Visual Effects

Instinct evolves

Revolutionizing the industry

AT INSTINCT, WE UNDERSTAND THAT SOMETIMES WHAT THE SCRIPT REQUIRES IS JUST NOT POSSIBLE TO ACHIEVE PRACTICALLY WITH A REAL ANIMAL. WE REALIZE COMPUTERS CAN DO SOME THINGS WE CAN’T DO WITH AN ANIMAL. AND THAT’S OK WITH US, OUR PRIMARY GOAL IS ANIMAL SAFETY.

Technology changes

The film industry is always changing and advancing in its ideas and techniques. Last year’s best techniques are frequently different today. Instinct is agile and innovative. Just as other departments have had to change and adapt, instinctually so have we.

CGI (computer generated imagery) is one of the biggest advancements and revolutionary film making techniques to affect the animal industry. Virtually every film involving an animal seen recently has some element of CGI in them.

VFX (visual effects) come in many different elements from green and blue screen shooting, plate shots, locked shots, multi-pass shots and split-screen shots, to the latest in motion capture shooting stages and 3D full body scanning.

Testimonials

Andrew and the Instinct team brought their knowledge and expertise into a very challenging filming environment to deliver one of the most amazing performances for our scene with 2-Toes the wolf. When I needed reference material to help create our CG wolf assets Andrew went above and beyond to help get our team what we needed. It was a great experience working with Instinct.

Rich McBride - Visual Effects Supervisor on The Revenant

The wolves were great to work with. We had a lot of wolf shots this season with some very unique action. I thought we might have to make a CG wolf for some of them. However Andrew was able to get them to do things that we honestly didn’t think would be possible for a real wolf. Thanks to their work we were able to use plates of the real wolves instead of creating them in CG. We were able to get all the elements we needed, including some alternate takes. It was a fantastic experience working with Andrew and his team.

Eric Carney - Additional VFX Supervisor on Game of Thrones Season 6

As a VFX supervisor I can offer a director a better CG animal if I have the proper live elements to work with as reference. Its still a long process but having the pleasure to work with Andrew Simpson and his wolves on Wolf Totem was a great experience. His understanding of what I required along with his ability to train the wolves was very impressive.

Christian Rajaud - Visual Effects Supervisor on Wolf Totem

We find we can work alongside the new technology instead of fighting against it. We are happy to assist with placing marker dots on a dog to capture the motion exactly to create an impossible stunt safely. Consulting with you to help identify and improve your new “computer wolf”, ensuring it moves in a realistic way is a common call for our services these days too.

Other Elements

OUR WOLF PUPPETS HAVE BEEN USED IN VARIOUS PROJECTS TO AVOID RECREATING A WOLF IN CGI FROM SCRATCH. BY FILMING WITH THE PUPPET AND THEN MAKING AN EYE BLINK OR BREATH COME OUT THE MOUTH DURING POST PRODUCTION, THE SCENE BECOMES REAL AND AT A MUCH LESSER COST.

View Our Wolf Puppets

Sometimes a production will already have made the decision to make all the animals in the project using CGI. But sometimes its hard for an actor to ‘act’ to a green ball on a stick, so we often bring a real animal to the film set for actors ‘eye line’ and emotional reference.

Just like the art of filmmaking, Instinct has learned to evolve and change our way of thinking to be able to provide our clients with even more options when they call us.