Creating a AAA Game at Warp Speed!

For several key episodesand following Kevin's character arc , we needed to quickly design and develop convincing multiple "AAA" video game titles that mimic the spirit of the biggest games out there such as Fortnite, Call of Duty and GTA. Creative Director Leslie Allen utilized his previous video game design expertise using Epic’s Unreal Engine and Autodesk 3DS Max to create truly unique experiences that would also be script directable and character driven.  The immense game environments rival the real thing and populated with animated characters driven by eyframe and motion capture. Active gameplay elements were coded using Unreal Engine’s Blueprints giving production real contollablity beyond any stock footage or even a real videogame).
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Creating Immersive Screen Content that looks Right!

We utilized our broadcast design experience to give scenes a more cinematic and immersive feel, espically communicating via text messaging. We wanted it to feel integrated, but also timeless and ride the wave of technology changes.. Making TV News look real and Immersive Social Media Posts requires a lot of work as viewers know when it doesn’t look quite right. One of our key strengths is broadcast design so we maintain correct proportions and composites.  We often integrate Social Media in a more fun and immersive way making it more than just a flat screen..

Controlling Climate Continuity

As the show is shot over many months, it's sometimes at the mercy of Chicago's notorious changing weather, which can also become problems for continuity. On multiple occasions we've created convincing scenes full of CG snow, sometimes blizzards, sometimes slushy and ploughed. Alternatively sometimes a bleak day needs to feel alot warmer and "green-ed up" using CG animated foliage the blows in the wind, combined with an additional color passes.

Realistic Firearms and Bloodwork

Because of the realistic feel of The CHi,  when a gun is pulled it has to be impactful and have cosequence.  Having worked on major action-driven shows such as Burn Notice and Shooter, we're able to bring a much higher level of "Gunplay to the scene. Gun's always interactively light up everything around including camera and bloodwork has to feel real, painful and wet.  

Lighting Up!

Because of tight production schedules, we decided to bring in CGI fire, smoke and steam using a combination of Fume FX, 3D tracking and interactive re-lighting. many scenes are just single shots that are over 2 minutes in length which required large amounts of roto-scoping and rebuilding, as actors go back and forth. One scene needed the actor to carrying CG clothing that is set on fire. Many episodes feature characters just "chilling out", which means lots and lots of interactive "dope smoke", We achieved this with a combination of 3D partcle creation and 2D smoke. Sometimes we go large with entire rooms being filled with environmental drifting smoke or even bathroom steam with dripping condensation on mirrors.

Digital Re-Lighting

One storyline needed us to cut the power and turn everything off to achieve a realistic blackout. We started by 3d tracking an aerial shot of the city and progressively taking out each area of the power grid, but keep traffic visible. For street shots, we performed elaborate day for night conversions by dialing down and flattening most of the existing color, tracking and painting out hotspots.. All Vehicle lights were rotoscoped and brightened to pop out, especially emergency vehicles with streets enhanced by adding Interactive re-lighting-candles, flashlights, signage etc.
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Re-Building shots in the Pandemic

Due to Covid guidelinse, production needed to buil;d scenes during season 3, required reconstruction by using a combination of different takes or the insertion of actors from other shots. Complex removal work is also necessary to rebuild the backgrounds before actors can be put back in. Some shots required a rebuilding and re-timing an actors arms to get the shot to feel right. We also handled dozens of large scale crew removal shots from roads, glass and interiors.
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