Lead Compositor John Lafauce, Jr. revisits the ardous task of
head replacement and shares his Shake compositing techniques on this unusual
film.
THE STAGE IS SET
After
a family is suddenly murdered while enjoying an intimate dinner in their home,
Master "Betty" Pain and his evil henchmen realize their work is not
yet finished. They approach a crib and
inside it, an infant known only as “The Chosen One”, is cooing innocently. Master Pain approaches the crib and marvels
at his discovery. His smile fades as he
slowly draws a huge knife from the sheath at his side and raises it above the
infant. In a flash, the knife lunges
down only to be abruptly stopped by the infant’s tiny hand. This baby is unusually strong with a firm
grasp on Master Pain’s wrist which cannot break free. Suddenly, little booties appear and in a
blur, Master Pain is kicked numerous times in the face. The infant springs from his crib and
proceeds to wreak martial arts havoc, displaying amazing acrobatics and
fighting prowess. Flipping through the
air, running up walls, rolling on the
floor, could this mere baby be a DNA clone of Van Damme himself, with possibly
the Three Stooges thrown in to give him personality? Master Pain is not deterred by this show and
he proceeds to lash wildly at the infant who deftly and playfully ducks his
every move. Master Pain’s confidence
turns to frustration as a near miss swipe of his sword results in the Chosen One’s
diaper to be cut off and fall to his feet.
In typical baby fashion, a urine spray showers Master Pain and all the
Chosen One can do is giggle. The baby
escapes, Master pain burns down the home and so begins this 80 minute quest by
The Chosen One to avenge the deaths of his family. Welcome to “Kung Pow - Enter the Fist”.
As
you can see from my introduction, this wacky story is a far call from high art
and is especially not your typical effects driven film. But, it is a spoof with many contemporary
references which promises to make you laugh and display a wide range of effects
trickery that is impressive artistically, technically and in its scope.
HUGE AMOUNT OF EFFECTS
"Kung
Pow" is the brain child of Steve Oedekerk, who serves as the writer, director,
producer and star of the film (he plays The Chosen One). The film was released by Twentieth Century
Fox last year and has since garnered shining reviews for its effects,
especially for the computer generated baby fight sequence at the beginning of the
film and the “Matrix”-like Kung Fu showdown Oedekerk has with a CG cow.
Chris
Watts, Visual Effects Supervisor and Betsy Paterson, Digital Effects Supervisor
of Dubbed Films Visual Effects, helmed the bulk of effects work for this film,
which features over 2,000 effects shots.
To their credit, this film was an enormous undertaking and showcases
some fine character animation and CGI compositing, but also a large amount of
“invisible” live action compositing as well.
It is this meticulous work that a talented and tireless artistic team of
compositors, painters and rotoscopers worked for many months to complete. I was a lead compositor on that team and I’d
like to give you a demo on one of these shots.
.
