crew of about 75] in terms of the actual production, but we started talking to the client February of last year, and we delivered the final product in September for the launch of the Spire in Chicago.
BD: Have they started construction?
SD: Yes, they started construction in June... and there are now pictures on the web of the construction site.
BD: So what inspired you?
SD: For me, it was listening to Mr. Calatrava talk about his own inspirations, which are generally nature. He's concerned with people connecting to the building. He talks about the building as a living thing. It's a building, but there are people living in it. Like a written word in a book, it doesn't have life, but when you speak that word, it takes on a vibration. So he's all about immersion and being connected to the environment. In this day and age, where there's all this concern about destroying the environment, [it's inspirational] to have an architect that's concerned with building something that not only sits in the environment and lives in the environment but also is generated around the mathematics by which things actually physically grow in nature. The Fibonacci Sequence [each number is the sum of the two preceding numbers] can be found in the way that plants grow, the way that rabbits reproduce and in the galaxy, in patterns in the stock market and in the human body. And so I just built on this basic idea that there's a mathematical formula for beauty that can be defined. So I tried to find mechanisms to visually layer as much as I could into the film. For example, the bird flying around the building showing the spiraling [surface], the droplet hitting the water, echoing the harmonics.
BD: Talk about utilizing animation and effects and what new advancements you took advantage of at Imageworks.
SD: I dont know how much I can tell you about the ray tracing that we used because its an in-house product that we developed. [Imageworks CTO George Joblove explained that the studio has only recently begun working on an internal renderer, which it first used on Monster House and then on other projects such as Inspire.] And it allowed us to create some of the more beautiful images such as the ray traced reflections and atmosphere and in the Spire building itself. But we used a bit of everything, to be quite honest. We used clouds that we repurposed and the Spire itself we built in Maya. But because its based on the Fibonacci Sequence, we were able to create [mel] script to generate it, and we worked with the architects to find out what the rules were in terms of height and how many windows there were because obviously it gets taller and thinner as it goes up. Then each floor rotates 2.44 degrees from the one below [until it reaches 360 degrees at its apex]. So we found out all this information and create a program and plug into Maya and then fit it to the blueprints that we got from the architects.
BD: And what about the interior of the building?
SD: It was all based off the actual DXF files and blueprints that the clients provided to a team of architects all over the world. We worked with them in understanding what they were trying to build because obviously were not architects. What was great about this project is that we have a lot of people at Imageworks that come from an architectural background, though they were interested in working on this simply because of Mr. Calatrava and they brought a lot to the table. We dont typically take whats on blueprints and accurately depict them when making movies. We take liberties all the time with what we make -- it doesnt have to be a true representation of the real world. Well, we couldnt do that in this case. And even though this is artistic, the client didnt want us to produce something that wasnt accurate.
BD: What was it like directing Inspire?
SD: All around creatively it was a wonderful experience for me, being able to direct my own vision rather than bringing someone elses vision to the screen. It was very valuable.
BD: What was the collaboration like with the developer and architects?
SD: In terms of the developer, they obviously had certain criteria that we had to adhere to. For example, they chose all of the interior design and gave us what the furniture should be. We worked with Mr. Calatravas architects figuring out all the other aspects of the building like: What does the metal look like? What do the windows look like? Are they tinted? How does something intersect with something else? What are the designs of the landscape? What are the cracks on the ground made of? Is there ceramic tile around the courtyard? There was just a plethora of questions. How it all works and what the ultimate design is going to be...
BD: What 3D assets did they have available to you?
SD: They have a model, but it doesnt exist in a resolution that we could utilize.
BD: And are they able to now utilize the 3D assets that Imageworks has created?
SD: Thats a good question. Im not sure, but I suppose technically its all there if they need it.
BD: What are you proudest of?
SD: Its a work of art that Ive never done in my life, but what Im most happiest about is the fact that people have an emotional connection to it and that visually it captures the inspiration behind Mr. Calatravas vision. This building is not just a physical and financial project; there are also spiritual and environmental aspects involved.
Bill Desowitz is editor of VFXWorld.
Bill Desowitz, former editor of VFXWorld, is currently the Crafts Editor of IndieWire.
