Bollywood

‘Ramayana’ first promo captivates

Although animation films haven’t really made a mark in India, the fortunes could change for better with UTV, Karan Johar and now Ketan Mehta in the fray. Ketan Mehta, who has worked with some of the biggest names in the business like Aamir Khan and Shah Rukh Khan, is back after a sabbatical. And this time it’s with an animation film called RAMAYANA – THE EPIC, which has been directed by Chetan Desai.

This writer had an exclusive dekko at the first promo of RAMAYANA – THE EPIC and I wish to add that one is mesmerized by the stylized and contemporary manner in which the makers have narrated the story. Slated for release on Dashehra [15th October], the film will be released in six versions simultaneously across India – Hindi, Tamil Telugu, Marathi, Gujarati and Bengali. Hollywood giant Warner Bros. is distributing the film in India.

The first promo will be launched tonite [Thursday] amidst industry bigwigs at an event in Mumbai.

The first promo of ‘Golmaal 3′ is sure to create a dhamaaka

That Rohit Shetty has made some great entertainers in the past, is known to all and sundry. Naturally then, you expect the ultimate in entertainment from his next release GOLMAAL 3, produced by Shree Ashtavinayak Cinevision. The challenge lies in superseding the first two installments of GOLMAAL in terms of content and of course, business.

GOLMAAL 3 carries the burden of humungous expectations and the first promo of the film more than lives up to the hype. Like all Rohit Shetty films, GOLMAAL 3 promises lots of fun, excitement and loads of entertainment. I am sure, the promo will be greeted with ceetees and taalis at plexes and single screens alike. It leaves you asking for more!

This Diwali, GOLMAAL 3 is sure to strike like lightening. It is sure to tickle your funny bone yet again. Oh yes, this time it promises to be bigger and better. This writer had an exclusive dekko at the first promo of GOLMAAL 3. It will officially be launched with DABANGG next Friday [10th September].

Nikhil Advani’s office burgled

While Nikhil Advani is super busy with his Akshay-Anushka starrer Patiala House, the director faced a tragedy when his Bandra office was reportedly burgled on Saturday.

Apparently, the contents that have been stolen consist of a laptop and two cameras worth Rs. 1.12-lakh. A complaint that had been lodged with the Bandra police station points at an 18 year old boy named Abdhullah Shaikh as the main accused.

Nikhil Advani remained unavailable to comment.

How Tata Elxsi’ VCL animated Woodland shoes

Tata Elxsi’s Visual Computing Labs one of India’s leading animation and visual effects studios, has churned out a television commercial for Woodland shoes. The TVC is 3D animated that is 15 seconds long which contains about 7-8 shots. The idea of the commercial is to have a story that communicates about the toughness of the brand. The commercial with a comical twist at the end revolves around a baby elephant playing with a shoe which endures getting trampled on by a herd of elephants.

The team of fifteen managed to pull this off, headed by animation extraordinaire, Suhail Merchant and Shrirang Sathye animation directors of the ad. Bollywood Hungama Gives you a breakdown of the animation production pipeline that the team at VCL used.

The script and screenplay

The ideation of a concept or a story which is recorded on paper is a script. This is by far the most crucial stage in filmmaking, a script or a screenplay can determine a films success or failure. Besides getting a brief from the agency, Suhail and Shrirang have developed the script for this commercial which was approved by the client. “The challenge was to work up a story in that given 15 seconds” says Suhail merchant “the script was a very basic, there is a shoe lying on forest field and these elephants would trample over the shoe. We decided to add a baby elephant, because a child angle always works well.” Shrirang says, “The execution was left to us alone, with the idea of having a story with this we conceived the character of the baby elephant around the shoe.

Modeling and texturing

In simple terms, 3D modeling is the process of forming and shaping the characters or objects. For the modeling process of the ad Shrirang explains “the elephants had to be as realistic as possible so no cartoon characters were designed. Ageing is more visible and prominent on the skin, so the look and feel of old and young elephants are different. We found references of wild elephants of various age groups on the internet which helped us in modeling the characters.” Adds Suhail, “The textures and the colors of the skin play an important part as well.”

Layout and Background

In animation, the stage and composition space where the characters performance takes place is known as the layout or the background of a scene. Shrirang said, “Through our research, elephants wander in dense forest and open fields as well. The opening shot of the commercial has the grassland as the layout where the elephants are walking through.” Suhail points out, that they didn’t want to clutter the framing with too much foliage, which could distract the viewer’s attention. He adds, “We made it sparse with shrubs and some stones so the shoe is clearly established.” Shrirang notes that the real challenge was framing the elephants and the shoe’s together as they were of different shapes and sizes. Regarding the camera composition Suhail said “we kept the camera lenses very wide, so we get a bigger establishing picture, which directly gives the feeling of being in the wild.

Rigging

Rigging in animation terms refers to adding “strings to a puppet” or adding bones to make an object or puppet move, for rigging the elephants Suhail said, “We did a walk cycle of the elephants, then we studied the softness of the pads under the foot, and especially their joints. We did a lot of back and forth research on that.” Shrirang points out “A detailed rig of the foot was required to make the sponginess of the elephant feet look real.”

Animation

This is the process where-in animators bring the digital puppets to life, most of the animation process involved in this ad was executed with help from references, Suhail said “the brief was to make it look real, so there was no character animation involved where we could use our heads to give it some personality. We looked at live action references and made it as real as possible”, adds Shrirang “It’s the bits and pieces of the references, compiled that gave us a clearer picture of the elephants motion.

Aishwarya Rai Bachchan to star in Shyam Benegal’s next

When two titans come together, they’re bound to make news. The latest buzz is that Aishwarya Rai Bachchan has apparently agreed to feature in ace director Shyam Benegal’s next. The film in question will apparently go on floors next year and is touted to be an out-and-out female-oriented subject.

Ash, who has back to back releases this year, has finally decided to do Benegal’s film stating that it is a very special project. In the past, Aishwarya was offered Benegal’s film Chamki Chameli, an adaptation of Georges Bizet’s classic French opera Carmen, but there was no further word on the project

The latest Benegal film apparently, takes Aishwarya into a different time zone; however it is not a period film.

The official announcement of the film is awaited.