Entertainment and technology always go hand in hand. These two are the something that is vastly consumed and easily connected sources in the world. Both are for the advancement of society and make a slight alteration to make it new every time. When you take the example of a movie, the traditional aspect of shooting it in a film reel is already lost. In the last decade, most filmmakers veer towards doing the whole movie digitally opening many new paths the technology can enhance this visual art. Let us see how coding used in movies.
How Is Coding Used In Movies?
The first time a computer program was used to shoot a film was in Star Wars. George Lucas used camera controlling rigs with the support of a system that makes the camera go through a certain path again and again. Humans can never do that so it actually worked. There are many coding used in movies especially in this digital filmmaking era, like the data compression code used in the post-production phase of Avatar.
The VFX industry is one sector that got wide recognition for its work in many films, mostly superhero and sci-fi genre movies. These movies are shot within a small production period and go through long post-production because most of the world-building and effects are added in this period. It can even take as long as a year to complete some movies and most companies face a deadline issues because of the pressure from studios.
Motion Capture
Avatar is a movie that was released in 2009 which broke the reality in most of the sci-fi films made till that time. Sci-fi movies are not real and we know when we watch them. But in the case of Avatar, we know it is completely virtual but we wish it was real. Not many movies can make you feel that. And this film is made with the technology of motion capture.
The acting, voice, body language, facial expression, and all those factors are captured with a Motion Capture camera which is different from a film camera and is shot digitally. They record this information and make models and worlds around it to make it look like a scene. Later, Animators and Compositors work hard on these projects to make every single frame look natural.
Data Compression Coding
The same movie avatar, as I said, is a digitally shot movie, so it will go through a long post-production phase and the rendering of these machines or computers was not as strong as now, remember it was a decade ago. So they reach out to several professionals and experts in the software or programming field to find a way to get everything exported faster from the computer.
Eventually, many software engineers and coding experts created a bunch of codes in a particular programming language that is similar to the system and added to it. These were codes that would every unit of data small in size or compress it to a certain point where you will not lose its quality. This made every system render faster.
The predicted time to get the whole film exported from the computer was more than 16 months or more. And when they used the codes it made the computer easier to render and the film got exported within 9 months.
VFX and 3D
The scope of combining technologically driven objects in a movie is one of the major milestones filmmakers acquired in this era. Acclaimed directors like Steven Spielberg and George Lucas showed a path for more coming-of-age movies with greater scope for visual entertainment and compelling it to create imageries that are out of this world. And to acquire this you need to make your vision digitally practical.
Many companies like ILM (Industrial Light and Magic) and Dreamwork studios made a major impact in the Star Wars franchise and Jurassic park movie. Both got released before the 21st century and still hold up with the VFX and compositing work done compared to movies in 2022.
Simulations in Software
Physics simulations are a feature that simulates particles according to the property or material. In simple words, the tsunami and natural disaster sequences in movies were made by water simulations done in software. It is only seen in the industry in the last decade because it is difficult to make the water look real on computers.
Scanline VFX, a VFX company founded by Stephan Trojansky coded a special software for water simulation and it came out to be the best water simulator and was used in many movies they are the best in the industry right now.
Conclusion
Movies always tend to go to a new higher level to get the attention of the audience and digital filmmaking helps to take it there. As we become more aware of the technology we have at the time, the possibility of experiencing beautiful visuals in a cinema theatre. We came to a level where we can change the coding algorithms used in movies to support the software we are using for VFX and for rendering. This is one such moment in history where anything is advanced and mutually supports both industries.