Avatar was in the making for quite some time. James Cameron really waited for the right moment to start working on this movie. James and his production crew had hard times making the Avatar. No wonder for such a huge movie to have so many breakthroughs as the making of Avatar was a true unique process. One company had to work harder then others. Weta Digital which was responsible for most of the visual effects had to really turn itself inside out to adapt for Avatar.

It all started several years ago with Lord of the Rings. When James first saw the movie, he knew it is time to start making the Avatar. All these years Weta had worked hard. Their R&D crew developed technology after technology. After years had passed, this wonderful crew had some unique character animation techniques in their pocket. Another part of R&D was focused on making digital plants and forests become reality.

When Weta Digital finished polishing their skills, it became a reality that Avatar can be made. Movies like Lord of the Rings and King Kong really brought this company on the top of the iceberg of visual effect industry! James Cameron had unique world in his mind. This world was populated with creatures, called Na’vi. They are much taller than human, and had to be done digitally. Once the character Golum was in the past for the Weta, all this experience they had on Lord of the Rings helped James Cameron to bring his characters to life for Avatar. The successful making of avatar was dependant on how well Wete would be able to do those creatures.

To capture actor’s performance Weta had to come up with new ideas. To capture actor’s face performance, a new technology had to be built. The close up video of the actor’s faces had all the data needed for it to become reality. This was achieved through the use of a head rig. Helmet with a small camera was all there was to the rig. It helped to capture every small detail on the actor’s face. Camera was placed on a special rig. It was placed just a few inches from the actor’s face. This gave tracked data for those dots. Weta Digital had a record of each frame of actor’s performance. While chooting the performance, actor’s faces had to be marked with small dots. Those were painted directly on actor’s faces. Then small digital camera was used to capture every inch of movement to gather all the data required to have full picture. Weta developed new 2D tracking and solving software. These small dots on actor’s faces were then used in a special software. The software would drive the facial rig to bring in real performance to the world of computers. The rig on the other hand drove virtual muscles. This technology really helped in the making of Avatar. You may want to check out these two making of’s.

20 minute making of Avatar
Exclusive Making of Avatar from Sequence Magazine
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