Space continuum: GVFX transports television viewers to a new phase in Babylon 5's history. (modeling/animation).

Following a three-year hiatus, the mysterious ranger group from the science-fiction television series Babylon 5 returned to active duty last month in a 90-minute television movie, Babylon 5: The Legend of the Rangers, which aired on the Sci Fi Channel.

Written by J. Michael Straczynski, creator of Babylon 5, the movie picks up in the year 2265, approximately three years after the events chronicled in the final episode of the series. While the spin-off contains many familiar names and faces, one leading role--that of visual effects production--has been assigned to a new player, GVFX (Toronto and Vancouver, Canada). GVFX assumed the post from now-defunct Netter Digital, although the studio's former CEO, Douglas Netter, returned in his role as executive producer.

According to Straczynski, the Legend of the Rangers is more action/adventure-oriented than the original drama series. To augment the action, GVFX produced 300 visual effects shots that portray the futuristic universe, including a crystalline city, explosive mines that propel themselves through space, and realistic star fields created by Emmy-nominated compositor Sean Stranks, who used Hubble telescope images as reference for his backgrounds.

According to Mark Savela, visual effects supervisor, the most complicated sequence was of the Liandra starship as it became immersed in the tail of a comet. Artist Kyle Yoneda reviewed NASA photographs of comets for reference, but the images were so small that, for the most part, he had to follow his own creative direction.

Yoneda's goal was to simulate an overall feeling of confusion and uneasiness as the ship enters the comet, by generating an area littered with tiny rocks created with Alias/Wavefront's Maya. Next, he added elements to the comet's tail using Maya's particle system and volume shaders.

Yoneda also incorporated a giant rock that detaches from the main body of the comet and threatens the Liandra as the rock melts and breaks apart. To show the ice chunks melting away, he modified the brush palette in Maya's Paint ...