Interview With Luke Webster on The Nike World Cup Spot Featuring Ada Hegerberg
What was the most exciting part of working on this spot?
Undoubtedly, the most thrilling aspect of leading this project was witnessing the transformation of a simple concept into a grand spectacle. Taking an existing stadium and expanding it to accommodate a vibrant Norwegian crowd, complete with flags and flares,really added to the scale of the spot. The moment we saw the visual elements seamlessly merge with the live-action footage was incredibly satisfying.
What was the biggest challenge for you or your team on this project?
The most significant challenge faced by our CG team in this project was enhancing the quality and realism of our crowd agents, particularly when dealing with a large number of agents in stadium scenarios. Having worked on previous stadium projects, we recognized the need for substantial improvements in the way our crowd agents were portrayed.
One of the main challenges was achieving a level of detailing and authenticity in the representation of individual agents within the crowd, whilst still trying to keep the memory footprint of each agent down. This is a challenge as it compounds with the sheer volume of agents required in a stadium setting, making it difficult to maintain high-quality human-like characteristics for each agent.
What’s the best place to think when you’re struggling with your creative process?
The Shower. We all love a cathartic shower, don’t we..?
Who was your most fun collaborator from another location of The Mill?
Singling any one person out would probably be unfair to the rest of the team. So I’m going to cop out and single out all the leads I worked most closely with in Bangalore; Amit Patil, Setty Ashok Chakravarthy, Biswajit Tarafder, Shravan Srikanth & Vikram Salvi. each brought their unique strengths and expertise to the project, making the collaborative process incredibly smooth and productive, but enjoyable at the same time.
The Shower. We all love a cathartic shower, don’t we..?
Singling any one person out would probably be unfair to the rest of the team. So I’m going to cop out and single out all the leads I worked most closely with in Bangalore; Amit Patil, Setty Ashok Chakravarthy, Biswajit Tarafder, Shravan Srikanth & Vikram Salvi. each brought their unique strengths and expertise to the project, making the collaborative process incredibly smooth and productive, but enjoyable at the same time.
Amit Patil: It's always exciting working with live-action and CGI. It made CGI and live-action making look real and gave a seamless experience to the viewer.
Setty Chakravarty: My most exciting part of the project was allowing my imagination coming to Life and my ideas were transformed to realistic visual elements on screen, after watching my vision on screen it was incredibly fulfilling.
Udaykiran Chowdary: The most exciting part was integrating CG crowd into the scene, whole spot looks stunning after adding the crowd, stadium (in some areas) & some smoke flares from FX.
Amit Patil: The time line that we finished the whole project i would say. we worked 5 weeks from scratch building the CGI stadium and the crowd simulations and worked on 35+ shots.
Setty Chakravarty: My biggest challenge was getting all streamline crowd Scale and Complexity to Realism andrender Memory Management with High render Quality, there were mutiple shots which needed continuity in terms of look and feel. So, this was the most challenging part of this project.
Udaykiran Chowdary: On compositing side, the challenge came in the form of adding cg crowd and getting back the characters from plate adding them on top, we have too many players running in the scene, with roto in place, blending edges and getting the look of the crowd is not that simple.
We have almost 15 shots from comp with each comp artist with 2 to 3 shots working simultaneously, coordinating with them and seeing that each n every shot is balanced with one another so that the continuity is maintained, this takes time and effort.
Amit Patil: For me its always been going to YouTube or mill archives and look at the past work mill has already done.
Setty Chakravarty: When I am struggling for creative work, I often tend to visualize and that worked for me in problem solving.
Udaykiran Chowdary: Whenever we face any roadblocks, the best thing is to spend some time on the shot along with the artist who is working on that, fix the look of the shot, keep on working on it until we get the desired look, there are no short cuts in the process.
Amit Patil: The whole team is fun to work with, If i have to name it then Ben Turner, Luke Webster, Declan Andrews, Ed Shries. Working with this team is always fun!Setty Chakravarty: Working at mill is always fun and cool, I have enjoyed every project, but I remember when I was working with Luke Webster, I do have amazing and fun time and, I would like to add here he was open to sharing ideas tend to make the collaboration process more enjoyable.
Udaykiran Chowdary: It was fun working with 'Ben Gallagher' and 'Ben Turner' from The Mill, London, the collaboration between us went smooth.
Amit Patil: The whole team is fun to work with, If i have to name it then Ben Turner, Luke Webster, Declan Andrews, Ed Shries. Working with this team is always fun!Setty Chakravarty: Earlier I was used to working on most of the maya projects. But this year I got the chance to work on Houdini projects, so I have gained hands on Houdini experience and this also helped me in solving most of the creative challenges that I faced on working projects.
Udaykiran Chowdary: Every year we learn something and gain something, sharpening our VFX skills with every new project we work on, one project will not be like another, must execute and deliver with perfection, finding smart ways or new techniques to tackle the shot is what we learn mainly on every project.