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New realities: The Matrix Revolutions completes a trilogy of films that introduced a new style of visual effects.(back drop)(Interview)
Q Why did you use an image-based method to create virtual characters in The Matrix films?
A We didn't think it was possible to do a superhuman in any other way, because we wanted the performance you could only truly get with real actors, yet we wanted the impossible feats in a comic book that you cannot do with stunts and rigs.
Q Had you used the idea of sampling reality before The Matrix?
A We began with this idea of a dimensional representation of a space and performances in the 1990s, when people first started connecting spatial analysis and photogrammetry with computer graphics. We used it first in What Dreams May Come, when we scanned the sides of mountains in Glacier National Park and converted the landscape into a world of paint. Because we had to create virtual characters and the spaces where dynamic events take place in the Matrix, the films have provided the perfect canvas for us to push a little bit harder on how to dimensionally acquire spaces and performances.
Q How did this technology progress through the three films?
A In Film One, the concept was that when you are in the Matrix, in the simulated universe, there are no limits, and as you gain control over being in the Matrix, you are able to perceive things. So with the first primitive Bullet Time method, we created imagery that allowed that concept to come through. In Reloaded, with our real-time performance acquisition system, we took a step toward the real-time simulation of virtual humans. Obviously, the scenes in Reloaded aren't the product of AI scenarios running in real time as you interact with them, but the idea of that happening is readable in the content. And in Revolutions, the virtual human project ends with a shot that George Borschukov and Kim Libreri call the super punch. It's the closest, most realistic virtual human face ever rendered, ever seen in a movie or elsewhere. Guaranteed.
Q Where do effects go from here?