city on fire
Creating a Murder Mystery on a Massive Scale
The fiction series, based on Hallberg’s 2015 novel, focuses on the aftermath of the murder of a New York University student, during the 4th of July celebrations in 2003. Working on Apple TV's "City on Fire" and it's great producers, enabled us to really stretch our creative legs, and we delivered over 300 VFX shots of enormous variety. The project mostly entailed seasonal and environmental changes such as trees, skies, weather, architectural removals post 2003 era, Pyro FX, blood and beauty work, smoke, snow, water, de-aging ,and many types of removals. Let’s not forget flip-phones, TVs, and the early internet!..........THIS PAGE IS UNDER CONSTRUCTION AND WILL BE UPDATED SOON!
Digitally "Greening-Up" an Entire City
As the story is set in hot July, but filmed in early 2022, we needed to undertake the massive task of “Greening Up” New York with countless varieties of photo-realistic CGI trees and other foliage. Large areas of Central Park needed to be "re-leafed" as well as other locations that for actors walked through. The CGI trees needed to be inserted into complicated camera moves, matching wind direction, time of day, street illumination, and close up character interaction. Editorial flashbacks meant seasonal changes were necessary to enhance the feeling of summer and the fall.
Creating Fire that looks Real!
The scend was originally shot without any fire or interactive light. The final burning down of the art studio has a killer throwing flammable digital liquid against a wall of paper, which ignites, engulfing the room in flames. The entire scene used 100 % CGI fire, smoke, heat and the gradual destruction of the building.
It's Lights out in New York resulting in a once in a lifetime view of the Milky Way over the city. We constructed a 12K Milky Way sky plate from NASA photography and added millions of twinkling stars. The original footage was shot day for night, requiring removal of all city lights and shadows before the actors and environments could be relighted using flashlights and candles.
Animation plays a big part in one of character's drug-fueled experience. We needed to convincingly blend live action and the illustrated to help make it feel immersive.
Because 2003 is still a mostly electronic world and not fully digital, we needed to realistically bringing back to life old tech TV's. phones and computers.
