Marvel Studios has undeniably crafted the biggest and most fleshed-out world in Hollywood historical past with the MCU. With present followers now being handled to upwards of three movies and 4 Disney+ collection a 12 months, it is easy to overlook how this all began with simply six movies releasing in Part 1 from 2008 to 2012. Crafting this world has taken an immense quantity of collaboration between creatives on totally different initiatives with producer and studio president Kevin Feige sitting on the helm of all of it.
After the pandemic prompted manufacturing points and subsequent delays for the post-Endgame world, Part 4 kicked off with a bang with WandaVision in January 2021. The studio went on to revisit many fan-favorite heroes throughout the 12 months together with Black Widow, Loki, and Spider-Man, however moviegoers had been additionally launched to some new pleasant faces like Shang-Chi and the Eternals.
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Coordinating all of the totally different heroes and franchises takes quite a lot of work for the studio; from a timeline, character arc, and visible perspective, every little thing needs to be aligned. Naturally, these situations will limit what different initiatives can do, and it seems these effects were especially prominent for Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.
How Did Eternals Impression Shang-Chi’s Manufacturing?
Throughout a current interview with ScreenRant, Weta Digital VFX supervisor Sean Walker mentioned how different Marvel motion pictures, together with Eternals, restricted Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings‘ VFX.
Walker revealed round “midway by the manufacturing,” Marvel determined “they want all of the weapons to glow,” including additional problems to the VFX course of:
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“Then there was a name made about midway by the manufacturing that they want all of the weapons to glow, that was one other second. So we simply obtained the workforce to work arduous for a few months.”
In line with Walker, whose firm labored closely on Shang-Chi, Marvel’s personal VFX supervisor acquired the suggestion to have the weapons “[glow] with magical vitality” throughout a studio assessment and agreed:
“Yeah, it was a kind of moments the place I believe Marvel’s VFX Supervisor, on their finish, was in a studio assessment, and somebody within the crowd goes, ‘Would not or not it’s cool if all of the weapons glowed with magical vitality going by it?’ And he was, like, ‘Okay, we are able to do this.'”
The VFX supervisor defined they then had “one in all [their] workforce whip up some vitality” designs and animated it to have “literal geometric veins going by all of the weapons, so they’d glow from the within:”
“So we began with a bit of little bit of idea, a movement idea, it is all carried out in 2D, we had one in all our workforce whip up some vitality flowing by it and animated it, so we might get a buy-off on it. We took all her arduous work and added it to our shading approach, so we had literal geometric veins going by all of the weapons, so they’d glow from the within.”
Walker went on to elucidate the problems with “[working] on quite a lot of Marvel motion pictures on the similar time” is making certain the “designs aren’t precisely the identical as another person’s” for different initiatives equivalent to Eternals:
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“So that is the difficult factor about having so many Marvel motion pictures. We had quite a lot of them in-house, so we work on quite a lot of Marvel motion pictures on the similar time, so just about all of us are in fixed contact with each other to verify we’re not stepping on one another’s toes, that the designs aren’t precisely the identical as another person’s. So, we needed to be sure that none of our results seemed something just like the Eternals’ results. So we had free rein, exterior of stepping on another person’s toes.”
The Difficulties of an Ever-Rising MCU
The MCU has expanded significantly through the years to now embrace over 14 franchises and 5 collection, with extra releasing virtually each month. Marvel’s ever-growing world has now dived deep into the supernatural, cosmic, magical, and criminal underworld.
With so many shifting components throughout quite a few franchises, it is crucial that the creatives concerned keep robust consistency and connectivity. Not solely do timelines and continuity should align, however the visuals and their colors have to replicate the similarities or differences in the powers of each hero and villain.
For instance, Harry Kinds’ Starfox in Eternals couldn’t have a portal that looked anything like those in Doctor Strange, or moviegoers could assume the immortal hero was utilizing a Sling Ring just like the Sorcerer.
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Because the universe continues to develop, this downside will solely grow to be extra prevalent as VFX employees now has to check their work to upwards of 30 previous initiatives. Overly comparable designs might closely mislead audiences or justifiably ship theories operating wild, one thing Marvel Studios shall be desirous to keep away from.
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings and Eternals are actually streaming now on Disney+.
